General contractors are faced with a continually fluctuating market which makes it frustrating to maintain reliable and consistent workloads throughout the year. In today’s environment of economic pullback, the construction trades are seeing major cuts and contractors must do more with less. The contracting industry as whole has always been subject to the whims of commodity cost changes, local market conditions, and the never-ending cycle of subcontractors; but with the current resources, lack of training, and dwindling labor pool, recovery in the construction sector may take years. Even so, most general contractors expect to have quality performance, accurate costing, and available subcontractors at point. They, and their subcontractors, are finding themselves looking to outsource costing and estimating in order to streamline and maximize their project pipeline. An outsourced estimating company can provide crucial relief to the organization by providing take-offs, material counts, and detailed costing in a time effective and accurate format. This can be invaluable not only for evaluating sub bids, but even bidding work where subcontractors are not responding. The general contractor may want to help their available subcontractors to provide bids by suggesting or recommending an outsourced estimating service, effectively building a relationship between the general contractors, subcontractor, and estimating service. A strong team of this nature can deliver accurate bids and reduce the feast-famine effect that results from not keeping a pulse on the sales pipeline. Accurate, timely costing that is right the first time is everyone’s goal in construction. The estimating company is an invaluable time saving service that can be utilized to evaluate a job to be profitable for all parties involved from the very start.
