Archinect - Forum

Owner Architect Agreement: Compensation Issue due to Turnover

2024-09-08T14:42:00-04:00

I was recently thinking about this and I'm not sure if there is a way the Owner can protect himself from such situations, so here's a hypothetical (albeit ubiquitous) scenario:

The Architect is midway through a project and staff leave the firm. A new person or two start working on the project, but they need to get caught up to speed. Naturally, there is a certain amount of inefficiency related to this. In some cases, the people inheriting the project discover that the instruments of service are not prepared well and need to be "fixed" (example: an improperly constructed BIM model).

Now: I know that on fixed fee projects or percentage of construction projects, the above might not have a tremendous impact because the Architect is contracted for the agreed-to-fee and it would be hard to argue for more money due to staff turnover, BUT what about contracts that are either hourly or hourly not-to-exceed?

Separately, and this is more of a legal question (I guess), since most states are ...

AHJ Stamp on Permit Drawings, and other Miscellany (Architecture in Wonderland Pt. 2)

2024-09-06T23:45:47-04:00

Another set of questions from "Wonderland..."

1. Do AHJ's elsewhere in the USA put an official stamp on drawings that are permit-approved? Here in Wonderland, inspectors review the construction work based on those City Permitting-stamped drawings only and request revised drawings be sent back through permit review if they find field conditions that deviate from the drawings, even if the A/E issued the changes.

This obviously isn't how things were done back in the Midwest where I was trained, and I can't imagine a Midwestern AHJ taking on that kind of implied liability.

2. If there ARE other jurisdictions in the USA that do this, what are the justifications/reasons given for going through the process as if the permit reviewers are ultimately liable, even though they legally aren't?

It makes me come to the conclusion that the building industry here in "Wonderland" is completely flooded with bad actors, and it's the only method the City could come up with to keep the citizenry from buildin...

Question about pro-bono drawings and liability

2024-08-31T11:17:00-04:00

I donated my time to create a basic set of construction documents for a local non-profit that builds houses. They are unstamped, although I do have my license. The municipality in which the house is being built does not require stamped drawings for this particular sized single family house.

Where it gets complicated is that a member of the public asked this non profit for a copy of the drawings so that they could build a similar house on their own, not affiliated with the non-profit.

My question is three-fold:

1. Who technically owns the original drawings? They were never stamped, and they were donated to the non-profit. Is it up to the non-profit if they want to give a copy to a member of the public?

2. What liability do I take on if I give permission to the non-profit to hand a copy of the drawings over to the private citizen?

3. Moving forward, is it better to stamp and put the standard fine print on these drawings, rather than hand over a "casual" set of drawings?

Any insight ...

Taking over project from Another Firm.

2024-08-30T11:05:00-04:00

Hello All,

I was contacted by a potential client who came to us after a recommendation from a builder who knows us well and we have worked with before. The new client wanted to discuss a 2,500 SF new home project that had been through SD with another Architecture firm. They are looking to change firms (Still trying to gauge why). I wanted to get everyone's thoughts on taking over the project. I am looking to do this in a way that fully fulfills my legal and ethical responsibilities to the prior firm.

My thought is that I will have the owner obtain a formal written release from the other design firm. Since the project only progressed to SD I am not too worried about liability for any mistakes made by the prior firm as I am going to have to go through the design with a fine-toothed comb anyway to ensure everything complies with the code.

Beyond the formal written release which would allow us and the owner to progress their original design from the prior architect is there anything e...

San Diego - Transit Priority Areas parking requirement question

2024-08-29T17:09:27-04:00

Am I reading this right? In most of the CC-x-x (commercial w/ no residential use) zones in San Diego which in the TPA (yellow area) you dont need parking, whether development or existing?

Im probably missing something...

