Services & Fees

The 6 stages of our full architectural service and associated fees

There are six stages typical to our projects and they are described here. Architects’ fees are often charged on a percentage basis, meaning that once the construction cost of the house or extension is established (initially estimated and later adjusted once a contract is formed), a percentage of that sum forms the architect’s fee. In many cases, however, our clients choose to have fees levied at hourly rates. In either case, typical fees up to the commencement of construction range from 5% to 10% of the project costs (depending on size and complexity of the project).

Our stages prior to construction are as follows:

1. Project Assessment/Concept Plan – hourly rate (see below)
2. Developed design/pre-tender estimate
3. Final design and development approval
4. Contract Documentation/Tenders/Building approval

Two additional stages complete our services:

5. Construction services
6. Post occupancy services

The first step – Project Assessment/Concept Plan

To commence our engagement, it is only necessary to make a commitment to this first and most creative stage of our services. Often this stage is quite speculative. It may be your first experience with an architect, your first building project; you might be unsure of your requirements and/or wish to explore all opportunities before making a commitment to proceed. All options are explored to make best us of the site opportunities and to imaginatively, yet practically interpret your requirements without losing site of your budgetary constraints.

Fees for this first stage are time charged ($190/hr principal architect and $150/hr project architect) with the typical range of fees as follows (GST is in addition to our fees):

Project cost/fee

• Up to $200,000 $4,000 = $5,500
• Up to $400,000 $5,000 = $6,500
• Up to $600,000 $6,000 = $7,500
• Up to $800,000 $7,000 = $8,500
• Over $800,000 $8,000 = $9,500

The tender process and competitive savings

Our completed Contract Documents (detailed drawings and specifications) will be tendered to a small group of reliable quality builders that we have worked with before or have been referred by colleagues. Our survey of projects that recently went to tender shows that the prices varied by an average of over 15%, with the lowest tender being around 8% less than the average. This shows that our fees are largely offset by savings through the competitive tendering process.