commercial insp cost

Is there a average to start at per sq foot like office starts at 10 cents per sq then add the extras or whse starts at 15 cents plus.

Does any one run into bottom feeders like the $150 home inspectors

Depends Eric…on the Scope of Work, you may run into someone who only wants the roof and air conditioners inspected, their gutting the place, if the roof is good and the A/C’s function they don’t care about anything else.

An instance like this, I wouldn’t use a square foot calculation, I would figure how long its going to take and go from there, you should be making a minimum of $1,000.00 per day regardless of what type of commercial inspection your doing.

There are low-ballers in every trade, forget about them folks, if a buyer wants a good inspection, they’ll pay for it…much different than residential.

I’ve got a 6000 sf commercial Inspection scheduled for tomorrow morning. Easy roof access and the interior is not built out. $1200 for about 2 hours on site and 1 hour for the report.

Just finished up a 5375 SQ/FT retail space with flat roof and mechanicals in the basement. 1,621.50 or .30 a SQ/FT. I have noticed that we get a higher price then most on commercial though. Took me a full day to inspect and write the report. I bill out at 125 per hour and base my inspections on it. If you get a call for a commercial inspection you need to do some homework before giving a price. Ask a ton of questions to see what your client expects out of the inspection. Does he just want a walk through survey or is he looking for tech’s to come in to verify plumbing, heating electrical… If you can visit the building that is even better. If tyou are thourogh before the inspection you will look more professional and likely land the job. JMO.

I always do a drive by before and then quote based on what the client wants inspected and reported.

This is a necessary and recommended, I do the same thing if the building is over 10K+ SF.

Anything less than 10K SF Google Earth gives me enough info to bid the inspection (most of the time)…unless its some type of specialty occupancy, other than retail or office space.

If I can’t get to the property(out of town) I will check MLS, google maps and earth, talk to the seller or whatever. Going in blind (which I have done) will burn you every time. My second commercial job when I started was a 6,000 SQ/FT warehouse/ office combo. The buyer only wanted a walk trough and report. No mechanicals as he had his own guy for that. I priced it at .15 a SQ/FT but didn’t look at it first. I arrived to find a three story office building (6,000) and a 10,000 ware house behind. So it should have been priced at 28,000 SQ/FT instead. Thank god the investor was there and I was able to talk him into another 500.00 or would have lost my shirt.