Builders across the country are looking for ways to reduce their direct construction costs by 15%-20%. Have you gone through a complete plan review, stripped options from your base houses, cleaned up your building specifications and are still coming up short in terms of reducing costs? If so, it’s time to look at how you purchase.

What percentage of your cost codes are done with turnkey bids vs unitized pricing? Your best opportunity to cut construction costs is unbundling your turnkey bids. You can easily save 20% on roofing by splitting up your material and labor. That could reduce costs up to $3,000 per house. If you build 200 houses a year, that’s a savings of over a half a million dollars. What about drywall? Not only would you save money by separating out your material and labor, but you could also expand your labor pool. How many drywallers are out there that don’t have the capital to front all of your drywall? They would jump at the opportunity to do your work if you provided the material.