Our Process

Give Us a Call

During our initial phone call, we will discuss:

• The nature of your project
• The way you intend to use your space
• Your aesthetic
• Your timeline
• Your budget
• Any questions you may have about our firm and our process

If it sounds like we might be a good fit for your project, we will set up a meeting to come to visit your home or property.

First Meeting

One of our experienced project managers will visit your home to follow up on the details from the initial call, take measurements, and talk to you more about any design or structural considerations.

The best way to prepare for this meeting is to create an idea book on Houzz or a board on Pinterest so we have an idea of your aesthetic, the features you wish to incorporate, and your expectations for the quality of finishes.

It is also good to have a frank conversation with your family about your budget.

Preliminary Scope + Budget

After our initial meeting, we will use our estimating software and decades of experience in construction, to come up with a budget range based on our discussions and your expectations.

This is our best educated guess, subject to seeing a completed design and the specifications for the materials you would like to use.

We will do our best to return this document to you within 7 business days of our first meeting. We will follow up with a phone call and an email to discuss the budget and the plan forward.

To prepare for this call, we recommend you have a list of your questions handy so we can address them to your satisfaction.

Design

We are not a design-build firm. Through our years in business, we have found that design-build does not attract the best architects and interior designers, which creates a subpar finished project.

In addition to oftentimes subpar work, the overhead of offering this service inevitably gets passed onto the customer, creating an unnecessarily expensive project.

We do have the capability to do CAD drafting for smaller projects if a client knows exactly what they want, or for someone who elects to do their own design.

For most clients, we can provide a list of architects and interior designers whom we have worked with in the past and whom we know would be a good match for your project.

There are no markups or kickbacks from these suggestions. You pay these individuals or companies outside of any agreement you have with our firm.

Once you have come up with a design, we will review the plans with you to make any changes necessary to make the project buildable and to help you come in on budget.

Proposal

Based on the plans, most projects take between a week to a month to come up with a very detailed budget and scope that is included in our proposal. We provide our customers with firm, transparent quotes rather than vague estimates. When you work with us, you’ll get a straightforward pricing model with no hidden fees or contingencies.

We will set up a meeting in your home, at our offices on the East Side of Milwaukee, or at the office of the architect, to make sure we have included everything and to go over the final numbers and a timeline for completion of your project.

Project Management

Once you have signed off on your proposal, you are assigned a project manager who specializes in your type of project. All of our project managers have decades of experience and have been carpenters or engineers at one point in their career.

We will work with the municipality to pull a permit and begin the project. Our state-of-the-art project management software allows you to:

• Communicate with our staff in real time.
• Send pictures.
• Ask questions.
• Make selections.
• Request changes to the project scope.

In addition to the ease of use of our software interface, our clients often comment on the cleanliness of our jobs, the professionalism of our staff and subcontractors, and the quality of our craftsmen.

Substantial Completion

As we near the end of your project, your project manager will work with you to create a “punch list” of any items that are outstanding or that do not make the grade.

We will create a plan to correct any inadequacies to your satisfaction and to our high standards. We pride ourselves on our internal systems that make most client punch lists very short.

Warranty

While rare, based on the volume and scale of the projects we do, there will inevitably be a few problems that pop up on some jobs after we have left. Most of these are minor.

Our warranty is ironclad, and we will work promptly to resolve any issues that arise after your project’s completion to make sure you are 100% satisfied.