The Change Order You Approved Without Pricing It

You're standing in the parking lot. The super calls. There's an issue—something the architect missed, something the owner wants, something that wasn't in the scope. You know you need a price before you commit. But the job's moving, the crew's standing there, and if you say "hold on" you look like you don't know your business.

So you say yes.

You tell yourself you'll figure out the number later. You tell yourself it's not that big. You tell yourself you're building goodwill with the client.

Three weeks later, you run the actual cost. It's $8,000. You quoted $4,500. And now you're stuck—because you can't go back and tell the client you underpriced work they've already watched you complete.

Here's what actually happens: You eat it. You call it "relationship building." And you do it again on the next job.

Why Smart Owners Keep Making the Same Mistake

This isn't stupidity. It's pressure plus optimism plus the construction owner's disease: the belief that you can figure it out on the fly.

You've built your business on moving fast. Decisive action is your edge. The guy who hesitates loses the project. The guy who says "let me get back to you" loses momentum. You've been rewarded for speed your entire career.

But speed without structure isn't decisiveness. It's chaos with confidence.

The other issue: You don't want to look like you don't know. Stopping to price something feels weak. It signals to the client, the super, the crew that you're not in control. So you project certainty. You nod. You say, "Yeah, we can handle that."

And you lock yourself into a number you haven't calculated.

The third reason: You genuinely believe the cost will be less than it actually is. You run the math in your head—quick, rough, optimistic. You forget about the mobilization. You underestimate the hours. You assume the material will be cheaper. You tell yourself it's a small thing.

It's never a small thing.

The Real Cost of Saying Yes Too Soon

Let's be specific. You approve an unpriced change order. Here's what happens:

Week 1: The crew starts work. You're busy with three other jobs. You make a mental note to price it later.

Week 2: The super mentions it again. You say, "I'll get you a number." You don't. The work continues.

Week 3: You finally sit down and run the actual cost. Labor's higher than you thought. Material got delayed. The crew had to come back twice because of coordination issues. The real number is 60% more than what you casually quoted.

Now you have three bad options:

1. Eat the loss and pretend everything's fine
2. Go back to the client and look incompetent
3. Bury the cost in another part of the job and hope nobody notices

Most owners pick option one. They eat it. They call it part of doing business. They tell themselves it evens out over time.

It doesn't.

Because this isn't a one-time event. It's a pattern. Every unpriced change order is a slow leak in your profitability. Do it five times on a $500K project and you've just given away $20K–$40K without realizing it.

And the worst part? Your team learns that pricing doesn't matter. They learn that the owner will say yes regardless. So they stop asking. They just assume you'll figure it out.

The Discipline Nobody Wants to Enforce

Here's the truth most people avoid: You need a rule. A hard, no-exceptions rule.

No work starts until there's a price. No price until there's a scope.

This feels impossible. It feels rigid. It feels like it will slow you down and cost you opportunities.

But let me be blunt: You're already paying for speed. You're paying in margin you can't recover. You're paying in stress when the numbers don't add up. You're paying in the gap between what you thought you'd make and what actually hits the bank.

The discipline isn't complicated:

1. Stop the work. Not forever. Just long enough to price it.
2. Document the scope. Three sentences. What's included, what's not, what assumptions you're making.
3. Run the real cost. Labor hours × rate. Material with a buffer. Markup that covers overhead and profit.
4. Get approval before you mobilize. In writing. Even if it's just an email.

This takes 30 minutes. Maybe an hour if it's complex.

You're telling me you can't afford an hour to protect $8,000?

What This Looks Like in Real Operator Conditions

I know what you're thinking: "But the client needs an answer now. The crew's standing there. I can't just stop everything."

You're right. You can't stop everything. But you can stop this.

Here's what you actually say:

To the client: "I can get you a firm price by end of day. If you want me to ballpark it now, I can, but I'm going to pad it to protect both of us. Your call."

To the super: "Hold the crew on something else for two hours. I'll have a price and a go/no-go by lunch."

To yourself: "This is not an emergency. This is a decision that deserves a number."

Most of the time? The client will wait. Because they don't want a surprise either. They want certainty. And when you give them a real price—fast, but real—they trust you more, not less.

The supers will adapt. They'll stop calling every little thing a change order. They'll start thinking through scope before they ask. They'll get better at the game.

And you'll stop bleeding margin on work you never should have started.

The Human Friction You're Not Acknowledging

This discipline exposes something uncomfortable: You like being the hero who says yes.

You like the client thinking you're flexible. You like the super thinking you're decisive. You like the feeling of being the guy who makes it happen.

But heroism without math is just expensive ego.

The other issue: You don't trust your team to price it right. So you skip the process and do it in your head. Which means the process never gets built. Which means you stay the bottleneck forever.

If you can't delegate pricing, you can't scale. If you can't scale, you're just buying yourself a job with more stress.

The way out is simple, but it's not easy: Build the system. Enforce the rule. Accept that you'll feel rigid at first. Accept that some people won't like it.

Peace comes from knowing the number before you commit. Not after.

Bring This to Your Leadership Meeting

The Question:
How many change orders did we start last month without a written, approved price? Who approved them, and what did we actually lose?

The Prompt:
"We're going to role-play the next unpriced change order request. Super calls, client's asking, crew's waiting. Walk me through exactly what we say to get the price before we start work—without killing the relationship."

The Action:
Create a one-page Change Order Approval Form. Must include: scope description, estimated hours, material cost, markup, total price, client signature. Assign one person to own it. Every CO goes through this form starting Monday. No exceptions.

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You don't need ten steps. You need one rule, enforced consistently.

Stop saying yes before you know what it costs. Not because you're being difficult. Because you're running a business, not a charity.

Clarity beats speed. Every time.