Florida State Certified General contractor since 1980
WELCOME
I want to thank you for visiting my website.
My name is Wes Driggers. I'm a 56 year old Tampa native and have over 35 years of experience in the general contracting industry.
In today's complex world you need much more than just someone to build your building. You need a seasoned individual to be on your side of the table, looking out for your interest that will guide you through the entire process from beginning to end. The relationship between most owners and contractors tends to be adversarial with you on one side of the table and the contractor on the other.
I have developed a construction management system that literally places me on the same side of the table as you and your architect and totally eliminates any such conflicts.
Additionally, The way I've structured my fees will generally result in my fees for overhead and profit being about half what a typical GC would charge you. Depending on the size of your project that can be a huge savings.
Lastly, my CM system is designed to remove the risks that you would face when dealing with most contractors. I've eliminated the fear of any sub or supplier being unpaid or possibly placing a lien on your property. I've eliminated the fear that your contractor could abandon your project or fail to perform as promised.
WHAT YOU'LL SAVE
The savings you'll realize by allowing me to build your project are tremendous. Below are some examples of the savings you can expect.
Here are several hypothetical projects of various sizes to illustrate the cost savings that can be realized with my construction management system. The savings shown do not reflect additional savings realized as a result of my involvement in the pre-construction phases or buy-out.
SAMPLE #1 - SMALL PROJECT (6 MONTHS)
Old Way - With typical GC firm
Estimated direct construction cost - $1,000,000
Contractor's fee for overhead & Profit - $ 100,000 (10%)
Total cost to the owner - $1,100,000
Same project using my CM System
Estimated direct construction cost - $1,000,000
My CM fees - $ 40,000
Total cost to the owner - $1,040,000
You would save $60,000 by using my CM system
SAMPLE #2 - MID-SIZED PROJECT (ONE YEAR)
Old Way - With typical GC firm
Estimated direct construction cost - $6,000,000
Contractor's fee for overhead & Profit - $ 300,000 (5%)
Total cost to the owner - $6,300,000
Same project using my CM System
Estimated direct construction cost - $6,000,000
My CM fees - $ 100,000
Total cost to the owner - $6,100,000
You would save $200,000 by using my CM system
SAMPLE #3 - LARGE PROJECT (2 YEARS)
Old Way - With typical GC firm
Estimated direct construction cost - $20,000,000
Contractor's fee for overhead & Profit - $ 800,000 (4%)
Total cost to the owner - $20,800,000
Same project using my CM System
Estimated direct construction cost - $20,000,000
My CM fees - $ 300,000
Total cost to the owner - $20,300,000
You would save $500,000 by using my CM system
HERE'S WHY IT WORKS
The raw cost of the construction is what it is. On your behalf I will solicit multiple bids from contractors in every category of work involved in your project. This may include such items as site work, concrete work, masonry work, steel, etc., etc. We'll select the lowest, responsible bidders and I'll issue subcontracts or purchase orders to them. That takes care of the actual job costs. Other construction management firms will do the same thing.
But then there is the matter of the CM's overhead & profit or Fee. That's where my firm is so different. My fee is not based on a percentage of costs. I think it makes more sense for the fee to be based on my actual time involved in the project plus a small monthly fee once the permit is acquired.
As you could see from the examples above, my total combined fees are substantially less than most other contractors.
After we meet and discuss your project, I will prepare a preliminary time line for your project as well as what you can expect my fees to be. I even guarantee that my fees will not exceed a certain amount.
Prior to acquiring the permit, I may be providing many pre-construction services. The scope of these services will vary depending on if you already have architectural and engineering plans completed, or how far along you are in the planning phase. I will provide estimates, budgets for you to present to your lender, help you find a lender to fund your project, permitting, etc. All of these services are provided on an hourly bases and invoiced monthly. The time line and fee proposal will show you what each month's fees will likely be.
Once I pull the permit, in addition to my hourly fee for my time involved managing the project, I then charge a monthly fee. The amount of this fee will also be provided in advance along with the hourly rate on the time line. Depending on the size and scope of the project, this fee could be anywhere from $2,000 up to $5,000 with most projects being around $3000 - $4000 per month.
