I have no intention of airing dirty laundry. Brad, I do not think “everyone is trying to rip you off” as you put it, and I never said anyone was a "scam artist". I was merely telling Ron about what not to do, from my own experience with designer and GC, and how to protect yourself. I think you're reading more into my post than what is actually there.

Protecting yourself has no bearing on the process that should be followed – complete design, real world costing, and then frame cutting. To NOT have real world costing of a complete design sets you up to go way over budget. Yes your costing is going to have many variables which must be taken into account, which is why, as I mentioned, you or your project manager has to have the experience to know if a bid is reasonable or not, and how to make educated assumptions and estimations to put together a real world cost. Ron asked a question and I tried to answer with what to be aware of, to hopefully prevent someone from going through what I have.