The Contractor Bid Audit Challenge, I'll find something wrong with yours in 24 hours

[JS Burnett]

Here's the offer. You've got a contractor bid sitting on your desk. You're not sure if the number is real. Send it to me.I was a GC. I've rehabbed and built thousands of structures across Houston and beyond. I've read contractor bids for residential flips, retail strips, office build-outs, ground-up construction, and everything in between. I've been the guy writing the bids and the guy picking them apart.
Every single bid has something wrong with it. Not because contractors are trying to burn you, most of them aren't. But because bids are built on assumptions, and wherever you left a gap in your scope, they filled it in. Sometimes conservatively. Sometimes not. Sometimes they excluded something critical and buried it in the back page. Sometimes the allowances are made-up numbers standing in for decisions nobody wanted to make yet.
Here's what I'm going to look for when you send yours over. Scope gaps, work that clearly has to happen that nobody priced. Allowances that are placeholders, not real numbers. Exclusions that will come back as change orders once you've already signed. MEP scope that doesn't match your end use. Permit costs missing entirely. Material quantities that are off. Labor assumptions that don't match this market.
If I can't find anything in 24 hours, the review costs you nothing. I've never had to make that call.
This is not a pitch. It's a public challenge. Bring your bid. Let's see what's in it!!