How a pricing model saves a turn contract on a 312 unit interior renovation
Take a six person renovation crew whose biggest prior job was an 18 unit building done over eight months. Scaling from that baseline to a 312 unit contract is a case worth studying, because the first bid on a job like this is almost always underpriced. 312 units, 1990s vintage, sponsor bought at around 109k a unit with a plan for 140 interiors in 18 months. Scope per unit: cabinets refaced, quartz tops, LVP throughout, lighting, plumbing fixtures, paint, appliance swap. A first pass priced off the small job baseline lands around 5,900 a unit all in. What is wrong with that number. On the small job there is one building, one dumpster, materials in a garage. On 312 units there are five buildings spread over 14 acres, no staging space until a down unit is negotiated, occupied neighbors on both sides of every open unit, and a leasing office that needs 48 hours notice before any noise. Real per-unit labor hours typically come in around 30 percent over the small-job baseline, almost all of it walking, staging, and waiting. What a stronger bid looks like: price at 6,400 a unit with a separate mobilization line, one permanent down unit for staging written into the contract at no rent, and a variation clause that converts a unit to time and materials if a wall opens onto galvanized supply. A clause like that can trigger on roughly one in ten units and would eat the margin on every one of them if it were not priced separately. The part that nearly breaks a crew financially is pay timing, not price. A sponsor's draw coming from the lender monthly with a 15 day lag, on top of net 45 AP terms, means 60 days from finishing a unit to money. At 11 units a month around 6,400 each, that is roughly 140k of cash standing out at any time against a much smaller cash cushion. The fix is draws negotiated twice monthly on completed units with a third party inspection sign-off, plus a line of credit as backup. The lesson worth keeping: build in the down unit and the galvanized clause every time. The lesson worth heeding: promise a delivery rate that matches what mobilization and staging actually allow, not what sounds good in the first conversation.