3D printing advise

2024-08-24T22:11:29-04:00

Okay I'm an old guy with a 3D printer trying to figure out how to print a multi-story building.
The design has a lot of transparency and a column structure so a massing model won't do.
Obviously I can print floor by floor.
Is there any way else to do this?
Rafts, bracing? Thanks

The Quest for 200K and leaving architecture to do so

2024-08-23T10:32:00-04:00

I need a little career advice. I am 40 years old, I am licensed, I have two Ivy league degrees. I currently work as a Senior Architect at a mid sized multi-family residential firm in NYC. Even though I'm a "designer/strategist" at heart, my work is mostly in CDs, CA-- project management, technical troubleshooting, client relations, regulatory compliance. I make 125k per year. I don't have kids but I have a longtime partner and we have a mortgage on a modest weekend house in the Hudson Valley. Life is good, but not great, and money is always a little tight. Thankfully I have some well performing investments on the side. In some ways, I've felt pretty stagnant since 2019 in my career trajectory, more of the same, no big leaps.

I'd like to be making 200k by the time I'm in my late 40s. My friends in tech or big law are easily making much more than this now. This is the salary I've concluded I need to make to feel comfortable living in NYC with a large margin of error, and without needi...

Cost of architecture services by a firm

2024-08-21T16:48:00-04:00

Are architects charging on a base of a percentage of the cost of the project? 5-15% ? Or at least comparing the fee to that percentage?

Does this 5-15% only include the architecture and not the associated engineers and any other consultants?

Say a typical fast food restaurant at 2500 SF is now going for $1.5m. a 5% number is $75k and I assume this should go only to the architect. All other fees are on top of that?

Am I looking at this wrong? I know if can vary from city to city. I am getting into ownership of the form I have been with for a couple decades and I feel the numbers are way low.

Thanks in advance

NY MEP consultant

2024-08-21T01:09:04-04:00

I'm looking to team up with some new consultants, especially MEP - I have a bunch on my list but they are all big firms and frankly pain in the asses and not with terribly good track records from my experience..
I'm looking for a young, capable, somewhat Architecturally sensitive . MEP firm in the NYC area to help me secure a project. It's in Westchester County if that matters.
The project is a 40 unit apartment building - 6 stories of apartments and parking on 2 levels.
If anyone here can provide a recommendation this would be most gratefully be received.

Submittal Packages

2024-08-13T17:50:28-04:00

This is related to a current project I'm doing CA on.

I'm used to having submittals being issued 'grouped' together. For example: all the plumbing fixtures are in one submittal.

Recently I've been encountering GC's submitting individual items separately. Their reasoning is that it's easier to do in Procore and it makes the project closeout easier.

This is not acceptable to me. In the future, I'm going to provide language in our front end specs that requires grouping of items within a submittal.

I'm wondering what others experiences are with this. Do you get 'grouped' submittals? Do you have language in your project manual directing how submittals should be 'grouped'?

Fees for owner's rep work?

2024-08-13T15:06:53-04:00

For those of you who have hopped over what do you charge? Or have seen charged by owners reps?

This is for management of entitlements, CUPs (if applicable), permits, etc in addition to construction.

Farming out renderings to some email.....

2024-08-12T22:31:23-04:00

I'm on a potentially tight timeline for an apartment building - new out of the ground 7 story (will know more tomorrow). Looking to get a prelim set together in a month - that I can do regarding all the Architectural 2D, zoning etc. I don't have time to render or even the interest.
I keep getting emails from a few different places - all appear overseas.. And every time I get an email it's from a different person. Sometimes an "American" name, sometimes not. Just concerned about a potential scam - nothing more.
I guess the question is: have any of you farmed out rendering work this way, what are the pitfalls, and the safest methods of payment.
Much thanks

MEP engineer detroit

2024-08-11T13:45:17-04:00

Can anyone recommend an mep engineer for permit drawings for a project in detroit? its not a big project - 2500 sf converting retail space into a creative studio. can either be a small firm or independent engineer who does side work. Thanks in advance

Accessible Means of Egress

2024-08-08T17:42:29-04:00

Scenario: TWO means of egress are determined to be required from a TWO-story building that is fully-sprinklered. The existing stairs cannot be widened to serve as accessible means of egress and there is no room for an Area of Refuge within the two required stairwells. The Owner requested that an elevator be installed, and this elevator will be used as an accessible means of egress. The code states that where more than one means of egress is required, accessible means of egress shall be provided in the same quantity as the number of required exits.

