The construction arbitrage game
Three months of a real maintenance firm. Price the work, pick who does it, fund the gap, and try to end the quarter in profit.
What it actually simulates
You are a general maintenance company. Not one trade, all of them. Property managers send you work, you put a price on it, and then you decide who actually does it. Hand the whole job to another firm, or put your own people on it. Whatever is left between what the client pays and what the work costs you is yours.
That spread is the entire business. It is much easier to understand once you have priced a job badly and watched it eat a month.
Nothing in it is a dice roll
Every bad outcome traces back to something that was on the screen when you chose. A review count. A missing certificate. A trade that does not match the job. A date too close to the deadline. The information is always there before the decision, which is how it works in real life, and why most people still lose money at the start.
The part that catches people out
It is not pricing. It is cash. You pay subcontractors long before the client pays you, and the tax you have been holding back is not yours to spend. Most failed runs are not unprofitable, they are simply out of money on the wrong day.
Common questions
- What is the construction arbitrage game?
- It is a free browser game that simulates three months of running a general maintenance company using the construction arbitrage model. You price incoming work from property managers, decide whether to subcontract each job or run it with your own people, manage cash flow and tax, and try to finish the quarter in profit.
- Is the construction arbitrage game free?
- Yes. It runs in the browser, there is no sign up, no account and no payment. Your progress is saved locally on your own device so you can close the tab and carry on later.
- Do I need any construction experience to play?
- No. The game explains each decision as it arrives and narrates why an outcome happened. Beginner mode teaches as you go. Advanced mode removes the lessons and runs at full speed for people on a repeat playthrough.
- Is construction arbitrage a real business model?
- Yes. Acting as the main contractor, winning the work and subcontracting it out is ordinary practice in construction. The model itself is legal everywhere. What varies by country and by state or province is compliance: contractor licensing, business registration, insurance and tax.
- Why do most players lose money in the game?
- Usually cash flow rather than pricing. You pay subcontractors before the client pays you, and the tax you have held back is not yours to spend. Most failed runs are profitable on paper but run out of money on the wrong day.
Read the model properly
- What is construction arbitrage, the full explanation of the model
- How construction arbitrage works, step by step
- How to find and vet subcontractors, the half the game punishes hardest
- Pricing and margins, where the spread is won or lost
- Is construction arbitrage legit, and where compliance actually bites
- The 90 day start plan, if you want to do this for real
The people doing this compare notes in Construction Arbitrage Players. That is where the real numbers get argued about.