A Team Approach to Minimizing the Owner’s Risk

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The owner contracts with a single entity to perform both design and construction under a single contract. The owner has a single point of contact for the project since the designer and the contractor are allied and work together to serve the owner. The owner gains the benefit of early advice on design, cost, schedule, and constructability during the entire design process. This provides the owner with options for adjusting project costs, scope, and delivery. The accounting system can be an “open book” system for the project or a “closed book” system for the project. The design and construction phases can overlap.

Considerations and Advantages:

  • This system is typically utilized on projects where the design-build team a has extensive experience with the type of facility being built or a particular specialization is required.
  • The owner is required to perform a certain amount of preliminary design and planning prior to engaging a design-build entity.
  • The owner receives early cost estimating input, sometimes as early as conceptual design.
  • The owner can take advantage of special services such as:
    • Feasibility studies
    • Value engineering
    • Life cycle costs
    • Identification of Long Lead items and pre-purchase of the same
  • Significant time can be saved because the construction can begin before the design is complete.
  • Architectural and engineering fees can be reduced by the early involvement of the design-build entity.
  • Construction costs are minimized by incorporating constructability reviews into the process and by the designers incorporating materials, methods, and systems that the construction manager knows are more cost effective.
  • Misunderstanding between the parties is minimized when the owner, designers, and construction manager work together as a team during the planning stages of the project.
  • The owners risk is minimized as the design-build entity team approach tends to focus on problem solving.

To learn more about the Design-Build process, please contact us.