Alex Jackson
With the pandemic, the nature of work changed, perhaps forever. While many of us are just finding our way back to in-person working, others are still working remotely and still others will remains so indefinitely. All of this remote activity has opened up new avenues for business ventures. This is even true with more hands-on businesses like commercial construction. Whether you are hiring out of state, out of the country or are consigned to working from home, it is now easier than ever to employ a construction company remotely. If you are going down this route there are a number of factors to consider.
Hire a Licensed Builder
Research your builder before you engage with a contract. Whether commercial or residential, your project will necessarily be a heavy investment and you will thus want to hire a reputable and experienced team. As with any construction venture, you need to look for a company that is licensed and has been in the construction business for at least ten years. An experienced company will have worked on a variety of projects both commercial and residential as well as smaller and large-scale jobs. Hiring a licensed builder ensures that your prospective builder has passed a laundry list of requirements overseen by a local government agency, including having skilled technicians on staff and a healthy measure of experience in the construction field. What’s more, licensed companies can be forced to compensate you via agencies if something to were go wrong with your project. In short these are builders who have proven themselves and are held to a higher standard than unlicensed builders.
Remote is All About Communication
Plan a communication schedule with your builder. Arrange with your building regular time that you will communicate with one another about project updates. Choose a means of communication that works for both you and your builder, whether this means regular phone calls or video telephony or an online chat service best suits your needs. And, if you can, plan to visit the site on at least a monthly basis. If monthly visits do not work for you, it is good idea to plan to visit the site during a project’s pivotal stages. If you are too remote for site visits, plan to have your builder send you visual updates via your online service of choice. What’s more plan on a file sharing service like Dropbox so that your builder can share any visual assets that you might need to look over.
Nail Down All the Details
When you builder provides you with an estimate, and later a contract, be sure to go over all relevant facets of these documents in detail. Be sure that you understand all the costs, and associated costs as well as the time frame within which the job is expected to be completed. An experienced builder will; be able to provide you with all of these details with a high level of accuracy.
Embarking on any commercial project is financially vigorous and often time sensitive venture. When hiring remotely it’s imperative that you hire the right team for your job. Do your research. Be sure that you have a clear cut plan and means for communication between you and your construction company. Most importantly, however, hiring a licensed, experienced and reputable builder will smooth out any of the wrinkles that might arise when working with a construction company remotely.
Ben’s General Contracting Corporation, commercial and residential contractors, has been servicing greater New York since 1980.
