Impact of Material Market on Early Stage Building Cost Estimation

Materials Market 1
EARLY STAGE BUILDING CONSTRUCTION ESTIMATE
A Research Paper on Material Market By
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Materials Market 2
INTRODUCTION
This report involves the assessment on how the material market affects the accuracy of the early
stage building cost estimation by bringing the examples of the from both the research findings as
well as in industrial cases. The factors under the material market which affects the accuracy of
the early stage of building cost estimation include the material availability, material quality, and
material prices.
Material Prices
The prices of the materials are one of the most varying factors affecting the present market.
When the materials to be used in construction are purchased when the market prices are very
high, there will be an increase in the cost estimation of the early stages of construction (Arthur,
2012). The prices of materials are always fluctuating according to numerous factors such as the
cost of their manufacture or other external factors such as political stability. In the case of the
Mara Large Project the table below shows how the fluctuations in the cost of materials are
dominating the management of the project:
Table 1: Rank of the Materials prices fluctuations (Holm, 2012)

Materials Market 3
Construction materials such as electrical fittings, plumbing, bricks, gravel, timber, steel, and
concrete play a significant role in the accuracy of building cost estimation. The cost of
purchasing these materials is affected by the capability of the manufacturers to manufacture
them. In case the materials are purchased from the manufacturers at the moment when the order
for the materials is at their peak, then the cost of these materials would be higher compared to the
moment when the orders are fewer (Moselle, 2016).
Material Availability
When raw materials such as stone or timber can be found easily in the region surrounding, the
estimation cost will drastically reduce, however, when the raw materials are in short supply, their
estimation cost will be higher. Therefore, it is normally advisable to select regions where there
are plenty raw materials so as to save on the cost of transportation and also reduce the time
wastage during the transportation of these raw materials from where there are manufactured or
where they are existing, to the area in which the construction process will be taking place. The
raw materials sustainability also contributes to the accuracy of the early stage construction
estimation (Ogershok, 2012).
The sustainable materials are normally available and can also be recycled hence the estimation
cost will be greatly reduced since such raw materials do not necessarily need to be construction
new. Sustainable materials that have been used at one time can be used again in the construction
of a new structure especially when these materials are recyclable or reusable. For instance, a teak
tree is very difficult to type of tree to grow since the tree requires particular climate conditions
making the estimated cost of material to be high. Due to the low availability of the teak tree, the
estimated cost of this material when it is expected to be used during the construction process will