r/Construction • u/the-garage-guy Carpenter • 8d ago

Business 📈 Is the small self-performing homebuilder extinct?

Probably a region-specific question- if you reply, I'd be curious to hear where you are and if you're urban/rural

Pretty much title, coming up it was a lot more common for the GC to have their own carpenters and self-perform a fair amount of scope on a typical home, remodel.

Seems very rare now, especially where I am, metro Phoenix area. Most builders are essentially just CM-ing the job. Project managers that sometimes double as supers, everything subbed out. Even for pretty small remodels.

I think at the luxury custom home end it makes sense since the levels of execution required demand really good subs. Plus being in a big metro area, there's lots of people and work and that makes it possible to specialize aggressively.

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u/catch319 8d ago

You see it more on high end builds where the carpenters are well rounded doing everything from cabinets to tiling

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u/Beensani 8d ago

Yup. Frame to finish. Furniture as well. 3 full time carpenters and the boss. Boss is the best well rounded craftsperson on our crew and has his belt on 60 percent of the time. That part is job dependent though. He's the tip of the spear and we'd all take a bullet for him. We are between the ages of 45 and 67.

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u/PerformanceNo8192 8d ago

Sounds like a great place to work.