D5 Build brings control to complex handovers

The Challenge

Scaling up brought administrative bottlenecks & version control risks

D5 Build began as a small family construction business in Melbourne, Victoria. Today, it has grown into a team of 35 direct staff, supported by hundreds of specialist contractors. Its projects have transformed from smaller townhouse builds into more complex multi-residential and mixed-use developments.

This growth inevitably increased the pressure on the people delivering the builds.

Before implementing Procore, D5 Build relied on a mix of Google Drive, emails, printed documentation and manual binders, leading to long hours of administration managing drawings, specifications and project records. For Mandy Djurovic, Office Manager at D5 Build, keeping information current for all parties became a constant task.

“We had files in Google Drive, they were always being overwritten and making sure everything was up to date was a mess,” Mandy said.

If one page changed in a 30-page drawing set, Mandy had to extract the old page, insert the updated page and save the full set while making sure the right people knew about the changes. Specifications also created more work. Fit-out items including toilets, taps, power points, joinery and other buyer selections all needed to be found, copied, filed and shared. 

This was a real day-to-day risk. If any trade missed an update, there was a cost, time and rework impact on site. As Mandy explained, D5 Build needed to make sure “we don’t make errors on site, as this would impact our budget.”

This was what Srdjan (Serg) Djurovic, CEO of D5 Build, wanted to address when he first looked at Procore. 

“As the business grew, we knew the margin for missed information was getting bigger,” Serg said. “We needed Procore to give our people better visibility across projects, so potential issues could be picked up earlier, managed properly and resolved before they affected the site team.”

Procore was introduced because the old way of working was no longer sustainable for the people carrying it. Serg could see the hours Mandy was spending on drawings, specifications and site requests, often while the business was still small and the team was stretched. At first, the idea of learning a new system felt like another task on top of an already full workload. Over time, Mandy became the person who turned Procore from a tool the business had subscribed to into a system the team could trust.

The business case became stronger on the Park House, Richmond project, a boutique mixed-use development including 14 apartments and two commercial tenancies across five levels, with 2.5 basement levels below. Buyers had high expectations for finishes, while superintendents had contractual requirements to meet. The Body Corporate, actively involved in the project, needed confidence in shared spaces. For D5 Build, they needed to manage all parties and resolve defects while moving the project toward practical completion.

The Solution

Transforming handover pressure into collaborative site inspections

D5 Build now uses Procore across Project Management, Quality & Safety, Invoice Management and Financials. The Park House project became the standard way to use Procore for the company, with the strongest impact on the way the team was managing inspections, observations and handover. 

D5 Build used Procore to give everyone in the team a simple way to record what they saw. Superintendents, buyers and Body Corporate representatives all walked the site, raising observations, adding descriptions and attaching photos. This streamlined how the D5 Build site team could review each item and assign it to the right trade.

“Procore helped us keep this process simple,” Mandy said. “Collaborating created observations that were supported with descriptions and a photo.”

Handover is one of the most emotional and pressure-filled stages of a construction project. Buyers want confidence that the home they are receiving matches what was promised. Body Corporate representatives need assurance across shared spaces. Superintendents need evidence that contractual requirements have been met, and site teams need a fair way to manage what is a defect, what is incomplete and what is outside the builder’s scope.

Procore helped D5 Build deal with those moments before they escalated. Buyer variation lists were uploaded and linked to drawings, so site managers could check the record in real time on site. If a buyer queried a power point location or finish, the team could refer to the documented variation instead of relying on memory or calling the office.

For buyers and Body Corporate representatives, the process created a clearer way to raise concerns. For D5 Build, it created a fair record of what had been requested, what was in scope and what needed to be assigned, repaired or rejected. That helped take the heat out of handover conversations because issues could be checked against the project record in real time, rather than being debated from memory.

The same approach helped trades on the project. Observations were filtered by apartment, location, company and trade, giving subcontractors specific instructions and helping site teams track progress without losing sight of who was responsible for each item.

Mandy became the human centre of the change. After initially feeling overwhelmed by the time required to learn a new platform, she trained herself, worked through the system in the background and then helped bring the site managers, office team and subcontractors along with her. The shift was not simply technical. It required people across D5 Build to trust a new way of working and use Procore consistently on site.

That change management moment became part of D5 Build’s operating rhythm. The team brought site and office staff together, walked through the system and made the expectation clear: this was how the business would work moving forward. For a growing builder, that consistency mattered as much as the technology itself.

The Results

• Managed about 1,900 handover observations
• Helped improve quality outcomes by 50%
• Reduced handover friction by giving buyers, Body Corporate, site teams and trades one transparent record
• Helped site teams assign defects to the right trades with photos and records
• Supported D5 Build’s move into larger and more complex projects by strengthening collaboration with consultants and project stakeholders

Better records, stronger decisions and fewer disputes

On Park House, D5 Build raised and managed about 1,900 observations through Procore. The team used that record to track defects, support buyer walkthroughs, manage superintendent requirements and achieve practical completion. One requirement was to reduce open observations to fewer than 30 before practical completion could be completed.

For Mandy, the result was clear.

“Our process was very different prior to the Park House project,” she said. “Procore was the first time people could complete a site tour and take photos themselves. From my perspective, this new way of doing things was very successful.”

The impact went beyond defect tracking. Buyers and Body Corporate had a structured way to raise issues. Site teams had a fair way to manage requests, and D5 Build had a stronger evidence base when an item was not its responsibility. The result was a clearer handover process, where people could see what had been raised, who was responsible and what had been resolved.

“Procore gave us a transparent process for managing queries and resolutions, so everyone could see what had been raised, what was being actioned and what had been closed out,” Mandy said.

D5 Build estimates that quality outcomes improved by 50% through more structured inspections and defect management. The company is now extending the use of Procore across all of its other projects and continues to refine how it uses the platform.

This includes stronger financial control. D5 Build uses Procore Financials, Invoice Management and connected payment workflows to track subcontractor progress claims against work completed on site. That helps the business hold people to account and protect itself from claims that do not reflect actual progress.

As D5 Build looks toward larger residential, commercial, high-end home and mixed-use projects, Procore is helping the team keep control as project demands increase. The value is not only in the software record. It is in giving people across the project a common way to communicate, make decisions and move forward with confidence.

Procore has also become part of D5 Build’s value proposition in new business conversations. Developers, architects and consultants increasingly want to know what system the builder uses to liaise across the project. Being able to say D5 Build uses Procore helps demonstrate that the team has the right systems in place to manage drawings, submittals, meetings and communication with clarity and control.

In the past 12 to 18 months, D5 Build has also expanded how consultants use Procore, giving them controlled permissions to upload drawings, manage submittals and participate in meetings. That has helped position the platform not just as an internal tool, but as part of how D5 Build collaborates with the wider project team.

“With Procore, we have a stronger base for growth,” Serg said. “As D5 Build takes on larger and more complex projects, our teams, consultants and subcontractors need to work from the same information every day. That alignment gives us more confidence in how we grow.”