The Five Phases, In Order
Almost every building project — a single home, an apartment, or a commercial block — moves through the same five phases. (1) Design & planning: an architect turns your requirement into drawings, and a structural engineer makes them safe to build. (2) Approvals: the local authority sanctions your building plan and you clear the legal paperwork on the land. (3) Foundation & structure: excavation, footing, and the concrete skeleton (columns, beams, slabs) go up. (4) MEP & finishing: plumbing, electrical and other services are laid, then plaster, flooring, paint and fittings turn a shell into a space. (5) Handover: final checks (snagging), the occupancy paperwork, and moving in.
The phases overlap in practice — finishing on one floor can run while the structure rises on another — but the order rarely changes. You cannot finish before you have a structure, and you cannot legally build without approvals.
Who You Will Deal With
The confusion in construction usually comes from the sheer number of players, each with a different role. Broadly: designers (architect, structural engineer, MEP engineer, interior designer), builders (the contractor and their subcontractors and labour), material suppliers (manufacturers, distributors, dealers and retailers), and overseers (a project management consultant, or a site engineer keeping quality and pace on track).
You will not need all of them. A homeowner building one house typically works closely with an architect and a contractor, and buys materials either directly or through the contractor. A developer building for sale coordinates the whole cast. Our "Who's Who" cluster breaks each role down — start there if the job titles are what's confusing you.
How the Money Flows
Money in construction almost never moves as a single payment. Professionals (architect, engineer) are usually paid in stages tied to design milestones. Contractors are paid against physical progress — a slice released as the plinth is done, more as each slab is cast, and so on — with a small percentage (retention) held back until defects are fixed after handover. Materials are paid for as they are ordered and delivered.
This staged model is your main protection: you pay for work that has actually been done. The single biggest way homeowners get burned is paying too much, too early. Our "Money & Payments" cluster explains normal payment stages, how much is reasonable at each, retention, and GST.
Where To Start Reading
If you are building or renovating: read this, then the "Who's Who" decoder, then "Contract Types" and "How Payments Work". Those four cover 80% of the anxiety and protect you from the most common mistakes.
If you work in the trade: the same clusters, plus "Quality & Measurement" (BOQ, rate analysis, measurement books) and the procurement supply-chain pieces, are written for you. Every article is tagged for the consumer track, the pro track, or both.
Frequently asked
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