Who Underbid Me? .... and by How Much? .... Do I have the Job?

  • Thread starter Thread starter rfwoody
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Everything is pretty straight forward. Just have to make sure where water/gas lines and septic are. 4-5 can be felled. The remainder I plan on getting limbed and topped out and seeing where I'm at on time. Then felling the spars, setting pull lines if needed. Have a guy interested in what logs I can salvage. Have our small excavator with a grapple I plan to use for loading the logs. Sean you pretty much read my mind!

Hopefully the man will go for my plan.
 
I must not be seeing things as they really are. I can't figure why most if not all of those couldn't be felled.

Pictures never tell the whole story.
 
The trees to the left on the first and last pics I believe are the neighbors. The way I understood they were going to let him cut just enough of them for his new building he is wanting to put right on the line 4-5 but do not want any limbs etc messed up on the remainder of the trees left. Won't know for sure or finalize a plan until I meet them in person and talk to both. It would be nice to just drop them all !
 
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  • #56
Mick! said:
Let's be honest Woody, you are going to be the cheapest, because you will have to be to get the job.

You're not going to blow them away with your equipment/knowledge/expertise.

Don't worry about it there's room for everyone.
Click to expand...

Mick, thanks for your frank wit and honesty.

I just told my friend I would remove the still living tree (Silver Maple?) in the small front yard... I came down from my original bid by half.
When he told me what the his other 2 bids were, I matched the lowest so I could get the job.
(he is going to give the 2 dead rotten trees to the another guy).

So I reduced my original bid by 1/2 in order to get the job.
 
Will do. Sorry for the derail but looked like the best place since everyone is talking about bidding , getting , not getting jobs.
 
Since everyone is on the subject, and I know it's been brought up more than enough. What's a ballpark number to go by when figuring up a quote. I've done my best to figure around 50hr, then add on my helps hourly rate if I have any. Then rental equipment etc etc on top of that. Anybody else have some input. Bidding has hands down been the hardest part in all this fun!
 
He pics I posted of the pine trees. My ballpark figure is 2500-3000 depending on several circumstances.
I figured on 36hrs of work (worst case scenario) hopefully. Rental lift and help for the job figured in. No stump grinding ( don't even know where to start on that) .
I should clear around 12-1400 minimum.

I guess I'm going about it like my mechanic days. Labor rate starts low and hours high. When experience gets up there my hourly rate will increase and the amount of time it will take will decrease.
Right now I'm just happy to get jobs on the side when I can as long as I don't lose a crap load of money.
I did lose a little on the honey locust job I did. Only one I've lost on so far. But wasn't enough to cry over.
For the time being I'm just looking for experience and add to the gear collection.
If I start to divide up my time between the mill and tree work I'll have to really get my crap in order on bidding jobs.

But for now I don't mind being the half price harry if I do screw up a quote that bad 😉
 
Yea Sean I do my best to keep track of every penny. I have my notebooks and spreadsheets on me all the time. I'm constantly crunching numbers. From a business standpoint I will undoubtedly lose money this year and probably next as well. Until I make the money back for gear I've bought and plan on getting anyway. I'll get the hang of it eventually.

Squish 👍
 
I missed it, did you get the job after reducing price by half?

Keep track of every minute you spend on that job. Then after subtracting all your costs you can divide it by the hours you spent and be sure you made far less than that after uncle sam and wear and tear etc.

That is one of the quickest paths to increasing you bids. :)
 
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  • #67
dstimber said:
He pics I posted of the pine trees. My ballpark figure is 2500-3000 depending on several circumstances.
I figured on 36hrs of work (worst case scenario) hopefully. Rental lift and help for the job figured in. No stump grinding ( don't even know where to start on that) .
I should clear around 12-1400 minimum.

I guess I'm going about it like my mechanic days. Labor rate starts low and hours high. When experience gets up there my hourly rate will increase and the amount of time it will take will decrease.
Right now I'm just happy to get jobs on the side when I can as long as I don't lose a crap load of money.
I did lose a little on the honey locust job I did. Only one I've lost on so far. But wasn't enough to cry over.
For the time being I'm just looking for experience and add to the gear collection.
If I start to divide up my time between the mill and tree work I'll have to really get my crap in order on bidding jobs.

But for now I don't mind being the half price harry if I do screw up a quote that bad ��
Click to expand...

dstimber, what you say resonates a lot with me!... only maybe a smaller and slower scale :)
 
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  • #68
Merle Nelson said:
I missed it, did you get the job after reducing price by half?

Keep track of every minute you spend on that job. Then after subtracting all your costs you can divide it by the hours you spent and be sure you made far less than that after uncle sam and wear and tear etc.

That is one of the quickest paths to increasing you bids. :)
Click to expand...

Yes sir.... Basically he told me what the lowest bid was and I said I would do it for that.
(I got one tree at one house... he gave the other trees at the other house to another guy... which was a whole lot lower than I had bid them for).

Will do. Thanks for the good advice!
 
I just did a small job, climb a eucalypt, cut out some dying branches and old stubs, chip the debris, little pile of firewood...2.5 - 3 hrs. $300 (me plus hubby, chipper for like half an hr) just around the corner from our house, people I know. Got a $50 tip on top.
Verbal bid....but this time I didn't give it to them on the spot, went home, called back the next day, gave bid and when I could do it. Works much better.
I will never (well, never say never) give a verbal on the spot to a new client again. They have to realize you need some time to do your figurations...
 
The worst is when you give them a price on the spot and they say something like, "WOW!!! I thought it was going to be a LOT more than that. You've got the job, my friend."
 
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