Questions about BIM modelling costs rarely come out of nowhere, because there is almost always a concrete reason behind them. A peak the in-house team cannot handle, a deadline that has already been set, or a vacancy for a modeller that has been open for months.
In all three cases, what counts is not so much a rate, but how quickly capacity can run alongside the in-house team without the organisation being tied to it permanently. We solve that with a large, flexible team that scales with each project.
We draft and model, we do not do engineering, and we bill net working hours only. Below, we describe who approaches us, how we arrange staffing, how the cost side works and how contact runs during a project. That way, a project lead can judge for themselves whether outsourcing pays off in their situation. We only name an amount once we have seen the material and the desired output, because any other estimate is a shot in the dark.
Cable tray routing in the model, built with parametric families that carry the material schedule with them.
Who comes to us for BIM modelling
Our clients are engineering firms, architectural practices, contractors and manufacturers, and more broadly companies with a lot of technical drafting work. We talk to managers, team leaders and owners, in other words the people who control the schedule and the budget. The trigger is almost always capacity and rarely dissatisfaction with their own people. A team leader sees two projects coming in at once and knows his modellers cannot manage both. An owner has a vacancy open and notices that recruiting takes months while the work is waiting now. A project lead has a handover date that cannot move and is looking for hands that can start tomorrow.
In all those cases, the conversation is about BIM modelling costs, but the real question is what standstill costs. A project that stalls weighs more heavily on the margin than a few extra modelling hours. We take over the volume work, while the client keeps the design decisions and the responsibility. It is often repetitive work, revision rounds on existing files or a model set that needs to be in order before the next phase begins. Our clients are based in the Netherlands and that is where our focus lies too, so meetings take place within the same working day.
We work entirely remotely from our own office, and you are always welcome to meet, at your place or ours. We also work in our own environment with our own licences, so you do not have to free up a workstation, hardware or software, or open anything up in your own systems. For an organisation that is only looking for temporary capacity, that saves a lot of preparation and a lot of waiting. We started this service because a client asked for it, and we have offered it as a permanent service ever since.
Scaling up BIM modelling without fixed wage costs
We have a large, flexible team and scale up or down for each project to match the work. That team is already in place, so we do not need to hire anyone before the work can get going. That is the biggest difference from a permanent employee, because a recruitment process takes months and afterwards the organisation is tied to a salary that keeps running even when volume drops. For BIM modelling with us, you pay no ongoing wage costs. If someone is out due to illness or holiday, we replace them and the work simply carries on.
Everyone who works for us has more than ten years of CAD experience, so scaling up does not mean a trainee joins the project. The core of our team has around twenty-five years of experience combined, and Sam, our team leader, directs the technical side. For urgent work, we add people immediately. When a deadline on one of our projects could not move, we worked evenings and weekends, with days of fourteen to fifteen hours, even during a planned holiday of Sam's. We discuss in advance how many people a phase can realistically handle, because more modellers do not always mean a shorter lead time.
When the volume drops, we scale back down and the meter stops. We do not work with a prepaid block of hours or a monthly hours subscription, so you are not tied to anything. A short job is therefore fine too, and it is often the most sensible way to test whether this form of capacity fits your schedule.
No ongoing payroll costs and no idle staff once the peak is over. If one of our people is off sick or on holiday, we replace them and the work simply carries on.
A closer look at BIM modelling costs
We work with an hourly rate or a fixed project price, and we discuss together in advance which option suits best. A clearly defined job with a lot of repetition lends itself well to a fixed project price, because we can then estimate the scope reliably. If the model is still evolving and the scope changes along the way, an hourly rate is fairer to both parties. In both cases, we only bill net working hours. If someone steps away for five minutes to get a coffee, the clock stops, and that is not a nice promise but simply how our time tracking works. The biggest cost reducer in BIM modelling is the quality of the material we receive. A consistent base set with correct dimensions and a logical structure can be taken forward quickly. A dossier with inconsistent layers, missing dimensions and handwritten notes first requires investigation, and we take on that investigation ourselves instead of calling you every day.
The second cost reducer is repetition, because we capture recurring components parametrically so that they adapt to a new situation. The third is our way of working with partial deliveries, so that a wrong interpretation surfaces after the first round rather than after a hundred hours. What does drive costs up is a scope that doubles halfway through. That is why we define it in advance and tell you straight away when something falls outside it. We only name amounts once we have seen the material. If you are looking for an indication, send us a representative part of the model and we will tell you which approach requires the fewest hours.
One fixed point of contact during BIM modelling
For a new request, Barry, our project manager, is usually the first point of contact, after which Sam takes over the technical side. That gives you a familiar face, and you never have to repeat your story. Sam has more than fifteen years of background in architecture, worked in Iran for seven years, ran his own design firm in the Netherlands and still works as an engineer.
He directs the CAD team and handles project supervision, so questions about the BIM modelling go straight to someone who oversees the work himself. We agree the rhythm of our meetings per client. One client wants to catch up every two days, another is happy with a weekly check-in, and that mainly depends on how fast things need to move.
Day-to-day contact runs via email, phone and meetings, and we visit your office or you come to ours. For standalone work, files go back and forth by email. On larger projects, such as greenhouse construction projects, we work with software that the client can log into to follow the project, so you can see for yourself how far along it is.
We work to your standard and drawing conventions, which we receive from you. The intellectual property of everything we make belongs to you. So far we have not signed a non-disclosure agreement because nobody has asked for one, but we are open to an NDA. We also comply with any arrangements you make about the storage and distribution of your files, and we prefer to agree those before the start.
Frequently asked questions about BIM modelling costs
Let us handle your BIM modelling
Send us your documents and drawing conventions and we will let you know within one to two working days what we can take on and when.