Every Chapter of Screwed Down in Five Minutes
The chapter titles of Screwed Down, read out and explained. Part one, how you get screwed down: the builder's bank, the two words that kill claims, one late week, the deduction on the certificate, "just do it", your money in their account, they can walk, the illegal clause still in your contract, last in the queue. Part two, how you take it back: leverage and when to use it, the tender room, credit-check the builder, price the contract, read it in ten minutes, the departures schedule, the paperwork, the snowball, silence is a debt due, down tools legally. Epilogue: nobody is coming to pay you.
Transcript
Excuse me while I read out the book's chapter titles because I love rereading this book's chapter titles. Screwed down the book that I published myself by the way. Link in the description if you want to purchase it yourself. These titles are bangers, man. So here they are one is the prologue it's a bit of a story a very personal story about myself and why I left the builder side to support subbies both on the subbie side as a CA now as director of the construction contracts co the prologue prologue is titled 5 40 pm Friday there's two parts of the book there part one how you get screwed down and part two how you take it back.
So the first chapter, I love this title, I love a lot of them, here it is. 1, you are the builder's bank and the interest rate is zero. 2, two words that kill more claims than bad work ever will. 3, one late week costs more than your whole margin that's referring to liquidated damages. If you know, you know. Deduction, this is chapter Chapter 4, the deduction you find out about on the certificate.
Probably causes you a heart attack every time you see it. Chapter 5, quotations, do it, we'll sort the paperwork later. Another contractual nightmare. Chapter 6, your money, their account. Chapter 7, they can walk, you can't. Chapter 8, the illegal clause that is still in your contract. That one's crazy work nine when they go under you are the last in the queue that's not fear-mongering that's the harsh reality that leads us to part two how you take it back so these are a bit more titles that shouldn't scare you as much 10 one of my personal you have more leverage than you think and less time to use it than you in this one there's a beautiful diagram which shows like the curve across the timeline of a project from tender to completion of the project and it shows where your leverage sits the builder
when you have more leverage than them so that's when you should negotiate hard first when you don't have much leverage so you should be aware of it so you don't burn the relationship important stuff the ambulance was buzzing its sirens please excuse that 11 inside the builder's tender room what happens to your quote after you press send paired up with the chapter that I just mentioned leverage huge insight point for you to gain a lot of benefit and value from when quoting and negotiating on a project.
Credit check the builder before the builder credit checks you. Very important not just a funny title. 13 price the contract not just the scope. Don't often see estimators pricing the contract so that's a key consideration. The CAs it's also their duty to price the contract if it's in their scope. 14 read it in 10 minutes. Chapter 15 the departure schedule. What builders actually say yes to. 16, the paperwork that gets you paid.
Chapter 17, the snowball, why the subbie who follows up in writing gets paid first. You've got to have commercial discipline if you want to get paid in this industry. The harsh reality. 18, silence is a debt due. Very strong point and that's like posted another video reading out chapter one. So that ties very closely to why silence is a debt due. And that's your strongest leverage point under the act.
That's very important to know. And chapter 19, down tools legally. Value behind that too. Then close out the book with another little story from my, I think it was either my builder side or subbie side CA days. Epilogue, nobody is coming to pay you. Then we have the appendix at the end which is a resource pack with a bunch of other freebies and throughout the book in between each chapter there are some other brief interludes with more personal stories from my builder side and subby side CA days with the raw experiences and insights that I sort of package up for you I hope that intrigues you and I hope that now makes you want to buy my book because a it's very affordable and b is thousands if not of thousands of in value packaged up in that in that book my experience my tips
advice my free resources in there and some other subbies have mentioned that already who've I've only launched this two weeks ago they've read it and they're already implementing things into their business so I have no doubt it will be of value to you so please buy it sooner rather than later for your own sake not for me I don't even make much money off these books so it let me know if you purchase it I look forward to connecting with you thank you for watching drop me a subscribe if you haven't yet I will see you in the next one cheers
General information about Australian subcontracts, not legal advice. Get advice on your own contract and facts.