My question:

1a) Per the above scenario, if I want to use an elevator as an accessible means of egress, and two accessible means of egress are required because TWO exits are required, then do I need to provide TWO elevators?

1b) If I provide two elevators, what is the travel distance requirement to those elevators with the understanding that I would meet the travel distance requirement for the two required stairs.

Cartoon Sets

2024-08-08T11:57:06-04:00

Do any of the newbie generations of architects do cartoon sets anymore?

PM's at Small Firms

2024-08-06T16:26:04-04:00

Project Managers at small firms (5-20 people): how many of you are involved in the actual business planning / financial control of your projects, or do you let the owners handle that bit and you serve as the point of contact and PA for the project?

Plan Check - QA/QC

2024-08-05T19:53:26-04:00

I alluded to this in another thread, but I'm curious about your thoughts on the following issue:

I have seen firms use the plan check process as a QA/QC of their own work for code-compliance. If you were the owner, wouldn't you expect that other than administrative information such as application numbers and jurisdiction-specific forms that are germane to the enforcement agency reviewing the drawings, that the Architect for a given project would at least get all the other information right / complete upon his/her first submission for a building permit? I know some might explain receiving long plan check letters to a client as the result of a "tactic" of doing the least amount necessary in order to save the owners money, but the flaw in that argument that the per the code, the design professional is still on the hook for designing a code-compliant project. So I'm just curious why Architects would feel entitled to any additional compensation to address extensive plan check letters if t...

Trend of unrealistic timelines from clients?

2024-08-03T21:16:00-04:00

I’ve been noticing in the past few years that project timelines from clients have been getting tighter and tighter, and simultaneously demands and expectations have been getting higher and higher.

This is unsustainable. Yes, technology advancements have increased our workflows significantly, but not enough to cut our documentation phase down to 1/4 of the time we typically do. That is an extreme example, but across the board, I have seem project timelines cut down to 3/4 - 1/2 consistently. I don’t know if clients view this as a way to save money, but I’m finding we are just having to put more time into work which is eating into our personal time, adding more people to project which becomes difficult to manage, making consultant coordination nearly impossible to achieve, creating burnout for all employees, and honestly leading us to produce sub par documentation that is only going to make CA a massive headache.

In addition to all of this, these constant tight deadlines hinder the g...

Acquiring a downloadable PDF of the CBC

2024-08-02T14:54:36-04:00

Hi all. I am a BIM Coordinator and I need to be able to access and mark-up the building code for my own notes. I can't believe that an ICC subscription is so costly at $1,000/yr! It seems that since this is law it should be possible to get access to the code in some way for free. Does anyone know if this is possible? Most ideal would be a big pdf so I can put it on Bluebeam and mark it up.

Drafter to Job Captain Transition

2024-07-31T19:39:45-04:00

Scenario: A firm owner recognizes the potential in a drafter to become a project captain, but doesn't know how to groom / train the drafter to become a Job Captain. The job captain is really diligent in following directions and does a good job at picking up redlines, but isn't (yet) familiar with building systems, construction means and methods, and how to coordinate different trades (yes, we're all aware that that this something SCHOOL should have taught at a basic level, but I'm more convinced that schools don't teach anything these days)

Beyond just assigning more and more redlines and hope that "time" will somehow by itself teach the drafter, at what point does the draft make the leap to job captain? What would be the first task? How do you know when someone is "ready"?

Salary Insights

2024-07-31T11:16:42-04:00

I started to respond to the other post with the same title, but wanted to take it in a little different direction. Lots of discussion about salaries by firm size, but I don't think that is really appropriate as there are large firms working in pretty unprofitable sections. I suggest looking at salaries by firm project type. These can be similar to firm size but not exactly the same.

