Say What?

Nothing new here, I deal with that every single damned day mostly (but not exclusively) from the elder statesmen of our profession.?ÿ

By and large surveyors are some of the most piss poor businessmen to ever walk the earth. They will spend $20 to make $10.

I just had a similar one. I priced a very complex 56 acre survey amd split with 16,000 feet of boundary line and a gazillion adjoiners at $17000 -$19000.

I lost it to someone who price it at 7k. I have no reason to doubt the almost client and I have advised him to be sure and get it in writing.

I have seen the enemy and he is us.

And these aren't surveyors bidding, an engineering company, probably charging $200 an hour for a desk jockey. Gives them 30 hours.?ÿ

Had a similar experience recently, I quoted a job and it was going to be $3850 for me to do the survey and record a plat. The client told me she had someone who was going to do the job for $1800. I quoted the job at ~$1.10 a foot plus my recording fee. The other guy was going to do the job for $.50 a foot with recording included. The irony is the other surveyor is the one who taught the business class when I was in school.

They want the design work more than the survey work. But the design will be bid out also, they may be turning over their site plan to a different company. I guess it's worth the risk for them, my buy the job price was 15.5k.

That's what I'd be thinking the thinking is, "foot in the door", "client unconsciously happy to pay for 'extras' up the value of the next lowest bid"

I get a lot of calls for folks wanting to put up a fence and they typically don't want or cannot afford the price for a new plat. At any rate I generally price these for field work only to come in find the corners and check that there are no encroachments and do the bare essentials to ensure there are no problems and put them some stakes online for a fence. If there are missing corners or other problems the price goes way up. But assuming it is problem free I do those for 12 acre or less platted subdivision lots for $550. Metes and bounds lots are a different animal.

Anyway a typical event happened yesterday.

I got a call from someone and after I check the records I told him the price of $550 and of course he said "I will call you back".

He got a company 2 hours away to do it for $350. 2 hours and a couple of counties away.....92 miles for a $350 job.

I am of the opinion that even my $550 price may have been a bit low for that particular subdivision since it is very old but at least I was only 20 miles away.

I certainly won't loose any sleep on this but I mention it as this is a typical example of the incredible stupidity here. What idiot would travel 92 miles from way southwest of Atlanta to go to Acworth for a $350 job?

Just out of curiosity, those of you that are around $1 a foot, does that include marking the property lines?

Posted by: Tommy Young

Just out of curiosity, those of you that are around $1 a foot, does that include marking the property lines?

There are only a few of us at $1 foot and I am one of them. And it does not include staking the lines. It may depending upon the property include hanging some flagging but definitely not staking. And the flagging is specifically described as to its positional accuracy and not to be used for construction of anything. It is good enough to know generally where the line is but not specific enough to build anything. That is all some folks want but I do get them to sign an acknowledgement.

And as a point of discussion I do not actually price by the foot. But I use $1 a foot as my Do Not Go Below price. There some properties here that are nasty swampy privet invested jungle and $2 a foot would not be enough. So yeah.....I sorta use $1 foot but only to make sure I am pricing it high enough but I do not use it as a ceiling but rather a floor. I actually despise pricing by the foot and feel like that is the most moronic way of pricing ever created.

Capisce!

I am surrounded by a number of old timer surveyors who refuse to raise their prices because that is how they have operated for many years. Everybody below retirement age is just screaming for these guys to raise their fees to no avail and it is going to be a helluva shock for folks when these guys pass and we can go up. And believe me they will go up over night as there is so much pent up frustrations over this.

Many of those who are frustrated monitor this board so they know of who I speak.

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Posted by: Just A. Surveyor

. I actually despise pricing by the foot and feel like that is the most moronic way of pricing ever created.

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Yes, using it as floor like you do sounds reasonable, but I cant understand charging by the foot (or by the acre). Do the people who do this just figure out an average and loose money on some jobs and rake it on others? If the client wants lines marked, then the cost for that is related to the length, but otherwise the length of the boundary is usually only very marginally correlated with the time to complete a job. I suppose if every other thing about the parcel was equal, then there would be a good correlation, but if that was the case, there wouldn't be much of argument for us to be classified as professionals, and the job would be smash my head against the wall boring.?ÿ?ÿ

When I was evaluating proposals a low ball one like that would be automatically disqualified, unless they had a good reason for it.?ÿ

That sir is the rub....the incredibly stupid per foot pricing doesn't mean a damned thing to the cost to do the job. Per foot pricing pisses me off.

And it is actually in serious conflict with the hourly crew rate that these morons claim to use.?ÿ

Posted by: Just A. Surveyor

Do the people who do this just figure out an average and loose money on some jobs and rake it on others??ÿNo, they generally lose money on everything. They are really only working for wages.

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If the client wants lines marked, then the cost for that is related to the length, but otherwise the length of the boundary is usually only very marginally correlated with the time to complete a job.

That sir is the rub....the incredibly stupid per foot pricing doesn't mean a damned thing to the cost to do the job. Per foot pricing pisses me off.

And it is actually in serious conflict with the hourly crew rate that these morons claim to use.?ÿ

Well since I am one of those morons that does price by the foot on jobs over an acre, how do you propose I price my jobs? Oh, and I certainly don't lose money doing jobs this way.?ÿ

This is so easy a cave man can do it.

