Industry Standard/Normal practice is that it should be spelled out in the contract whether or not installation is included. Allowances should be for material only and the installation should be included in the base price (unless you later choose something exotic that requires other than typical standard installation.) With the issues you have had every step of the way with this builder it does not surprise me that he is looking for more money now. You have to decide if now is when you want to dig your heels in or not, he is attempting this as he has been able to pull other things on you that you have either given in or settled on and is trying again.....................

Labor is generally only fixed when materials stay the same. When materials change, labor can too. That ''change'' means a model change, a brand change, a size change, or sometimes even a color change, if it results in additional installation effort (black painted doors for example). Change orders can reset the entire materials and labor structure, plus a change order fee for the administrative end of the job. It is all about how your particular contract is written.

Ichabod - Most upgrades was verbal.. In the beginning they would supply an invoice weeks after the verbal agreement and then I would pay.. However in the last few months it has been verbal with no invoice supplied..

I think things are going to take an ugly turn.. I approached the project manager about the driveway installation.. I asked him what material he was using for the curb on both sides of the driveway.. The ENGINEER put it on the site plan as a requirement.. I wanted to find out if they were simply pouring concrete or if there was a way to dress it up with Belgian Blocks.. The builder came back and said that the curb was not in my contract.. I laughed and asked him how he planned to build a house that was AGAINST the engineers plans. He told me that there was no line item for the curb in the contract.. I replied that the entire contract is that the build is in accordance with the supplied plans.. He then said that under the driveway section it only mentions asphalt and there is nothing about a curb.. I told him it was under Curbs and Sidewalks.. He then said that the Curbs and Sidewalks was specifically for the curb line and sidewalks.. I can't see how they are going to proceed as the town has an ordinance that requires the curb on both sides of the driveway.. Needless to say things are getting very tense and I foresee huge problems..

My experience is that it is best to avoid allowances at all costs, they are fraught with problems. In our contract, for the couple of things we didn't spec in advance or list as "owner to provide" the "allowance" covered the cost of the item and there was a separate line for the rough in, if needed, and installation of the item. In almost all of those cases I ended up sourcing the material and the builder either used the existing installation cost or wrote a change order if it was different.

It turned out to be very valuable to spend a _long_ time detailing and then reconciling and triple checking the drawings vs the specifications to ensure that everything was the same in both places. Our architect did the drawings, but I then wrote the detailed specification. Many small errors in both places were caught and eliminated during this process.

njbuilding143,

If your contract spelled out that he must be complied with county/city code to have CO, then he would do it without you saying anything.

MIne was like that

Similar to my experience at the end. You are sick of him, and he is sick of you. And you both just want it to be over.

In my case I was lucky, because the owner of the firm was fundamentally an honest man that wanted a happy customer, and his project manager was, if not 100%, much the same.

I allowed a couple of overages but that was dependent on seeing the invoices.

We had few allowances so that helped. But he did pass on allowance savings as well as billing for oversges. I could write a book, but to be brief, I looked at the project as a whole and didn't make an issue of certain things, while insisting on others...much as it appears you are doing now.

What's in the contract. Stick to it. There is no such thing as a verbal upgrade hehe. You have to write that stuff down.

Hang in. You are close now.