Cost advice for the meeting before the meeting.
A client asks what their project will cost, and until there is enough documentation for a formal figure, the honest answer is often that nobody knows yet. That gap is where projects lose momentum, and where trust in the process starts to erode.
We work from a concept alone, before any of that documentation exists, so you can bring a real, independent cost position into the conversation while the brief can still move — not after.
What this means for your practice
This is commercial cost advisory that starts earlier than a standalone QS engagement can — working from a concept alone, with no documentation required. As the design develops, we can also produce a formal Bill of Quantities directly, as a separately priced module, so the relationship does not need to hand off to a new consultant partway through.
See pre-construction advisor vs quantity surveyor for the full distinction, or how architects and builders can work better together for the wider picture.
Where this fits into a project
First client meeting
A concept, a sketch, or just a description of the brief is enough to start. Feasibility – Direction gives a plain-language read on whether the direction is realistic, before either of you has spent time on drawings that might not hold up.
As the design develops
Benchmark tracks cost against the design at each major checkpoint — Early Concept, Developed Design, Pre-Tender, Pre-Issue — so you always have a current cost signal to design against, not a number set once months earlier.
Heading into tender
Tender Support gets every builder pricing the same scope, so the quotes that come back are actually comparable — and if a project has already drifted, Realignment finds a way back without starting the design over.
No fee from any builder, ever.
We do not charge builders a success fee for work referred to them, and never have. That independence is deliberate — it is what lets you put a cost position in front of a client and mean it, rather than wondering whose interest it actually serves.
Frequently asked questions
Does this replace the quantity surveyor on a project?
Not entirely, though we can produce formal Bill of Quantities costings directly, as a separately priced module, once the design has developed enough to quantify. What is different is that we can also work much earlier than that — from a concept alone, before a standalone QS engagement would typically start. See pre-construction advisor vs quantity surveyor for the full distinction.
How early can you get involved?
As early as a first client meeting. Feasibility – Direction works from a sketch or description, before any drawings exist.
Do you help manage the tender process itself, not just review quotes afterward?
Yes. Tender Support structures the documentation and manages the process with builders directly, so the quotes that come back are genuinely comparable, not just confidently priced. See how to run a better tender for what that actually involves.
Do you take a fee from builders?
No. We do not charge builders a success fee for work referred to them, and never have. That independence is deliberate — it is what makes the cost position something you can actually stand behind with a client.
Will bringing you in slow the project down?
The opposite is usually true. A Feasibility – Direction conversation takes days, not weeks, and the projects that actually stall are the ones where a budget mismatch is discovered late — see why rushing the design phase costs you more.
Bring us into your next client conversation
No documentation required to start — just a concept and a sense of the brief.