Time to do the field work X?ÿcrew rate

Time to draft it X your drafting rate

Time for research and review X your billing rate

?ÿIf you are going to have field crew rates and drafting rates then dammit you have to use those rates and you have to be true to the cost of doing the job & $0.40 a foot doesn't cut it and neither does $1.00 a foot.

And don't forget travel costs. The job begins and ends at your door.

I only give a price for small acerage buyer, seller, refinance, reverse mortgage, etc.

All other surveys of farms, ranches, estates and any large or sizeable boundary survey will get a number they should budget for the work.

I do no actual work until I have received some formal authorization to proceed with the work and approval to pay for the survey fee when finished.

My fees are based upon dozens of factors that only apply to each certain property being ask of.

I love surveying with a passion and I only perform surveys to make money.

I will enjoy every minute of every day out there no matter the circumstances.

When there is no profit to be made, I do not take the job.

I will do the next project on the list that I am going to make money.

0.02

Area and length of lines are not used as a basis of expected cost to provide the service.....by us. ?ÿIn some cases we can do 640 acres much easier than some weird 7.23 acre gerrymander-shaped tract. ?ÿIn fact, many times we solve the 640-acre question to discover one or two sides of the 7.23-acre goal.

Posted by: Just A. Surveyor

This is so easy a cave man can do it.

Time to do the field work X?ÿcrew rate

Time to draft it X your drafting rate

Time for research and review X your billing rate

?ÿIf you are going to have field crew rates and drafting rates then dammit you have to use those rates and you have to be true to the cost of doing the job & $0.40 a foot doesn't cut it and neither does $1.00 a foot.

And don't forget travel costs. The job begins and ends at your door.

Ok I will give an example of how surveying by the linear foot works out.

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I did a 17 acre job earlier this year. This was on steep nasty terrain with ~500 foot of elevation difference from top to bottom.

With an hourly rate of $130 an hour for field crew (which is just me) for 20 hours of field work we are at $2600

Four hours drafting at $75 an hour for $300

Two hours research and review at $50 an hour we are at $100

This comes out to $3000 tack on my $400 per lot subdivision fee we are at $3400

I billed out $4300 on this job.?ÿ

Mind you the rates I am using are competitive in the local market and I am not doing work cheap, are their other surveyors more expensive than me? Of course but most are cheaper. Now I will say this I do not bill for mileage, I do however write it off per the advise of my accountant. Also the further a job is away the more I add into the cost.

You gave me squat. Apparently you are the one who does not understand lineal foot pricing.?ÿ

You showed an hourly billing rate X the time it took to do the job which is what I am advocating. Plus $900 for profit, good for you.

You da man!

I do not agree with your accountant about not charging for travel time. You write off fuel expenses, but not travel time.

And yes I am uncompromising on this because I have seen so many surveyors who do not charge for items that they should and I have seen so many surveyors use all kinds of crazy excuses to justify their low prices. I have even had surveyors justify prices of less than half market rate as "because that is all they were willing to pay". Etc etc etc.

Once again you showed me an hourly billing rate NOT a lineal foot basis for prices. I am fine with hourly billing rates so long as you're true to them. However, a surveyor cannot use hourly billing rates and per foot pricing interchangeably without lying.

You use one or the other but not both.

Serious question: Do you know what lineal foot pricing is?

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"By and large surveyors are some of the most piss poor businessmen to ever walk the earth."

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Truer words have never been said!!

I think what Hollandbriscoe was showing in his math is that using his hourly rates and time estimates to complete the job would have yielded at fee of $3,400 for the job.?ÿ Alternatively using his per foot pricing he actually charged the Client $4,300, $900 more than he would have using the hourly model.

I've never used a lineal foot method of pricing and until this discussion I honestly never knew it was a thing.?ÿ Marking and cutting line isn't a typical thing I'm asked to do though so I'm guessing that's why that pricing model isn't very prevalent here.?ÿ I typically look a potential job from a 30,000 foot level and decide what I think it's worth.?ÿ Things like project deadline, property value, boundary complexity, location, ect. all play into this worth.?ÿ Then I gut check that number against a rough per/acre unit cost analysis and an hourly rate analysis.?ÿ For me, my original "worth" number needs to be equal to or greater than either gut checks.?ÿ

I've always worked in multi-discipline firms like I think Moe's low ball competitor is.?ÿ At my last job with a rather large multi-state firm I was routinely asked to be the low cost leader on large scale design projects.?ÿ We were 95% private sector so it usually worked although it was always interesting at the quarterly P&L review meetings...the people on the top floor always seemed to forget the fee cuts on the Survey phase of the contract when it came time to review department profitability.?ÿ

I've not adopted that business model now at my own gig even though it is again a multi-discipline shop.?ÿ Interestingly of the 3 services we offer Survey generates ~65% of the overall firm top line sales.?ÿ I?ÿwon't speculate as to which philosophy is better but I do know that consistently being asked?ÿto undervalue your specific service to help advance or promote another service can suck the soul right out of you.?ÿ

I stake line, but I don't charge a per foot price. I have sat down and figured out that it was close to $1 per foot twenty years ago. Today I would expect it would be about the same. I can just do more of it as a one man crew.

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