I suggest the hierarchy might be:

tier 1: single family residential

tier 2: small commercial, small multifamily, restaurants, tenant buildouts

tier 3: larger projects such as government (schools, DPW, etc) commercial, light industrial

tier 4: Specialties and large scale projects such as industrial, healthcare, sports, etc.

Thoughts?

Examples of windows installed into party walls

2024-07-20T00:35:51-04:00

Anyone here ever design windows into an existing masonry party wall? Or is that just a bad idea in general?

At least here in California, we need to also have a 3' setback. Wondering whether having the windows protruding into the inside is something that would look really weird. Then the trouble of the additional fire protection, shutters (if needed) etc. Reason we are looking at this is because there is space were trying to get air and light to which are far from the glazing which is only in the front and back of the building.

EXAC prep 2024

2024-07-11T13:18:00-04:00

This is a thread to discuss preparation for the 2024 EXAC examination in Canada.

I'm based in Toronto ON.

Please join the discussion if you would like to.

Fee to Transfer CDs to another architect?

2024-07-01T12:12:00-04:00

I have a 100,000sf warehouse project in NJ with a client that made many changes over the course of the project, and was very difficult from day one to get payment for my work. I broke ties with them after they finally paid me, and gave a former employee the task of doing the Construction Administration. I don’t believe they have applied for a permit yet.

They now want changes made and they want me to give my former employee authority to make the changes. I don’t necessarily have a problem with this, except I think someone should pay for the rights. I will get my insurance companies input and lawyers input on liability. But what should I charge to release the BIM files?

Circular Steel Column

2024-06-29T01:45:11-04:00

I can’t find the UL listing for a 3hr gypsum board assembly that would protect a steel column with a circular cross section. Any pointers here?

Architect registration in VIC, Australia

2024-06-19T12:06:00-04:00

Has anyone got registered by working independently/not under supervision of an architect? I saw this registration pathway listed on APE (architecture practice examination) candidate handbook, but I’m not sure how it works as they don’t give much information, can anyone explains please? If you are from another state or country but have taken this pathway for registration, I would also love to hear from you

LADBS lack of response

2024-06-16T17:07:16-04:00

After addressing all of the LADBS plan check engineer's corrections and getting all of the clearances taken care of I've been trying to schedule the hopefully final verification meeting with the plan check engineer. The plan check engineer hasn't been responding to my emails or phone calls for over three weeks. Does anyone with LADBS experience have thoughts on how pushy I should or should not be? For instance should I start cc'ing her supervisor, call her supervisor, just be patient....? In the old days when they let the public show up in person I would probably go to the counter and try to push matters that way.

Your Personal Take on Residential Bathroom Types

2024-06-14T21:44:16-04:00

What's your personal take on shared full bathroom spaces vs private full bathroom spaces.

For example, some residential designs do not have master/primary bathrooms. Instead it's just one large bathroom with a large sink area, shower, and tub, and a separate toilet closet.

And then others have the typical private full bath for master/primary bedroom and shared full bath. See floor plan examples below

Shared Bathroom Example Below:

Private Bathroom Example Below:

Pros and Cons

Pros / Cons for Shared Bath
(+) Less fixtures
(+) Centralized location
(+) Allows more space to be allocated to other rooms
(-) Lacks privacy
(-) Possibly not enough fixtures (Wait for shower, toilet, sink)

Pros / Cons for Private Bath
(+) Full Privacy
(+) Can utilize wetwall adjacent to shared bathroom
(+) Provides additional fixtures
(-) increases upfront cost of fixture count
(-) increases floor area and walls
(-) additional MEP systems required.

PM to PA Transition

2024-06-14T17:40:26-04:00

Disliking doing admin work. Currently making $160k at 15 years of experience. If I wanted to transition to doing more PA work, should I expect a big pay cut and if so, why?

CD - not S&S

2024-06-10T18:50:00-04:00

I came across an architectural CD set that hasn’t been signed and sealed. The CA is ongoing. DOB set is S&S by AoR.

Is this illegal not to have Construction Document Set Signed and Sealed in NYS, with construction ongoing?

Thank you for any thoughts in advance.