Dive Brief: A new study has found that slow payments are costing general contractors and subcontractors $64 billion a year. This is a $24 billion increase from the 2018 study from construction finance platform Rabbet, formerly Contract Simply, as the company added general contractors to the respondent mix. Rabbet conducted the study in partnership with Procore Technologies…
Construction Sector overview Trends, developments and prospects What is the general state of the construction sector in your jurisdiction, including current trends, notable recent transactions/developments and future prospects? The United States continues to be one of the largest construction markets worldwide, with $1.23 trillion worth of construction in 2017. As recently as April 2018, construction…
While no one can claim to know exactly where the U.S. economy is headed, there is no shortage of indicators that help provide a reading on the nation’s economic health. These include manufacturing indexes, the stock market, the performance of major corporations, consumer spending and interest rates. In addition to national bellwethers that are common to…
Types of damages The types of additional costs and resulting damages that are experienced by a contractor or owner because of specific events, actions or inactions are likely to vary, but typically include one or more of the following: scope changes, acceleration-related costs, delay-related costs, disruption-related costs and termination-related costs. Rarely will one type of…
Bond buyers worldwide, awash in negative-yielding debt, are crying out for fiscal spending. A seven-minute stretch in the German bund market proves it. On Aug. 8, just before 9 a.m. in New York, Reuters published a headline that blared “Germany mulls fiscal policy U-turn.” According to an anonymous senior government official, Germany was considering abandoning…
Budget structures vary by the type of construction a contractor performs. For example, subcontractors typically have a significant amount of their costs allocated to direct labor and materials while general contractors’ budgets are likely to have more subcontracted work on their books. However, despite the differences in where the budget is weighted, every contractor, no…
Dive Brief: Some subcontractors who performed work at the $2.6 billion Encore Boston Harbor casino and resort in Everett, Massachusetts, claim that general contractor Suffolk Construction is withholding tens of millions of dollars for completed change order work, Casino.org reported. The largest claim is from Coghlin Electrical Contractors, which said that Suffolk owes it $30 million…
U.S. coastal communities provide recreation and a laid-back lifestyle for those lucky enough to be able to live in such close proximity to the water, and the flow of tourists sustains small businesses that set up shop there. But all of this goes away if rising sea levels put these areas under water. And according…
I was holding an annual surety account meeting out on the golf course one day with the agent and the contractor. This contractor works primarily as a subcontractor. He is financially strong and has a great reputation. I jokingly said: “If you are going to work as a subcontractor and insist on maintaining such a…
You may refer to them as Good Guy Letters, Sunshine Letters or just a Contractor Letter of Bondability. These letters have been around a long time, and their popularity has seen an uptick in recent years. What does a letter of bondability do? This letter provides evidence that the contractor has a surety relationship. It might…