Design-build or design-bid-build: choosing how to buy your project

An owner called us last spring with a finished set of drawings, three bids that did not agree with each other, and a lease date that had already been pushed once. Another owner called with a napkin and a date. Both got a building. The difference between the two conversations is the difference between traditional delivery and design-build, and it is worth understanding before you sign either kind of contract.

Two contracts or one

In the traditional model, called design-bid-build, you hire an architect, the architect finishes the drawings, you send them to several contractors, and you sign a separate construction contract with the one you choose. Two contracts, two parties, and the architect answers to you alone. In design-build, one party holds a single contract for both the drawings and the work, either with in-house design or with an architect under its own agreement. Our design coordination service sits in the middle: we work with your architect from the first sketch, but the design contract stays yours.

What each one does to the number

Traditional delivery gives you a competitive price on a finished design, which is real value when the scope is conventional and well documented. Its weakness is that the price arrives after the design is done. If the bids come in over the budget, the drawings go back for revisions and the calendar pays for it. Design-build prices as the design develops, so the number and the drawings grow together and there is less chance of a surprise at bid time. Its weakness is that you are not comparing several bids on identical documents, so the trust has to come from open-book pricing and from knowing who you are dealing with.

What each one does to the date

Because a single team controls both phases, design-build can start the dirt work and order the long-lead items while the interior drawings are still being finished. For a hotel or a store with a hard opening day, that overlap can be worth months. Traditional delivery generally waits for a complete set before pricing and permitting begin, which is cleaner but longer. On a renovation or a PIP where the property has to reopen rooms on a brand's deadline, we usually recommend the overlapping path, and we say so.

Where the risk sits

With one contract there is one party accountable for the design and the building working together. That is simpler when something goes wrong, and it is also more concentrated. With two contracts, the architect and the contractor can disagree about whose drawing or whose work caused a problem, and you are the one in the middle. Neither structure removes risk. They put it in different places, and the right place depends on how much independent design oversight you want and how much schedule pressure you have.

How we run either one

Whichever contract you choose, the way we work does not change. A principal of the company prices the job, walks the site, and stays on it. Our framing, drywall, millwork, tile, paint and concrete crews do the work under our own supervision. Preconstruction happens either way, because it is the part that decides whether the opening date is real. If you want the competitive bid, send a finished set. If you want the number and the drawings developed together, send whatever you have and we will bring the architect into the room.

Either way, the person who talked you through the choice is the person on the site when the building opens. Send the plans, or the napkin.

Whichever route you choose, insist that the person who put the number together is the person who will run the site. That one condition does more for the opening date than the contract structure ever will.