About
From the deal to the keys
I'm Claudio Manhaes, a general contractor in Palm Beach County, Florida. I run Haez Construction and Design, and I have worked every stage of a project, not just the part with the tools.
Most construction advice is written for one slice of the job. Estimators write about estimating. Lawyers write about liens. Software companies write about their software. But if you own a contracting company, you don't get a slice. You own the whole thing: the deal, the numbers, the team, the risk and the result.
That is who this site is for: contractors who think like owners and investors, not like employees of their own business. The ones who want every job to make money, every system to run without them, and every new tool to pay for itself. Most of us learned the trade by doing it. The next level is running it like a company.
The whole cycle, in seven stages
Every post here maps back to one of these. They are the stages I work through on real projects, and the places where contractors leave the most money on the table.
- The deal. Is this property, addition or remodel worth doing at all? Numbers first: purchase or budget, scope, risk, return.
- Design & engineering. Turning an idea into drawings that a building department and an engineer will sign off on.
- Permits. Applications, plan review comments, resubmittals, notices. The part most contractors dread.
- Estimate & contract. A price you can defend and a contract that protects both sides.
- Build. Crews, subs, materials, inspections, change orders, weather, and the hundred small decisions every day.
- Money. Deposits, draws, invoices, liens, and knowing whether the job actually made money.
- Keys. Final inspection, closeout, warranty, and a client who sends you the next job.
Why the technology angle
Construction has a paperwork problem more than a building problem. The tools that fix it have gotten good, fast, and the contractors who adopt them early can run more work with the same team. In The Contractor Brain I take one problem at a time and work out what actually helps. Tools & Tech covers the devices and software themselves, prices and limits included. And Paper Trail tells the stories of what happens on a job when a conversation never makes it into writing.
That work is also why I'm building JobsiteAI: a set of AI tools for the paperwork side of contracting, made by someone who has to live with the results on his own jobs.
More than one voice
A building gets delivered by a team, and so does this site. Rebar & Robots is opening to engineers, architects, project managers and specialist trades, each writing from real projects under their own name. See who writes here and the standards every contributor follows.
House rules
- Owner's math. Every idea gets measured in time and money.
- Numbers are cited. If I can't source it, I don't print it.
- Practical over clever. Every post should leave you with something you can do this week.
- No legal or tax advice. When something needs a lawyer, an engineer or a CPA, I'll say so.