THE PRINCIPAL
David Laramie
LEED® AP · B.S. Building Construction Management, Michigan State University · OSHA 30 · CMAA member · Chicago, IL
Twenty-five years in construction — project manager, project executive, VP of Operations, and President. David has directed capital programs worth hundreds of millions of dollars a year, run a general contractor's full P&L, and personally built the AI engine that now multiplies both — the coverage of a department, run by one principal.
At Gilbane Building Company (Project Executive, 2013–2021), David directed a major housing authority's capital construction program — $200–300 million a year, 185 projects, 125-plus active at once. The authority itself named him Deputy Program Executive of that program — the owner's own title, not the contractor's. He selected, negotiated with, and oversaw general contractors; managed budgets, draws, funding compliance, closeout, and cost certification support; and led a staff of dozens. He delivered large occupied rehabilitations with residents in place throughout construction, and, as construction manager holding the trade contracts, delivered a $215 million courthouse — a multi-courtroom facility with complex MEP, advanced security, and secure detention infrastructure — three months ahead of schedule and $10 million under budget, through the height of COVID.
At Apex Construction Group (President, 2023–2026; VP of Operations, 2021–2023), David held full executive leadership of a $50 million general contractor — P&L, operations, estimating, and delivery. He restructured debt, recovered receivables, managed lender and capital-partner relationships, and rebuilt the firm's estimating, buyout, and delivery processes.
Earlier in his career: at URS/AECOM (Senior PM, 2012–2013) David ran an owner's high-rise life-safety program across dozens of occupied senior buildings. At Southland Medical Center (Senior PM, 2011) he took an adaptive reuse — including a VA clinic — from planning to completion in under four months. At JLL Construction (Construction Manager, 2007–2011) he helped build the firm's Chicago construction division into a multimillion-dollar annual business, delivering commercial interior and fit-out projects year over year. At Burling Builders (Project Manager, 2005–2006) he delivered a South Loop hotel and an apartment building.
Experience described represents work performed while employed by or engaged with the named organizations. No endorsement, sponsorship, or affiliation with BuildIQ Advisors by any named organization is expressed or implied.
David is proficient across the systems that run a construction program — Procore, Primavera P6, eBuilder, MS Project, Timberline, Prolog, SmartApp, and Bluebeam — and, more recently, across the tools that build AI applications: Claude Code, AI-assisted application development, LLM application design, prompt engineering, and product architecture. David built both. That's the difference BuildIQ Advisors runs on.
Available for full-time, interim, and fractional engagements.
Professional Services Disclosure
BuildIQ Advisors provides construction advisory and consulting services — including owner's representation and program management, preconstruction and bid advisory, estimating and quantity verification, schedule and delay analysis, project recovery and turnaround advisory, and fractional or interim construction leadership — under a signed engagement agreement between BuildIQ Advisors and the client. These services are performed to the standard of care customary for construction advisory professionals performing similar services in the relevant market at the time services are rendered. BuildIQ Advisors is not a licensed architecture firm, a licensed professional engineering firm, a certified public accounting firm, or a law firm. This site, and the services described on it, do not constitute architectural, engineering, accounting/attest, or legal advice; where such services are required, we recommend the client engage the appropriate licensed professional, and BuildIQ Advisors will identify that need where we observe it. Findings, analyses, and recommendations delivered under an engagement reflect professional judgment applied to the information available at the time and are provided to support — not replace — the client's own decision-making. They are not a certification, warranty, or guarantee of project cost, schedule, or outcome. The scope of services, standard of care, and limitation of liability applicable to any engagement are set out in the executed services agreement, which governs.