What Are The Three Types of Home Remodeling Change Orders? And How We Avoid…

Back to all insights July 9, 2026

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New England Design & Construction CEO David Muniz Supple lays out the three types of change orders in the residential remodeling world in Boston and why NEDC’s change order rate is so low compared to the industry:

“We are anti-change order. It’s a differentiator because within the industry of design and construction, change orders, I don’t think it gets really talked about. It’s a little bit of a hidden unspoken blush on the industry, but they are common. I think if you look it up, you’ll find a 25% increase in cost. For us historically, it’s under 5%. We don’t want them on our projects, but that is different than the industry at large. I have heard comparable firms to ours—they target a 30 to 50% increase in cost in change orders after construction starts. That means the design was completed.

So let’s look at this. How could we have under 5% but another firm with a great reputation, beautiful work — you look at our portfolios, it’s like what’s the difference? One is under 5%, one is 50%. Right? Where does this come from? Well, I’m going to tell you.

So, let’s just take a million dollar project. We estimate it as a million dollars. This other firm estimates it at a million dollars, but the final price is different. Like, that’s not an apples to apples comparison, right? But you don’t even know it. You don’t even see it because the changes are to come IN CONSTRUCTION.

So, let’s break this down. Where do change orders come from?

There are three types of change orders:

Those are client-driven changes — like something is added, something is modified, they change their mind, let’s say in design. That’s one type.

Second type, there’s unforeseen conditions. Oh, you see this is HGTV all the time. Oh, I didn’t know this beam was here. Oh, we didn’t know these pipes were here.

And the third type we REMOVE ENTIRELY is incomplete planning. Okay? Because we are both the architect and the builder.

I’m going to give you a very practical example. I’m going to just sketch something out. I’m going to show you. All right. Good. So let’s say this is a floor plan. Maybe this is a kitchen and this is a living area. And the idea in design is to remove this wall. Make it an open concept.

This is estimated based on this being a nonstructural wall. And just looking at this floor plan, the assumption typically would be that this is not a structural wall because you would assume, you know, the joists run in parallel with that wall. Unless that was checked and verified, it could not be. Let’s say that wall was supporting this beam down the center of that floor plan and then every joist rested on that. So you take away that wall and you take away the floor above it. This would be a change order. Very common. Very common. This is an example. We would not have this. This doesn’t count. Okay? If this ever happened on one of our jobs, we would take complete responsibility for it because it shouldn’t have happened.

What should happen is in design that is investigated properly, okay? As to what is the structure. We’re not going to make the assumption. That’s on us to verify. So, our first phase of design is called pre-design because we’re not going anywhere. We’re going to build it. You know, the only person to point the finger at if this did come up is at ourselves. As opposed to if there is a separate architect and a separate builder, the architect’s like, “Oh, wow. Well, shoot.” And uh they didn’t look at it, right? They don’t even think with it. I won’t say all, but most — if they’re not building it, that accountability, that’s for the builder to figure out or whatever.

That’s one example. And for us, you know, we really pride ourselves on that completeness of design. And we do not have this third type of change order which is the discrepancy — you know, and then that falls down when there is a separation of accountability or responsibility. There’s a separate architect, separate builder, designer, you know it falls down on the client and that is a valid change order. There’s nothing illegal about this wherein the 30 to 50% is targeted. It’s just actually an outcome of the system that we’re operating off of.

And so wanted to share that with you. We are anti-change order and we hope to inspire the industry to follow that.”

New England Design & Construction CEO – David Muniz Supple