Private Road bid help needed.

[JS Landscaping]

I was asked to bid on a private road yesterday, went out and checked it out today. Has a bit of a grade at the beginning, nothing to severe tho, and is roughly a half mile long. Up until now I have never done a private road, just mainly lots and my drivers do my driveways for me. They want a price for the whole season, with sand/salt mix. We are fully equiped to take on this road, just wondering if you guys had any pointers on how to price it out roads like these and a ball park figure on what is a profitable price. Any help is greatly apreciated, Too bad all this rain that has hit the northeast where i am, isnt snow.....just imagine how many feet it would have been. Thanks again.....



James
JS LANDSCAPING

[Seascape]

All the private roads ive dealt w/ are common association areas. They'll be looking for dirt cheap and probally only want intersections salted.

You gotta stop and look at the situation. Is street parking an issue? How gig is the staging area on the road side? Ive seen these roads be straight up peice of cake ,, ive seen em where you gotta go 1 down the middle than bump each side,, ive seen em everything has to go to one side ect...... either way given a choice I'll take roads over lots anyday.

Also be prepared for multiple requests if they are in tight developments,,, as in snowblower work,,,, be prepared to as how or if youll handle that cause it will come up like money slipping through your fingers.

[JS Landscaping]

Thanks for the pointers, still trying to figure out a price for it for the season tho.....keep comming up with a number around 13 thousand, does this sound reasonable? Im going off of roughly a 15 events per season, with 3 visits per event. What do you guys think?




James
JS LANDSCAPING

[greenpastureslc]

Thanks for the pointers, still trying to figure out a price for it for the season tho.....keep comming up with a number around 13 thousand, does this sound reasonable? Im going off of roughly a 15 events per season, with 3 visits per event. What do you guys think?




James
JS LANDSCAPING

James, try something like this, figure out how long it will take to clear the road once. Then what you want to do is find the average snowfall for the year in your area ( around here its 60" ). Most private roads and parking lots want snow cleared at 2". Now take your 2" trigger divide that by the average snowfall, then mutiply that by how much per push.

I'll use my area as an example. Lets say it takes an hour to clear the road.
At $100/hr that means $100/push. With a 2" inch trigger divided by 60" per year that would be 30 pushes in a season. 30 times $100/ push would be $3000 just for plowing + the cost to apply salt.

Use this LINK to find the average snowfall in your area.

Above is just an example you need to adjust the info to fit your area but it a good model to go by that works for me.
If you still come up with the same numbers, then yes that is a good profit for that road.

BTW Im not sure how long it takes to clear a 1/2 mile of road, you'll have to figure that one on your own maybe do a dry run on the road.

[JS Landscaping]

Hey thanks on the help for pricing, found out I was a bit high by a few thousand. Breaking it down like that really makes it a lot easier. Looking at getting a IH 4700 to do some plowing with. Its an ex-town truck with a 10 foot plow and tailgate spreader. Looks like the perfect plow truck for private roads and lots. Definatly could push a lot more snow then my current truck, a 97 2500HD RAM. Just dont know if it is too big for landscaping......Thanks again guys.




James

[CCLS]

When in doubt bid by the hour.

We had one association last year with five streets a quarter mile long plus over 120 driveways to clear. You need to make sure you factor in cars in the road and possibly moving your snow piles if you get a lot of snow. The streets we did to this association were culdisacs and the only way to push the snow was to the end of the street. Once we filled up the end of the street we had to move piles and take snow off site.