28 March 2026 · Estimating
When Should You Get a Cost Estimate — and What Should It Include?
Cost estimates get requested at every stage of a project — from back-of-envelope feasibility through to tender adjudication. The problem is that an estimate produced at the wrong stage, with the wrong level of information, can do more damage than having no estimate at all. Clients make decisions based on them. Those decisions are hard to unwind.
Stage 1: Feasibility
At this stage, you have a concept — maybe a sketch, maybe just a brief. A feasibility estimate is order-of-magnitude: is this project financially viable at all?
This type of estimate is usually rate-based (cost per square metre by building type), carried with a high contingency (20–30%), and intended to answer one question: proceed to design, or not?
Do not use a feasibility estimate to manage a project budget. It's not designed for that.
Stage 2: Design development
Once you have a developed design — floor plans, elevations, a specification — a proper elemental estimate becomes possible. This breaks the project into its components: structure, envelope, fit-out, services, external works. It can be reconciled against the drawings and used to test whether the design is tracking to budget.
This is the stage where design decisions get made. This is also the stage where cost input is most valuable, because it's still cheap to change things.
Stage 3: Pre-tender / tender check
Before going to market, an independent pre-tender estimate tells you what you should expect to receive. When tenders come in, you can compare them against the estimate line by line — not just the bottom line. Outliers (too high or too low on specific trades) often indicate scope gaps or misunderstandings in the tender documents.
What a proper estimate includes
A fee quote from any QS should be clear about what format the estimate takes, what level of documentation is required as input, what's included and excluded, and what contingency is recommended at the given stage. If those things aren't specified upfront, ask for them.
Our estimates are fixed-fee and scoped in writing before we start. Request an estimate or call us to discuss what stage you're at.
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