How does it work?

EstatesMaster predicts the best-performance cost of providing facilities services.

It uses data on cost and performance of service delivery gathered and analysed over 40 years by the author and his former colleagues at BWA for the Scope items in each cost centre.

The program then asks the key questions about the buildings, the services and the levels of performance which are the cost drivers for each cost centre

EstatesMaster Lite is a cheaper and quicker version of the main program . It uses the full power of IFPI’s outstandingly successful EstatesMaster benchmarking and cost prediction program by accessing the most cost-sensitive of the key questions and answers required for completion of the more detailed comprehensive version of EstatesMaster .

What does EstatesMaster take into account?
EstatesMaster developers have over 40 years first-hand experience of benchmarking facilities services. They know all there is to know about the factors which drive the costs and performance of facilities services i.e.
• Scope
• Use
• Building configuration
• Quality
• Cost drivers
• Market conditions
• Etc.

The program takes all these resource drivers into account assessing their impact on each site.

Different Levels of access
EstatesMaster can be used at 3 different levels of detail:
• Lite Level One - for 'ballpark' high-level estimates
• Lite Level Two - for 'first strike' high level benchmarking or budgeting
• Full EstatesMaster - for more accurate detailed benchmarking or budgeting

Multiple building benchmarking
A unique feature of EstatesMaster is its ability to let you benchmark or predict the costs of facilities services across estates of buildings; size of estate is not an issue - the largest estate currently has about 8000 buildings split between UK and International properties.

It is clearly impractical to benchmark each and every building on such estates - or even smaller ones of 20-30 properties - so EstatesMaster allows you to answer the cost driver questions for categories of buildings e.g. warehouses, back offices, classroom blocks etc etc. .However provided the model knows the basic sizes and configuration of the buildings it can also generate INDIVIDUAL benchmarks for each and every building as required.

You can always override the category answer with more building-specific answers and so find more accurate benchmarks for individual buildings in a category. And you can split your answers within a category to reflect known variances in quality and performance.
All versions of EstatesMaster can be used to benchmark either single buildings or whole estates – there are currently estates of up to 8000 buildings being benchmarked under licence to IFPI Ltd (the developers of the EstatesMaster program).

Getting 'ballpark' estimates
Even at the highest 'Free estimate' level EstatesMaster is an infinitely more reliable method for getting 'ballpark estimates' than by 'asking around' or looking up price books. Many people who do not understand the complexity of facilities services are under the delusion that it is possible to benchmark costs without going into the detail of the buildings and how they are being serviced. Nothing could be further from the truth : which is why EstatesMaster – even the Lite versions – has to ask basic questions about the buildings and services being provided.

E.g., to start with it identifies the 'scope' of each cost centre thereby eliminating the largest source of error in any facilities cost estimate. It also asks about the buildings and the standards being achieved across the board and level of difficulty achieving those standards. In a word – the aim is for a site-specific benchmark.

At the Free estimate' level (where available) it is still only possible to get a ball-park to within about +/- 35% but Level 1 will get you to +/- 25% for a nominal licence fee.

These wide tolerance levels are not a deficiency in the program; the level of accuracy achievable is entirely down to the amount of information you can/want to enter into the program.

Pay a bit more for Level 2 and you are then +/- 12.5% - close enough for 'first-strike' benchmarking.

However many licensees prefer to use the Full version of EstatesMaster which takes the results nearer to +/- 5% provided the answers to the model’s simple questions are reliably accurate.