A generic feature-driven activity-based cost estimation process

Abstract

Understanding how the building design influences construction costs is a challenging task for estimators. Estimators must recognize the design conditions that affect construction costs and customize the cost estimate accordingly. Estimators have different preferences for how and when to adjust a project's activities, resources, and resource productivity rates that form the basis of a cost estimate. Current tools and methodologies lack ways to help estimators customize construction cost information according to their preferences and the particular features in a given design. This paper describes the process we formalized to customize a project's activities, resources, and resource productivity rates based on a project-independent representation of estimators' rationale and a project-specific feature-based product model. The formal process creates an integrated model that explicitly relates features, activities, resources, costs and the estimator's rationale. Our tests show that this process enables a software prototype to generate and maintain cost estimates quickly, consistently, and accurately for feature-based product models.