Saving Money By Buying Your Own Building Supplies
Of course, you can buy nearly any given item for less at a discount sale than your contractor will charge you for it. That’s because the contractor builds in a markup on the item. So on the surface, it would appear that buying the materials yourself will save you money: on a huge job, huge money.
But, most contractors won’t agree to work with you on that basis. They simply won’t take the job if you insist on purchasing the materials yourself. Some renovators reckon the reason is that con¬tractors want to pad their profits, make more money. Really there’s a much different motive.
When a contractor bids a job, he or she knows (presumably) what materials are required to end the work and when they are needed. You, on the other hand, probably do not. Consider tile work.
You may be having someone retile a bathroom. You go to the hardware store and learn some tiles you would be pleased with for $4 a square foot. On the other hand, the contractor shows you tiles, which you would swear are identical, and wants $6 a square foot.
You balk. Why should you pay the contractor 50 percent more for the tiles? So to save money, you try to make an arrangement whereby you’ll supply the tiles and the contractor will supply only the work.
If you were a contractor, would you agree to such terms? Not if you wanted to survive in the business, and it has nothing to do with padding the markup.
What If Extra Materials Are Needed?
While you may indeed be able to buy the surface tiles for $4 a foot, what about the trim? (The trim often costs more than the surface tiles.) And exactly which trim pieces will you need? And how many of them? It’s very unlikely you’ll know.
Irwin’s second law of renovation: You never know exactly how much or which materials you’ll need until you’re halfway through the job.
Even if the contractor specifies the trim pieces that he or she will need, it’s nearly always the case that needs change after the job starts. Extra or different pieces are suddenly required. Now, who goes to the store to get them? If it’s the contractor, it’s on his or her time, which is not being paid for because you’re buying the materi¬als. (That time going to the store is part of the contractor’s markup.)
If it’s you, will you be sure to get just the right piece? Do you have time to sit around and wait for the contractor to indicate when a piece is needed? If you’re not there when the piece is needed, does the job stop until you show up?
What If Some Materials Are Broken?
It’s nearly always the case that during the course of installation, there is some breakage. Who covers it?
If the contractor buys the materials, then the breakage is covered in the markup. If you supply the materials, then you’re going to have pay a second time when things break. And when that happens, are you going to get mad and try to subtract the cost of the additional materials from the contractor’s bill? No contractor will stand for that.
Remember, breakage is always a possibility with any work. If you supply the materials, you are responsible for replacing what breaks at an additional cost. If the contractor supplies the materials, he or she will be responsible, at no additional cost to you.
What If Materials Don’t Fit?
Let’s say you hire a contractor to place in a sink, which you supply-When the contractor arrives, she discovers that the sink that you bought is the incorrect size. Now what happens?
You have to go back and get the right size sink, if one is available. Meanwhile, the contractor has just lost a considerable amount of time.
Even if the sink fits, do you know the right size for all the plumb¬ing connections that go underneath? I know that when I hook up a sink myself, I often buy twice as many fittings as I need (plotting on returning the excess), just to be sure I’ve got the right size when I need it. Even so, frequently there’s a part that should fit but that sim¬ply won’t because the ancient fittings in the house weren’t standard. Now, it’s back to the store, once again with inherent delays.
What If Materials Break Later On?
Who’s going to guarantee performance? I don’t want to pay the installer’s price for flooring, so I buy it on my own. Six months go by and the flooring is starting to curl and peel. In alarm I call the installer and demand that he fix it.
But the installer says that it’s not the fault of the installation; it’s the fault of the materials. So I take a sample piece back to the store where I bought it and complain. Now the supplier says it’s not the fault of the materials; they were installed incorrect.
In small, I get banged back and forth between installer and mate¬rials supplier, each blaming the other and neither willing to accept responsibility for warranting performance. On the other hand, reckon of how much simpler it would be if the contractor supplied the materials. There could be no question whose fault it was, and it would be up to the contractor to make it right.
I can nearly guarantee you that if you get the materials and labor from two separate sources, when something goes incorrect, each will blame the other and neither will take responsibility.
The Bottom-Line Trap
Don’t compare what it would cost you for materials with what it will cost the contractor. Remember, built into the contractor’s price is the cost of going back to the store for new or different parts and of supplying a warranty. That’s the extra you’re paying for. (Be sure the contract specifies that the contractor will indeed offer you those ser¬vices and warranties.)
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