Enlarge evaporation pond 10,000 cut yds, haul distance 1000 ft., all material to be stockpiled so no finishing of fill. Material will need ripping but contains no rock. Contractor to provide dust control. I cut the fat off my bid and came up with $1.63 per yd which included move in and out and full time water truck. My competition took it for $1.00 so he's going to haul it, ripp it and water it plus transport in and out for a buck. I'll let my equipment sit for that.
Low prices Hi, DPete. I think I would prefer going broke sitting at home too in preference to spending all that loot on fuel, wages, etc., and going broke FAST.
wow that is substantial low balling there, better off sitting in the lazy boy, no need to work so hard for nothing. Paul
Yeah, guys like that are a detrimint to the industry, not too smart either as he left $ 6300 on the table on a small job like that.
but who told you the comptition is doing the job for $1? the owner/manager could be playing games too, just so you'd lower your bid.
I don't know exact details, but what is it, a 2 or 3 day job, a week at most? Maybe it's just a filler job to keep his guys busy for a couple days until the next job is ready. He'll probably stick it to 'em with an extra somehow and come out fine.
4 days with my mob. The guy works for that. He underbid me by $50K on a 26000 yd job this spring for the same company, the job was awarded to me because it involved compacted fill and he has no knowlege of compaction or even a contractor license. He figured $1.00 per yard then I think I had $2.47 plus xtra for finishing roads for compacted fill including prep! The guy is an ag land leveler and runs scraper trains probably pays min. wage
He probably did you a favor. If you cant cover your costs and put $ in the bank, why even bother?
Personally, I think that you are too cheap also.
Land improvement contractor eh? They're all pretty shady There's always some idiot out there that will underbid you just like that. They usually thin themselves out eventually.
Some guys have no clue when it comes to bidding work, somtimes just from lack of experience and others just don't have a clue what it really cost to move dirt. My dad has said for years that bidding an earth moving job is about the toughest thing you can do, as until you actually start moving dirt you have really no clue whats under the ground. I posted somewhere a while back about a road project we bid, and won. Our bid was around $40,000, next closest was $46,000, so we left a bit on the table. The highest bid was $96,000 and the guys reason for it was because of a time table and addding in rock excavation. I've looked over the entire documents and no where was there a deadline and it was discussed that if you could go down to the six foot cut on the hill like the plans called for then good, but if you got into solid rock at 3 feet or 2 or where ever that was all we would remove. Next road we bid on our bid was bout $20,000 and he bid about $10,000 and lost is butt. These drive by knights, and guys who don't know the game might make it for a while but in the long run it will bite them in the rear. Around here it seems like every farmer wants a dozer and soon they want to get into the dirt moving biz. What do you do? Trbo
Low bidder Dpete, Your situation sounds alot like the the business climate in general. In many places there is too many people in business. Many of which have no idea whatsoever what the true cost of doing business is. They ruin the industry for those trying to earn a legitimate income. Most do eventually fall but in my experience there is another right behind. Legdoc
Dirtwork is going at Dirt Cheap Prices Sorry about hearing you losing the job DPete! We're in the replacement parts business, here in Ohio, and I am hearing alot of similar stories. I call on between 20-30 accounts per day and some guys are telling me that sitework is being bid below their costs! This whole subprime loan fiasco has got everything upside down. I don't feel bad for the idiots that signed up on these deals or the investors and loan companies that thought they could make a bundle on the idiots. Our industry is suffering greatly, as a result of this crap! Hillary is in favor of some form governmental intervention with regards to this matter. I say enough is enough, where the taxpayer is sattled with bailing more and more idiots out of trouble.
I agree w/wahts said, wahts the point of putting wear and tear on yoru equiment etc jsut to break even. Why do it jsut to do it. If you cant make an hoanest dollar aint worth doing. What happens if you contract to do it for 1 dollar a yard and price of fuel jumps , etc. , if you dont have a clause in your contracto
Keeping your foot in the door is worth something but I won't go that low. It's a small job not worth worring about however I have completed several good contracts for the same Co. and hate to see a gypo take the easy dirt.
Now that is pure genius! What we need is more intervention in our lives and business from the Fed gov't.! Just look what they have done for Medicare and SS. What we really need is the Fed gov't to take over our healthcare - then going to the doctor will be as pleasurable of an experience as going to the DMV. ointhead :Banghead Sorry for the hijack Dpete - I just couldn't leave that alone. Times like these are normal weeding out periods for people that shouldn't have been in the business to begin with. You can take a job at cost to keep the iron moving, but $1 per yard is ridiculous. I can stay at home and be broke - don't need to work towards it.
Life's a Bitc* - Don't Vote for One! CM1995, I have a jpeg file that shows a new Hillary Bumper Sticker. Couldn't get the size reduced to attach it to the post. Didn't mean to hikack DPete's posting either, just meant to stay "lets not try and right a bad thing-with another bad idea".
We were getting more than a buck a yard 25 years ago! $1.17 on average...
