We get great questions during our free i3 church building webinar series. The answers to these questions can be as informative of the church design and construction process as the webinars themselves. In this post, we answer three more questions that church leaders have asked during recent webinars.
Question 1: Do you have someone on your church building team who helps figure out sound and lighting design?
Clearly audio, video and lighting (AVL) are important elements of any modern church design. We do understand the needs churches have for AVL and how to create a church design that takes it into account. When it’s time to work out the details, we are flexible in how that is handled.
We have AVL designers and contractors that we can recommend. We can subcontract them ourselves and include it in our scope of our work. Or we can recommend them to you, and you can do the interviewing, hiring, and paying directly. We are also happy to work with sound and lighting experts that you might already know and have a relationship with. The key point here is that we’re flexible. We want the best for your situation, so we’re happy to work with you to accomplish that.
Question 2: What is your subcontractor selection process, or do you always build with your pre-selected subcontractors?
The McKnight Group functions as a general contractor for all of our church design and building projects. This means we provide a project manager and project superintendent who work onsite on your church building project.
Most of the actual church building work is done by local subcontractors and suppliers. We go through a competitive bidding process, put together the best package of people and businesses, and present that to you as a single contract with a guaranteed construction cost. This ensures you are getting the best prices from local people.
The selection process involves making sure that the subcontractors and suppliers have the proper amount of people available to do the work, they have a good reputation, they pay their bills, and they have a track record of successfully handling any issues that arise during the work. This way we are responsible for handling their work, rather than relying on church leaders who do not have experience with church building construction.
Question 3: What is the cost of each phase of the church design and building process?
The cost of the initial church design study can vary. In 2018 we estimate anywhere from $4,000 to $20,000, based upon the complexity and size of the project, and what you are trying to accomplish. Yes, that’s a wide range, but there’s a wide range of problems and situations that individual churches have to address.
Construction documents and construction itself would depend on your actual church design and the budget you have prepared for the church building or remodeling project. The budget will include the architectural, engineering, and building permits, as well as the actual construction costs.
With all of those variables, it’s impossible to give you generic cost estimates for each stage of the church building process without visiting your church and discussing the what you are trying to accomplish. However, you can learn a lot about each of those variables in our free i3 webinars, which is why we encourage you to sign up and join us there to learn more. Meanwhile, if you have specific cost questions related to your existing church design, give us a call at 800-625-6448 and let’s begin a conversation.