Educate Yourself About Construction Terms Before Negotiating a Project | Oak Hills

Every professional industry possesses what seems like its own language. This is commonly referred to as jargon. For those not familiar with the industry’s jargon, can sound like gibberish. Unethical construction contractors will take advantage of a client’s lack of knowledge and hide behind communications, which is why Murphy Construction seeks to share knowledge with others in order to eliminate misunderstandings.

Murphy Construction treats clients like a trusted partnership sharing the objective of project completion and wants prospective and existing clients to understand the construction language. Clear communication is an excellent tool for satisfying the needs of both parties in contract negotiation and execution. Fortunately for the High Desert area, Victorville and Oak Hills regions of Southern California, Murphy Construction is here to help!

During project execution, clients can ask for documents to be provided prior to close out or final payment in order to protect their interests. This is common to all contractor negotiations, and a legitimate contractor will not hesitate to provide these documents to a client in order to reach payment points. A good contractor will be proactive about asking for these points.

Common Terms in the Construction Contractor Industry

  • Purchase Order – the invoice or bill of laden between the supplier and the contractor. This is useful for confirming the materials agreed upon in the contract match in terms of brand, quality and price.
  • Change Order – a document proposing details to be amended to the existing contract requiring approval and signature from the client and returned to the contractor before deviating from the existing project contract.
  • Milestone – the end of a construction phase of operation. Big projects have many milestones and act as bottlenecks to check and sign off on quality before proceeding to the next phase. Typically, contractors upon conclusion of a milestone with client approval receive a percentage of their payment.
  • Walk Through – an appointment set for the client to travel to the project location in order to examine in progress or finished work while accompanied by the contractor’s project or construction manager to address concerns.
  • Close Out Photos or Package – photos and all documents required by the client to be in order before the contractor closes a project phase to receive payment.
  • Punch List – an itemized list using close out photos to stipulate corrections or deviations that need to be fixed before payment is concluded or progression to the next phase.
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