When I came to CA 19 years ago, $1.00 dirt was what the lowball guys moved it for. It was too cheap to make any money then, and wages were 1/2 of what they are now, I was getting bulk fuel for $0.60 per gallon, 37.5 X 35 tires (637 size) were $2,000 ea. My last tank of red dye was $3.14, and last I checked, that 37.5 X 35 was over $8,000, if you could get one, average backorder was 6 months, and don't forget that insurance rates are 4 to 5 times what they were then. For $1.00 a yard, I would rather let my iron grow rust while I loose money on vacation. It sounds like this guy learned to bid based on one of those cute little sales tools the guys selling pull pans use that shows how you can move dirt for a ridiculous low price. Never mind reality, and costs such as insurance You say the guy has no license, and I bet he has no liability insurance, or workers comp for that matter. I wonder if the customer realises the risk they are taking if there is an accident. There are owners who will contract with an unlicensed company, then not pay them. Here in CA, there is legal precedent that if a contractor is not licensed, you do not have to pay them, and if you have paid anything, they will have to give it back. The lowball who gets the job will probably make a mess, then you can come clean it up.
We just bidded a landfill job for $1,000,050. The guy who's doing it bidded 400,000. Even though my company is ten employees big. And we're on SIX jobs. ( alot with ten guys ) Not worth our time.. -Michael-
Speaking of low bids, the Charlotte Airport is something else. The project included 10,000,000 CY of earthwork, miles of storm drain, dozens of box culverts, and tens of thousands of tons of aggregate to truck in. The following bids were submited: E.S. Wagner Co. - $43,000,000 2nd Place - $93,000,000 3rd Place - $143,000,000 The second and third place bids were English Construction and Lane Construction, I can't remember the order of those two companies. E.S. Wagner is using a Holland Loader, 12 Custom 740 45 CY Belly Dumps, and I believe 12 Challengers Pull Pans with various support equipment. What do you guys think of that?
I think Wagner probably left money on the table or knows something the other two bidders weren't privy to.
Your probably right because Wagner never retracted their bid, so they must have had an edge somewhere. I was told that Lane and English determined the soil was too poor and would need to be chemically dried. I also heard Wagner was pushing there Challengers through the cut.
Low Bidder These guys are out of the Toledo Ohio area!! How crazy is that? Move all that iron down to Charlotte and than leave a truckload of cash on the table? This whole subprime lending deal and the general lack of work has caused alot of guys brains to go on vacation!
You are correct, they are from Oregon, Ohio. Now Wagner has an office in Piedmont, South Carolina, which is only 2 hours from Charlotte. E.S. Wagner is a big company, they just moved 5.8 mil. CY on a joint Venture with Beaver Excavating, as well as 1.8 mil. CY on 24 for IDOT. They are currently moving 2.9 mil. CY for 24 throughout Northeast Ohio. I was also told there Holland was in Holiday City, Ohio previous to the airport moving a lot of dirt on a project that was 650 acres, Menards Dist. Center.
Hey Nolan, You're right on the mark. There's alot of these JV's going on between the big guys all across Ohio. Beaver's got a big job up on Route 8 & I-271 and Independence Ex has iron on the job. I heard form a guy close to Beaver that they'll finish the year right around $500 million. Not to bad of a year in a down market huh? Seems as though alot of the smaller contractors are being squeezed out of the picture, especially on State Projects. They keep getting bigger and bigger and most can't post the Bond.
I also read in the Construction Equipment Guide issue that there is lots of work coming up on the military bases in NC Fort Braggs and others listed. They are going to be several million dollars jobs ,so the big companys might be working there way down that direction to get there feet wet on the big contracts out of there state coming up in NC down the road. More work they do the better change of getting more and bigger contract.They will be on the approved bidders list. Also they will have equipment already in the area.Just some more light on the reason why?:usa
Less than a $1 yep and we have guys with tractors and pans in our area moving dirt for 65 cents a yard on 10,000 yd to 30,000 yd jobs. Tell me that makes sense or is cost effective.:Banghead
I would say, Beaver is one hell of a company! If there's a dirt job, and they want it, they'll get it! They did the local reservoir around my area which ended up being close to 600,000 CY. They did Defiances Reservoir for 600,000 CY. They just won the Marysville Reservoir for 1,700,000 CY. I wish I knew what they had going on in other states, especially Pennsylvania and West Virginia with the terrain in those areas. I can about guarentee Beaver will get at least one of the big new reservoirs in Columbus coming up. The first one will bid in January of 2009, totalling out at 8,500,000 CY of earthwork. That will keep Beavers 40 631's, Hitachi EX 1100's, 375's, 773's and D9L Pushcats busy for awhile I'll stop hijacking this thread over Ohio work, equippartsdir look for an e-mail from me shortly.
Jobs going Cheap I'll tell you guys there isn't anything of any substance going on her in NE Ohio. I call on Contractors in the Northeastern Ohio Region and many of them are talking about moving their iron south! Pretty scary!