By the COLLABORATION phase, you will feel comfortable and confident in your selection of Ecofutures as your builder, advocate, and building science expert.
It’s at this point that we ask our clients to enter into a formal agreement for work related to pre-construction design and planning. Below is the typical chronology of events and activities you can expect:
Pre-Construction Services Agreement
The Pre-Construction Services Agreement (PCSA) allows for Ecofutures to allot staff time to begin the detailed work of specifying, designing, and budgeting for your project. We’ll ask for a PSCA commitment fee ranging from $300 – $1,500 depending on the approximate scope.
This is an extremely wise investment as we will work closely with you to realistically match your desired scope with your budget range and come up with costing that is as close as possible to the actual construction costs. We’ll also make recommendations to your architect based on building science principles to maximize the design to create for you the greatest comfort and energy efficiency based on the siting of your home, location of windows, doors, and energy usage. In this way, we become your partner and advocate and are able to tackle potential issues long before breaking ground – when changes really get expensive!
Integrated Design Team
Once the PCSA is mutually agreed upon, our work officially begins. We’ll assign your project manager, which is an Ecofutures employee and will be dedicated to being on the jobsite daily to expertly manage the schedule and budget, order materials, conduct quality assurance of other trades, and lend a hand wherever needed to keep your project moving forward.
We’ll also coordinate a meeting between all streams of expertise – you, your architect, us, and any other specialists we may need – to discuss your project. It’s here that we will discuss ways we can match the scope with your budget that will launch or refine the schematic drawing development process.
Schematic Drawings and Opinion of Probable Construction Costs (OPC)
We work closely with your architect to integrate your desired advanced comfort and energy systems into your schematic drawings and ensure we can build the design within your approximate budget. While the architect is the expert in your aesthetic and functional desires, it’s also important that he or she is experienced in the unique features of a net-zero energy home. If you’ve not yet selected one, we have a handful of architects that we highly recommend and have worked with on numerous projects.
With schematic drawings substantially complete, the OPC is generated. Our OPC’s are known to be a very accurate estimate of actual costs. Read more about our Cost-Plus Contracting model.
Check-In Point
In order to assure that the schematic drawings align your needs with scope and budget, we’ll have a final meeting to confirm these compatibilities. It’s important that the scope and budget align before moving on to the next step in the Collaboration phase. It’s our role as your contractor to ensure that you will not encounter any surprise costs down the road, therefore we’ll work with you and your architect as long as necessary to match your dreams with construction realities.
From here we will generate an “Estimate of Allowances” so you can get started on selecting your finishes (i.e. appliance, fixtures, trim, etc.).
Special-Needs Considerations
We want to help you achieve your visions in ways that are beautiful, functional, and sensitive to your need for healthy indoor air. You may have needs related to chemical sensitivity or allergy, but need some help defining your specific needs as it relates to your remodel or new build. Part of our service is to analyze your health requirements and design a home environment that fits your needs now and in the future. Ecofutures provides excellent design consultation services for special-needs clients such as chemically sensitive and highly-allergenic homeowners.
Interior Design Consulting
It is our mission to make adding green and healthy materials to your project not a frustration or added expense, but rather allow them to enrich your home. We research products from many sources to ensure the ones chosen are cost-competitive and long lasting. From flooring to tile to paint,wall hangings, interior window shades and accessories, we’d like to make sure your home is the most beautiful and healthy it can be.
We are also available to help your interior designer or architect in specifying green and healthy materials fitting to your design aesthetic. For example, the rich, vibrant colors that you see in the design magazines are now available in nontoxic paints – by companies that believe in serving the health of your family and the planet.
