The Issues of Business

By Dustin

One of the issues that owners of a construction business (actually, any business) faces is summed up in the question, “Why would someone hire me to build their home?”, (Or “Why would someone buy one of my homes?”, if you build spec homes like we do here.)

“Why would someone hire me to build their home?”

Our hardest customer to acquire is the uneducated customer. In Missouri, home builders aren’t licensed, and most towns who do license builders require nothing but payment of a fee. No guarantees of knowledge, workmanship, or honesty come with the license. This means that any Joe Blow who has watched a few episodes of This Old House can become a “builder”. The problem with this two-fold.

1. These guys can produce poor quality work, further harming the reputation of contractor’s in general.
2. Customers who shop on price alone are often fooled by these builders. The burden of education is placed on those of us who take pride in our trade.

There is a lot involved with building a house properly. This extra work means extra cost. Now, don’t get me wrong, in many cases, the efficiency that we can bring to the table more than offsets these costs but they’re still costs to consider.