AEC definitions
CM at risk, or CMAR, hires a construction manager during design to estimate, schedule, and advise, and then to build the project, usually under a guaranteed maximum price. The construction manager holds the trade contracts and the risk of delivering within that price. An agency CM only advises and does not hold that risk.
Definition
The owner still holds separate contracts with the architect and the CM. That is the main split from design-build, where one entity holds design and construction. The CM's preconstruction work is paid as a fee. At a point the documents can support, the CM proposes a GMP. After the owner accepts it, the CM is at risk for the cost of the work above that GMP, except for owner changes and risks the contract leaves with the owner. Some public agencies use CM/GC for a similar arrangement. Read the statute before assuming the initials match.
In depth
The value is early estimating and constructability while the architect can still change the documents. A CM who arrives after the set is finished is a GC with a different title.
The preconstruction agreement should say what the estimates are based on and how design contingency shrinks.
Until the GMP is signed, the work already released is often cost-plus. The GMP amendment should reconcile those costs, list assumptions, and attach the documents it is based on.
Qualifications that swallow the GMP, such as 'price assumes undesigned interiors,' belong in the open. A cap full of holes is not a cap.
Subcontracts sit with the CM, not the owner. Bidding requirements in the GMP contract protect the owner from a closed buyout. Self-performed work should be allowed only under the rules written down, because the CM is also the buyer.
Savings clauses say who keeps unused buyout and contingency.
The architect of record remains the owner's designer. The CM comments. The architect decides, unless the owner directs otherwise. Confusing that line produces drawings nobody will seal.
Coordination comments from the CM should be in writing and tied to an estimate, so advice has a cost.
CM at risk fits projects that need construction advice before the price, with an owner who wants to keep the architect.
A simple building with a finished design may not need it. Design-build fits an owner who wants one contract for both.
Examples
A hospital owner hires a CM during design development. The CM prices two structural options. The architect keeps the one the budget can hold. A GMP follows at CDs.
An agency CM attends the same meetings but signs no trade contracts and offers no GMP. That is not CM at risk.
The GMP amendment lists $4 million of work already under way and caps the remainder. Both are in the reconciliation.
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