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October 5 Fine Home Builders

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Jim Brophy

Architectural & Design Team Management

Customer Introduction:

October 5 Fine Home Builders is a design-build firm that aims to build perfect homes. Having nearly 40 years of experience under his belt, founder Jim Brophy continues to empower his clients to feel in control of the design of their home. “I firmly believe that everybody has a certain style or taste. They know where they want to go with it, they just may need some shepherding along the way.”

By keeping their clients directly involved in the design stage of the project, the finished product comes with an added sense of pride. The client knows that they chose the materials and design, and they had the tools to bring the vision for their home to life.

Location Website Industry
Long Beach, CA october5.com High-end Custom Homes and Renovation

ConstructionOnline ROI by the Numbers

down arrow 10hrs

Using ConstructionOnline saves Jim ~10 hours a week

plus 117k

Using ConstructionOnline saves Jim about $117,000 a year

plus 97.5%

Jim directly pockets 97.5% (over $100,000) of that money saved

 

The Challenge:

Before using ConstructionOnline’s Client Portal and Financial Tools, Jim would have to spend over 3 days of work on average choosing materials and fixtures with his clients. Every material and fixture was located at one site, but going through all of the options could be overwhelming for the client – especially if they didn’t already have an idea of what they were looking out for. While the process worked and was beneficial for the client, it was extremely time consuming for both parties.

Even though Jim used ConstructionSuite to build project estimates, Jim would have to track all other project finances through a well-built spreadsheet system. The system was easy-to-use and familiar for him, but Jim would still have to manually update every detail of the various pages throughout the project. Each project had tens to hundreds of spreadsheet pages – manually tracking each change order, invoice, and more.

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How it Affected Project Management:

By manually adjusting figures in a spreadsheet system, there is plenty of room for human error. Jim noted that he would have to check multiple times to be sure that every number in the sheet was properly updated. Sometimes he would look over small details like changing the invoice number or the change order number.

Additionally, even though Jim enjoys helping the client find the right materials for their projects, spending days on end going through selections with clients was not an efficient use of his time. Jim subcontracts labor, architects, and all other needs for the project – he is the main and only point of contact for his clients. The amount of time spent managing selections with clients did not leave a lot of time for other, more strategic tasks.

“I could spend half of my day going through materials with them, but that’s just not the best use of my time. ConstructionOnline is just making it more efficient for me, so that one man can handle everything.”

 

The Solution:

October 5 clients are able to do the bulk of making selections themselves. They can enter the ClientLink portal using their own login credentials, and either manually enter selection choice details or use the convenient QuickPick Selection Browser Extension to easily transfer selection details to the proper ConstructionOnline project.

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All financial data for October 5’s projects can be managed in one place – ConstructionOnline. The bidirectional QuickBooks integration means that Jim can enter the information into the estimate, change order module, etc., and quickly send it all directly into QuickBooks.

Cost transparency is a crucial practice for October 5’s client satisfaction. This means that change orders are extremely common. October 5 can now manage their numerous change orders right alongside their invoices, estimates, and client selections. Not only that, but the ClientLink Portal gives clients the access to see, approve, and track all project change orders.

The Results:

Jim notes three major benefits of using ConstructionOnline already – just in the first two months:

1. Time Savings

Before, choosing materials and fixtures together could easily translate into three or more days of work. Now, the clients make all of the selections themselves – saving Jim days of work per project.

 

“The most important thing: It’s time, and it’s capitalized, and it’s underlined, and it’s italicized. Time, time, time, time. The savings on time is immense.”

 

“Let’s be modest and say that it saves me 10 hours per week. So that’s $2,250. If I multiply it by 52 weeks, that’s $117,000. I paid my bill upfront which was about $3,000. That’s 2.5%. I’m saving close to 97% of my time in hours.”

 

2. Increased Client Involvement & Satisfaction

Within just two months of using ConstructionOnline, Jim has been able to get every one of his current clients excited about using their own portal for accessing the project. They use their own portal to add their choices, and on their own time. They can take their time to make a decision, and feel more confident about it when they meet with Jim to discuss the design.

“It is an opportunity to engage the client more than you would if you’re just taking them to the shop. I’ll still advise them, but I’m not putting in nearly the amount of hours as I would before.” “They really enjoy it. They like the opportunity to be involved.”

 

3. Better Organization

From design to completion, October 5 homes are all about the details – subtracting lines and textures that are unnecessary and ensuring interior symmetry. Keeping all project data in one central location brings a level of exactness to October 5’s project management that directly reflects the company’s values. “That’s what my company is about. It’s about precision, and being as accurate as possible.” Now, the miscommunications and misunderstandings can be eliminated. Everything is documented and can easily be found in ConstructionOnline.

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You were a long-time user of ConstructionSuite. What do you want to say to someone considering moving to ConstructionOnline?

“You just have to do it. You know you have to do it. You know you want to do it.”

“If you can open your mind up to some of the new options that are available, you’re going to be doing not only yourself a service, but you’re going to be doing a service for your clients. It’s going to improve your company. It’s going to make you more efficient, more professional, and it’s just another way to get the client involved. I find that’s where the key to success is.”

“I’m not an early adopter. I don’t always get the latest iPhone or latest this or that, and that has its advantages and disadvantages. In this case, I was very comfortable with [ConstructionSuite]. I really didn’t want to spend the time to learn things when I already had something that was working well for me. That was part of my reluctance.”

“You likely don’t want to go through the learning curve. I don’t think the learning curve is as scary as I thought it might’ve been. It is pretty simple.”

“I found that the estimating stuff is pretty much straightforward. The integration with Quickbooks was now a new thing to learn, but that’s going to save a lot of time. Other than that, everything is pretty much straightforward.”

Support & updates for ConstructionSuite will cease December 15, 2024.

As business needs and software preferences across the industry continue to evolve, construction pros are choosing web-based project management software 30 to 1 over desktop solutions like ConstructionSuite.

Accordingly, UDA has announced that ConstructionSuite will be phased out by December 15, 2024. Active ConstructionSuite users are strongly advised to migrate to ConstructionOnline in order to avoid any data loss.

Please call 1.800.700.8321 to speak to a UDA representative to discuss the best course of action for your company’s software needs.