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The purpose of this paper is to build a tested model and framework for describing the structure and factors influencing customer satisfaction in the construction industry.

The paper introduces a structural equation model illustrating the interdependencies of the factors influencing customer satisfaction. Data for the model are based on 831 assessments obtained from project customers with regard to the successfulness of the project.

The results show that customer satisfaction in construction is a complex phenomenon in which various factors have a different impact on the quality as perceived by the customer. Management and factors related to skills have a different impact on the factors describing the end result and methods of the project. According to this study, the contractor's ability to cooperate is divided into two directions: managing changes and communication. The result emphasises the significance of communication in project production. In order to improve their level of service, the contractors should focus on developing and improving their central processes. With regard to customer satisfaction, this stresses the significance of the entire selection of services and products the contractor offers.

Customer satisfaction has become a significant tool for measuring performance alongside the traditional, harder measurement tools. Although the demands of customer‐orientation and customer satisfaction have been acknowledged in the field, little attention has been paid to development of customer satisfaction and the factors involved.

Construction is often a long‐term project described as a dynamic and complex entity. This is one of the factors making the assessment of construction quality so difficult. The actors in the field of construction need versatile and systematic data about the quality of the construction process and the building in order to be able to operate in a customer‐oriented manner and develop their own operations. The purpose of this paper is to examine the typical factors in a construction project as regards customer satisfaction.

The cluster analysis differentiating between projects in this paper is conducted with a total of 831 construction projects.

The paper reveals seven similar but nevertheless different clusters. What the best clusters as regards customer satisfaction has in common is that the management's professional skills and the cooperation methods are successful when compared to other areas of the cluster. Additionally, good cooperation methods predict good level of customer satisfaction. In all clusters, handover inspections has the lowest level of success. When examining various, good and poor projects, it may be stated that the same factors were successful in all of the projects.

Improving the quality of construction projects from the customer's perspective has gained growing interest also in construction industry. Indeed, information about the project's success factors from the customer's perspective is needed in the construction business. Owing to the complex nature of construction and the special characteristics of project production, construction has had several problems in producing quality in a customer‐oriented manner. This paper describes, the success factors from the viewpoint of customer satisfaction. Construction has become a service industry adopting methods from the field of service management but the use of “soft” measurement tools, such as customer satisfaction, is still at an early stage of development.