Picking a builder is the single biggest decision in any renovation, and it’s the one Australian homeowners spend the least time on. We see it from the inside: months on Pinterest, weeks on tile colours, days on tap finishes, and twenty minutes on the question of who’s going to actually swing the hammer. Our team has been on the receiving end of those decisions long enough to know what separates a good build from one that turns into a nightmare with a Today Tonight crew on the front lawn.
So here it is — the twelve questions Mick, Dave, and Brett think every Australian homeowner should put to a builder before signing a contract. Not “favourite finishes” questions. Not “show us your portfolio” questions. The ones that tell you whether the business is solvent, the team is real, and the contract is worth the paper it’s printed on.
Why this list exists
Australia loses small builders to insolvency every year — the ABS and ASIC numbers are public, and the trend has been ugly since 2022. A homeowner who picks the wrong builder isn’t just risking a delayed handover. They’re risking the deposit, the progress payments, and in the worst cases, ownership of a half-finished structure on their own land.
The good news: 90 per cent of bad outcomes are predictable from the answers a builder gives in the first one-hour conversation. You just have to ask the right questions, and you have to know which answers should make you walk away.
1. “What’s your builder licence number, and which state issued it?”
Every state runs its own licensing regime — VBA in Victoria, NSW Fair Trading, QBCC in Queensland, BSA in WA. The licence has to be in the name of the person or company doing the work, current, and at the right class for the size of your job. A “builder” with a handyman licence cannot legally build you a $400,000 renovation. A licence “borrowed” from a related entity isn’t worth the photocopy.
What to do: take the licence number and check it on the relevant state regulator’s website, the same day. Cross-check the company name against ASIC. If they’re not the same legal entity, ask why.
2. “Who’s going to actually run my job?”
The person who quotes the job is rarely the person who builds it. That’s not a problem in itself — it’s a problem if the homeowner doesn’t know that, and finds out three months in.
Ask: who is the site supervisor, what other jobs do they have running, and how often will they be on your site? In our team, Dave runs no more than two concurrent jobs, and he’s on each site at least every second day. We tell clients that upfront. A builder who can’t tell you the supervisor’s name on day one is a builder running too many jobs.
3. “Can I see three jobs you finished in the last twelve months — and talk to those owners?”
Note the time-bound on this one. Old portfolios are easy. Showing recent work proves the business is operating, the trades are still around, and the workmanship is current. If the most recent job a builder will show you is from 2023, ask why. There’s usually a story.
Talking to the owners is non-negotiable. Spend twenty minutes on each call. Ask whether the build came in on time, on budget, what the variations looked like, and what the experience was like at hand-over. Anyone can write a Google review. Almost no-one fakes a phone call.
4. “What’s your insurance position — and can I see the certificates?”
You’re looking for two things. Public liability insurance, ideally to $20 million. And — this is the big one in Australia — domestic building insurance (sometimes called Home Warranty Insurance) that’s been taken out for your job, not “in general”. Domestic building insurance is mandatory in most states for residential work over a certain dollar value. A builder who hasn’t taken it out yet, or can’t show you the certificate before you pay a deposit, is a red flag.
Want a sharp test? Ask which insurer they use, and how their last domestic insurance application went. A builder with a clean track record will answer in a sentence. A builder with a history will deflect.
5. “How are progress payments structured, and how do I know each stage is complete?”
Industry-standard residential contracts (HIA, Master Builders) have progress payment percentages aligned to physical stages: deposit, base, frame, lock-up, fix, and completion. The percentages vary, but they’re roughly 5/10/15/35/25/10 in most fixed-price contracts.
Be very careful with builders who want larger upfront payments, or who define “stage complete” loosely. The base stage isn’t complete because the slab has been poured — it’s complete because the slab has been poured, cured, and inspected. Get this in writing, and don’t pay until each stage is genuinely done.
6. “What’s your variation process, and what does a variation cost?”
Variations are where most renovations blow out. The contract should specify a written variation process — every change in scope priced in writing and signed off by both parties before the work proceeds.
Ask: what’s your administrative fee on variations? (Usually 15-20 per cent on top of cost.) What if I want to delete something — do I get a credit, or is it sunk? A good builder will explain this calmly. A builder who gets shifty about variation pricing is a builder who’s planning to make their margin on them.
7. “What’s the timeline, and what’s the daily liquidated damages number if you go over?”
Most contracts have a “practical completion” date and a per-day penalty if the builder runs late beyond a set buffer. The number is usually small ($50-$200 per day, capped) but it concentrates the mind. A builder who refuses to put a meaningful liquidated damages clause in the contract has decided in advance they won’t finish on time.
Equally important: the inclusions list. A timeline is meaningless without a fully scoped inclusions schedule. The number of “we’ll figure it out as we go” tile, tap, and lighting choices is a direct multiplier on the timeline.
8. “What’s your provisional sum policy, and how many provisional sums are in this quote?”
Provisional sums (PS) and prime cost items (PC) are placeholders for things the builder hasn’t fully priced. They’re legitimate in some cases — landscaping, for example, or excavation when the soil report is uncertain. But they’re also where lazy or dishonest builders hide costs they don’t want to commit to.
Count them. A renovation quote with more than three or four provisional sums is a quote that hasn’t been done properly. Ask the builder to nominate them all, explain each one, and explain how the final number gets locked in.
9. “Who are your three main subbies — and how long have you worked with them?”
The builder’s tradies are the build. A builder who can’t list the names of his electrician, plumber, and tiler off the top of his head is using whoever’s available, which means whoever isn’t in demand. The good trades are loyal to the good builders. Long relationships are a green flag.
For our team, our sparkie has been with us for fourteen years. Our plumber, eleven. Our tiler is on year nine. We mention them by name on every job, because they’re as much a part of the build as we are.
10. “How do you handle defects after handover?”
The standard defect liability period is six months for renovation work, with structural defects covered for longer under state legislation. The question isn’t whether the builder is “covered” — the question is what their actual process is.
Ask: if I find a problem in month four, what do I do? Who do I email? What’s the response time? A builder with a real defects process will answer in detail. A builder who hasn’t thought about it will mumble. The mumble is the answer.
11. “Show me your last completed job’s final invoice, and the variations attached.”
This one separates the men from the boys. A confident builder will pull a recent contract out (with the homeowner’s name redacted) and show you exactly how the original quote, the variations, and the final cost compared. You’re looking for two things: the final number not being wildly above the original, and the variations being for things you can imagine genuinely arose.
If the variations on a recent job total more than 10 per cent of the original quote without a clear story, this builder either under-quotes deliberately or scopes badly. Either way, you don’t want them on your job.
12. “Why this job? Why my house?”
It sounds soft. It’s not.
The best builders are choosy. They turn down jobs they don’t think suit them. The fact that a builder wants your job, specifically, should not be assumed. Ask them. A confident builder will tell you what’s interesting about your project, what they think the opportunity is, and where the risks are. A builder who’s chasing every quote in town will give you a generic answer.
The right builder for your house is the one who’s already mentally building it before they leave the first meeting.
What to do with the answers
Get three quotes, ask all twelve questions of all three builders, and put the answers in a spreadsheet. The builder you pick almost never has the lowest quote. They have the cleanest answers and the most considered conversation. They’re the one who walks the site twice and asks questions back.
If you’d like our team to be one of your three quotes, get in touch. We won’t always be the cheapest. We’ll always answer the twelve questions in plain English, and we’ll always tell you which other builder in your area we’d be happy to lose the job to. Australia’s full of good builders. The trick is finding the one who’s right for your house.