Construction Contracts

The owner is interested in the quantity of material and of labor entering into his structure, in so far as it affects the quality of the finished work, its durability, and serviceability. The dis tinction between quantity of labor as an asset to the owner, and quality of workmanship, is a fine one; but there is no question that the owner is entitled to the proper amount of material and the proper amount of labor necessary to make the structure what the two parties agreed upon when the contract was signed.

(b) Quality of the Work. In addition to the amount, the owner is entitled to a certain quality of material and quality of labor; and here is one of the difficult problems that arise in all contract framing, and one which is worthy of careful study. As a general thing, what the parties have in mind when they sign the contract is that the material shall be of standard quality—the sort of quality that enters into a first-class job, the sort of quality that is readily obtainable at fair prices in the open market; but this understand ing is so general and is subject to so many dif ferent interpretations, and the variation in interpretation is so great with different kinds of material, that it is exceedingly difficult to decide' properly and equitably.

Take the common example of the ordinary red hard-burned brick. In the first place, the bricks made by different makers are of different sizes and of different shapes; and a big brick is worth more money than a small brick, other conditions being equal. A standard brick speci fication would require that a brick should show, when broken, a comparatively uniform structure, hard and somewhat glassy, and free from peb bles, cracks, cavities, and lumps; and yet, as a matter of fact, many a brick gets on the market which contains one or more pebbles the size of a hickory nut. An over-burned brick will be of a different size from an under-burned brick, and will have very different characteristics. More over, the art of brick-burning is such as not to admit at present of the most exact uniformity in the product. The bricks which are on the outside of the kiln will not receive as thorough a burning as the bricks toward the center of the fire; and therefore the finished product will necessarily show irregularity, and the justifiable range of irregularities is not easy to specify in terms of units. The owner is entitled to require

upon inspection a quality which was standard when the contract was signed; and it is essen tial to the proper success of his part of the busi ness that the standard quality be assured to him; but if the owner requires a quality which is higher than the standard and more difficult to obtain, the increase of usefulness thereby secured is usually not so great as the increase of cost involved.

It frequently happens that the owner changes his mind after the contract has been entered upon, as to what quality he wants in certain materials; and then, by an agreement with the contractor, he pays a certain amount for the privilege of changing the quality of the material. As a general thing, when so inserted, the cost of these extras to the contractor and also to the owner is greater than it would have been if they had been properly foreseen in the draft of the original contract. Sometimes a con tractor takes advantage of the fact that the owner wants to change his mind, and exacts an exorbitant compensation for the extras, in which case the contractor makes money out of it. Making these extra charges on a large number of items is one method of turning an unprofit able contract into a profitable one. It is nearly always strongly objected to by the owner, and is likely to lead to lawsuits.

The illustration of the red brick has been used above because it is such a common article for construction purposes. Another type of article to which attention should be called in this connection, comes within the class of spe cial fittings, hardware, etc. The standard quality of door-knob, for example, is a very difficult thing to decide on beforehand, or to agree upon afterward. There are so many different types of door-knobs, and so many different makers furnishing them, that sometimes the only way to solve this problem is to specify by catalogues and numbers. Then, if this particular manufac turer happens to have a surplus of orders and cannot deliver on time, the contractor has the excuse for delaying the work, that he could not get the special object specified by the owner, and the owner is in a quandary as to how to get what he wants without delay to his work in general.