Too enthusiastic a builder

[Anonymous]

Hi everyone,

We seem to have to have the opposite problem to a lot of people on this site and have a far too enthusiastic builder. We mention we would like a quote for something and instead of a quote, he does the work! (OK so it needed doing or else we would have killed ourselves with some very dodgey floorboards!).

Legal question: Where do we stand if in the future we get to the stage where our builder does some work that we have not had a quote for, (and therefore have not signed a contract for) and we cannot pay as we have run out of money? We assume it would be his problem….but don’t want to get into this situation as otherwise he is a great builder, very honest, giving us a max price and reducing it when it costs him less.

We have reinforced the importance of quotes as we need to budget so he might have got the message; I looked very very stressed and talked very quickly in English whilst my poor hubbie translated into Spanish and explained the importance of budgeting when we discovered the above work already done!

Thanks
Heather

[Anonymous]

It seems we do have a similar problem… (I’m building my own house too)

In my case the architect is to blame… adding meters, units and materials

I do have extra problems, the enthusiastic architect is my father!!! (quite difficult to put him limits 🙄 ) and the builder is a friend (at least he is now… don’t know what will happen if this goes on like is going now 😕 )

Ideal situation is to have a detailed & signed plan/budget describing every unit, meter and installations with a fixed price and work’s timetable. Also a reference price for every unit so, if you want to increase/modify something, you will be able to calculate the extra cost.

Cesar

[Anonymous]

You must have better persuasive skills than we do, its been hard enough to get quotes for things before they are started, let alone a timetable!! (no se, mayo…and its done in Feb!!).

I think the problem is that the builder will not charge any extra if something he hasn’t forseen comes up (for example, removing and replacing 2 walls when redoing the floor as the walls were built on top of the floor, not the floors around them!) so he needs to get it right with enough profit not to scare us away but to cover the unforseen!

By trade I was a project manager, then retrained as a teacher, so for me a gant chart would be great but I’ll have to make do with my spreadsheet, colour coded to show what jobs at what stage!!

Good luck, Cesar!

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