Advice about the Construction Contract

Giovanna and I had a Skype call this morning to discuss the construction contract. I had sent her Kevin’s draft and all the relevant materials I had: the floor plan, the site plan, and the budget. In Kevin’s draft, it referred to a Directory of Works, but I wasn’t sure just what that means in Italy, Was there more than what we had received? Whatever the practice is in Italy, I was going to require more details before starting a project that will cost about 500,000€.

Her advice was just what I wanted to hear: we need more detailed specifications before we can sign the contract. So if I needed support for my position, I had it.

She said there are two types of building contracts in use: Chiave in mano, what we would call “turnkey”, or a looser arrangement based on a cost-plus method. We clearly want the first.

Sample computo metrico page
Sample computo metrico page
Click image to enlarge

In this arrangement, we get a detailed budget and a final price for each contractor or supplier, accompanied by a detailed description of the work to be done, called a computo metrico.

We have been working intensively with Kevin over the last two weeks to work out the details of the overall construction, the pool, and the windows. We’re pretty much set on what we’d like to have.

The next step is for Kevin to give us the budget and computo metrico. I’m sure that will lead to some changes, as we work to keep the budget under control.

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