> It is a highly profitable business
It’s not. Margins are thin. Most companies make money though sheer size.
It’s not. Margins are thin. Most companies make money though sheer size.
At the end of the day, what you are building is typically a single individual's most valuable possession, and they have every right to nitpick poor build quality (which is endemic). A couple "bad make-up jobs" can end a contractor entirely, and usually quite suddenly (even in the middle of a project).
In my 20 years working residential, it was extremely rare to find a crew that didn't have a scheduling, drug, and attitude problem. Towards the end of my career ("retired" 2020) I began working primarily on 5000sqft homes thinking that this wealthier clientele might have less difficulties — turns out there's more.
ADVICE: invest in commercial/industrial tradeshops, because residential is "fly by night" in their much shorter existences.
SRC: Retired residential electrician (IBEW-trained).
I guess the only area for potential improvement by a startup is the physical labor, which no one wants to perform. As others mentioned in the comments, there exists stereotype that people in construction are dumb which is linked to the profitability "secret" - finding the cheapest labor. To the point even of importing entire crews from dictatures on another continent.
Otherwise real estate is full of architects, designers, inspectors, controllers, agents, and whatnot. They oftentimes have education and qualifications, access to data not available to you, and a professional network.
I'm stereotyping my own kind, and once thought of myself as "a fairly intelligent person" — but my occupational history would prove otherwise.
I absolutely loved the freedom of running my own shop (typically just myself, one-man one-van) — but after standing up for a few undeserving GC's, one of them sat me down and explained that "he has insurance for a reason, and necessarily must continue using sub-qualified labor to remain competitive [insurance covers his good name, he says]".
And the opportunities for cost-savings have often already been done (simplified design, cookie-cutter, etc).
And every single time the housing market even slows down, tons of builders go bankrupt. Many you've never heard of.