Musings about fraud

[Sam M.]

I was thinking today about the discussions we have had about fraud and what it means. I got to thinking over the last several years of my construction career and realized I was just as passionate about exposing fraud as what I am seeing in the real estate industry/business.

Case in point: I bid on a commercial job a few years back that was 65,000 square feet with 7 levels stepping back from a shoreline with an additional 40,000 square feet of deck over each roof system. I bid 900,000.00 to frame this project (including fasteners, crane and equipment but not materials) and was beat by 250,000.00!!!! You may say 900k! No wonder you were outbid! Here is the kicker. The only other crew that bid was a crew that had been caught by the feds twice already for hiring illegals AND did not pay their workers as employees or cover them with workman's comp insurance but paid "by the piece". Their expenses were controlled by doing this and they didn't have to take the risk associated with paying by the hour and underestimating the number of hours it would take to complete the project. At 65,000/month payroll liabilities it can eat you up pretty quick.
It pissed me off! What were these clowns still doing in business? Doesn't anyone care that these people are cheating?

It reminded me of how the real estate agents react to what they believe is fraud. I would get all worked up over it and even lost sleep trying to figure out a way to get the clowns out of my world.

Anyone else have similar experiences?

[Account Closed]

The biggest problem with fraud is that it brings down new laws on those of us who are behaving ourselves in a reasonable manner.

The government never kills a fly with a flyswatter. They bring out the elephant guns so that any new laws intended to stop fraud make life much more difficult for everybody. (and often don't actually stop the fraud that was targeted in the first place.)