The combination of the hourly fees and the monthly fixed fee will again be substantially less than what other contractors will charge you.
HOW I DO IT
You may be wondering how I can possibly make such an offer. That's a fair question and deserves an answer.
To answer that question I need to paint you a scenario. Let's suppose you were considering hiring some large commercial general contracting firm to build your project. The extra fees you will pay them, as you've seen above, are pretty substantial. So, will you get anything more from them than you will from me? Absolutely not !! In fact, the service you'll get from me will actually be better.
Let's think outside the box for a minute. That large GC firm has an impressive office, office personnel such as estimators, accounting staff, office managers or administrators, project managers, secretary, etc. in addition to the actual licensed contractor, who is typically the owner of the company. The overhead expenses they carry each month is a staggering amount of money. The question you should ask yourself is this...does all of those things (that you would be paying for) actually benefit you?
The answer is...NO !! And here's why.
The license holder of that large firm could get rid of every single employee, his office, equipment, vehicles, and everything else and could manage your project all by himself. He doesn't need any of it to build just one project. All the other expenses are for someone else's benefit other than yours.
There are two reasons they have all that overhead expense ...they have many projects in progress and the license holder could not possible handle them all by himself. Secondly, much of the office personnel is dedicated to seeking out new work and getting new contracts. None of these things benefit you one bit.
But if you hire that firm, you are going to help pay for all of it. That's why they have to charge a high fee. It has nothing to do with your project. You are helping to fund their cost of managing other owner's projects and helping them cover their cost of going after other contracts.
I do not have much overhead at all and never take on more projects than I can manage so I do not have to charge nearly as much as they do.
Another important thing to consider is this...With the large firm you'll likely be assigned a project manager to manage your project. The license holder is generally too busy with the overall management of his company to be very involved in any one project. However, if you hire me to build your project, you'll have the license holder, a seasoned professional with 35 years experience, to manage your project.
But it gets even better
RISK FACTORS
As the owner, when you hire a general contractor to build your project you face some risks. Your lender will also be very concerned about how to eliminate these risks.
There are two main risk factors at work. One has to do with making sure every sub or supplier gets paid and that no liens are placed on your property. The other has to do with making sure your general contractor doesn't desert the project and leave you hanging.
Sometimes lenders may require the GC to provide a Performance and payment bond to cover these risks. However, not only will you have to pay for the bond which will generally add an additional 1% to your project cost, but it is not a fail safe system. One percent may not sound like much but on a 10 million dollar project that would add $100,000 to your cost.
In most GC contracts, the owner, or lender pays the GC once a month and the GC then pays the subs and suppliers what they are due and keeps the difference for himself.
As you can quickly imagine, this system leaves way too much room for problems to arise. The GC may be slow paying subs which could cripple the subs ability to properly perform on your project. Or, if the GC does not pay them then they could file a lien. Lastly, there have been thousands of GC's through the years that have collected money from the owner or lender and then skipped town and abandoning the project without paying anyone. Occasionally you hear about these kinds of stories in the news but it happens a lot more than you may think.
There is a better way...
With my system, I prepare a payment request each month on your behalf. The lender issues payment to you or they may issue a joint check to you and my company. If so, I endorse the check and give it back to you and you deposit the funds in your account.
Then we sit down once a month and after I've reviewed and approved the sub and supplier invoices, you'll write a joint check to the sub and to my company, I endorse the check and hand it to the sub in exchange for lien waivers.
Most GC's won't do this because they want the money to go into their bank account so you will not see how much profit they are making and where they can earn interest on it until it's dispersed to subs.
Since the money does not flow through my firm, you and your lender are assured that every sub and supplier is getting paid and paid quickly.
This also takes away any incentive to abandon the project. 99.9% of project abandonment is because the GC has collected funds on numerous projects, failed to pay subs and suppliers and runs off with the money. That simply would be impossible with my system.
REFERENCES
Below you'll see some letters from professionals that have known me and worked with me on numerous projects for many years.
Click on the thumbnails below to see the full-sized letter:
After reading these letters, please give me a quick call or e-mail and let's talk about your project and schedule a time that we can meet.
It's very important that we get a chance to meet in person so you can get to know me and address any questions or concerns you may have.
