How much better is it to get wisdom than gold! And to get understanding rather to be chosen than silver!
Prov 16:16(KJV)

Cutting the cost of building is an approach whereby you significantly reduce the amount required to build your own house. If you can cut the cost, it would give you the opportunity to build the house fast.

My name is Segun Babs, a Property Developer and Consultant in Surulere and Cutting building cost is my job!

Before I tell you how to cut cost, let me quickly tell you what cutting cost is not:

• It is not using bad and inferior building materials
• It is not cutting down the quantity of cement at any stage of the building.
• It is not cutting down the quality of the materials used.
•It is not using unqualified workers
•It is not reducing the strength of the concrete.
These are the reasons many houses in Nigeria are collapsing today.

WHAT CUTTING COST IS:
-It is getting the best at the lowest cost.
-It is getting things done at the right time for best result.
-It is minimizing cost but maximizing result.

HOW TO CUT COST
Building a house involves two major things after the purchase of the land. It involves materials and labour. To minimize cost, you must know how to handle these things effectively. Let us take them one after the other.

1. MATERIALS
* Get involved in the purchase of your materials. Don't just give them money and sit back.

*Get acquainted with all the materials you will need at every stage. An Artisan can cheat you by inflating the price or by quoting more materials than needed or both. Hence, get to know the prices of these things and the numbers needed for the project by asking different people about it or by going to the market yourself. I want to assure you that there's no way they will not cheat you but what you will do is to push it to the bearest minimum.

*Locate the source of supply of all major building materials like cement, block, sand, gravel, laterite and garnite.

* Find out where the cement deposit is in town or order straight from the company. Companies like Dangote permit people to buy straight from their factory. Saving between N150-N200 per bag. That is about N60,000 savings on 300 bags!!!(Cost of transportation excluded)

*Locate the garage of tippers for sand and gravel

* Visit Iron makers yourself for iron rods

*Visit sawmills located in your area yourself after collecting the type of wood you need from the carpenter. Don't get sentimental with workers, you will save lots of money by getting involved in purchase of your materials; never trust anybody too much to commit your scarce resources into their hands.

* Buy in bulk and use that as a tool for bargaining. Sellers reduce their price if they know that you want to buy much.

*Mould Your Block Your Block Yourself, Don't buy!
This will reduce cost and allow you to determine the quality of your blocks. I once bought 500 blocks and lost more than 50 on my way to my site(most of these blocks are ordinary sand with little cement). When I finally decided to mould my thing myself, instead of the usual N90/block, my blocks came out at N47 per block after paying for materials and labour. Saving a whooping 43 naira per block!

*Buy at the right season
The cost of Cement falls a little during the raining season, since construction is always at its lowest in this period. You can cash on that. The cost of timber and wood on the other hand increases because timber merchants find it difficult to bring timber from the forest.

*Trim down quotes
Get a fair knowledge of what you need at every stage from an independent source. Know the number of blocks a bag of cement would mould, the number of tipper of sand that will be needed for the foundation, the number of bags of cement that would be needed to plaster a bungalow. If they realize that you're knowledgeable, they would be careful the way they handle you.

* Save on Site
Instead of renting headspans, shovels, spades, hammers,diggers, etc daily, you can decide to buy. If you calculate the amount spent on renting, it triples the amount needed to buy these implements. You can sell these things after you must have completed your project, give it out or even keep for future use.

* Avoid wastages
Use excavation from foundation, septic tank, soakaway and deep water well for backfilling the foundation to DPC level (Damp proof courts). Instead of buying laterite.

*Repeat usage
Use the wood used for framework to cast concrete. Keep the wood used to cast German floor for the lintels, use all those bamboos used for props for scaffolding instead of buying new ones

* Go far away from your site to check the prices of theese materials. Check the amount it will cost you to the site, also check the markets that are closer to you. Check the prices and transport. See the one that pays you most, go for the cheapest.

* Supervise the usage of your materials yourself.



See You at the Top!

Best Regards,
Segun Babs

Tenk

Imanuelle: Tenk

You're welcome

good job bro. tanx alot. awaiting more info.
precious info like these ought to be on frontpage.

[quote author=kunlesehan]good job bro. tanx alot. awaiting more info.
precious info like these ought to be on frontpage

It's gonna make FP soon. Nice, useful info. Most homeowners are aware of these points. You just dont get the time to be present because other engagements, like work demand your time, or you might be overseas

Good one.

Thanks for the information.

You're welcome