Going to be doing a rather large brand new home CCU. I normally do not undertake this type of work but during these times I will take it. One of my regular customers referred me to it as her son owns his own company and is building the home for himself. He told me he will use my company and the only thing we will need to agree on is the price. I want to take some time to put together a proposal as there were over 1100 french panes on this home. Vynyl frames on the outside and what looked like wood grids on the inside that are caulked and painted. Quite a bit of large tempered panes in the back and some wind rails on the deck. Waiver will be used. I normally charge near a dollar a french pane but know I will need more here.
Take a look at the pics and I welcome advice from those of you that do CCU.
What I do on CCU is, price it out as if this house needing just a normal window cleaning and multiply it by three.
If you haven’t done much CCU here’s why. Anticipate on cleaning each pane 2 or more times to remove silicone, paint, cement, plaster, glue, tape, stickers all that kind of stuff. And I’ll assume you will wipe down the frames too because they will filthy from saw dust. If you’re lucky, the contractor may have brought in a maid service who has cleaned much of that up for you.
Looks a good project to stay busy on for a while
Currently I am that maid service on a large construction clean up, however I do windows too. Everything you said is so right in regards to the huge assorted mess those contractors leave on those windows. You are lucky if it is only on the glass. Often times over spray of paint, etc. is on the frames as well, which is very time consuming during the clean up process. Gotta be very careful not to scratch! Also, it is very important to inspect the glass carefully because often there are existing nicks and scratches either from the contractor installing or from manufacturing, which are hard to spot when the glass is dirty.
Unfortunately it looks like he wants it done asap because he want to try and sell it now. (originally planned on living in it)
Too cold for WFP work initially. We’ll see though…there is still quite a bit of work to be done on the inside. Painters, drywall guys etc.
I know it will take quite awhile and I’m in the $3000 range for doing the work thus far. over 1100 true french panes, 12 large tempered panes and a few third floor level windows.
I’m hoping Seth and his guy will be able to assist.
Careful there Joie, I have a copyright on that.-----------------------J/K
Dwight,
Nice pick-up on this job. I think you’ll do well here. Are you going to be doing any other services than just window cleaning? Otherwise, I agree somewhat with what the others are saying. If you put two or three guys on this, you could knock it out in a day–maybe day and a half. But if you are alone, plan for at least 3 days-----sorry I know you know all this, but I was going somewhere with that thought.
Anyways, regarding the price; Is the home owner doing the General Contracting? If so, he may be hard to deal with on price. Otherwise, it appears that he has done well enough to afford the price that this job should be set at.
Somethings I saw in the pic’s;
ladders will be needed…no WFP here. Nose-to-glass style for CCU is needed
There is a basement access right in front of the windows on the back…you know that is a huge hazard and should be priced accordingly due to the nature of the hazard
Uneven surfaces in the yard…if you do this before final grading it will be rough on ladder placement…as well as they will stir up a lot of dust/dirt when they do the grading. All this gets back on cleaned glass and makes your job nearly worthless.
Lots of frenchies like you mentioned…buh, I hate frenchies on CCU.
If this was my job, my price would be somewhere in the neighborhood of $2200-$2500.
If a builder contracts my services prior to any work which may cause the windows to subsequently become dirty, they must pay me for the follow-up cleaning.
Yes this is why it is important in your scope of work to list how many mobilizations you are bidding. Dont take for granted that this is common sense. It isn’t
Congrats Dwight. It sounds like you’re in the ballpark on price. Since you’re doing it in winter make sure to remember the extra time it takes to do a ladder set. You need to be very careful about what you set the feet on. Also beacause of the cold and being layered up your speed will be impaired.
Oh, and when youget a chance I’d love to know who the temperer is for those windows. Just curious.
Thanks for all the replies guys, I have taken in all of them.
Here was our communication regarding this job:
Me to him:
Hey Xxxxx,
I went by the house yesterday and counted up the windows and looked around the interior. I have a few questions: When were you wanting the work to be done? And are you aware of what fabricating debris is? I require a waiver on all tempered glass that we do CCU on. In the event you have never heard of it, here is a link:
Is there anything pertinent you wanted me to be aware of regarding this job?
I will put together a formal proposal for a price and detail out what is to be expected. There are a few areas that will make the price higher like the large tempered panes in the back being over a stairwell, we do work similar to this all the time but with an increased risk comes an increased price.
I will wait for your response to this e-mail before finishing up my proposal. Thanks for thinking of my company for this job and tell your mother hello.
Regards,
Dwight
Him to me:
All sounds fine. Give me a proposal. I’m thinking work needs to be done mid to late February. My mom told me to tell you hello also.
Seth & I went to the site again and looked things over and I put together a proposal to the customer. Ended up in the $2400-$2700 range depending upon which level of service he chooses. I submitted it yesterday via e-mail so we’ll see.
UPDATE: It’s on the schedule for early March. Seth and his guy will be doing it with us. Also got the large chandelier gig. (sigh) Things have been slow so it is refreshing to be landing some decent work. BTW, my price was very much in the ballpark of what Bert had suggested. Thanks for all the help1
I’m sure you already know this you sound like an experienced wc. Make sure you wet the window before you razor it, and get some magic eraser, it is great for smeared silicon.
Seth & his employee Rudy and myself and my employee Claude banged out the outsides of this large CCU today. All went well considering. There were some hidden scratches that were already there as is normal in CCU’s. There was some small degree of fab debris on the back tempered. Overall the weather was as good as could be expected for early March and we were able to get the outsides done and the screens on before the rains come tonite/tomorrow. It’s inside tomorrow and the challenges of removing substances and stickers. A big thanks to Seth and his guy as they were awesome as usual.
Here’s a few pics of our day! The first is of Seth cleaning the frenchies in the foyer, the second is of my guy Claude cleaning frenchies and the third is of Seth & I water fed poling.
