Building a house.

[DavidG]

Now to pick your brains.

I want to build a house and can not decide between a kit home or starting from scratch.

I have not built a house before but I have renovated several and added rooms on.

The site is remote with poor access.

What advice would you give me. (apart from "don't do it")

[Grunt]

I would probably go down the kit home path. Ms. Grunt and I looked into it a bit and if we decide to move we would go for a Harkaway home and get them to build it to lock up and we'd do the rest. Harkaway say they will build it to lock up for around $80k and we'd need to spend the same again to build to completion.

[Ianab]

Having just watched a friends house being built - go for the kitset.
Even though this house was custom designed ( I helped with the floorplan sketches ;) ) and professionally built, all the wall framing and trusses arrived on site prefabbed. So if profesional builders consider it worthwhile to do stuff prefab then it's got to work just as well for DIY types.
I'd guess you will have the house closed in in 1/2 the time for very little more $$

I assume you have good enough access to at least ferry stuff in on a small truck or tailer?

Cheers

Ian

[Gaza]

Go the kit talk about value for money.<O:p</O:p

be careful when selecting finishes as often small changes are charged as big dollar variations, I have herd of people in the trade getting project homes built then ripping out kitchens and re-doing them, its cheaper than having the supplied one up graded.<O:p</O:p

My foks built a holiday house 20 + yrs ago it was single story timber frame on BJ's flat metal roof with timber cladding it went together over a couple of week ends and cost bugger all. <O:p</O:p

<O:p</O:p
When I get around to building a holiday house ill do the same or make it up in my factory at night then take it site and bang it together,<O:p</O:p

<O:p</O:p
One of the my lectures I had at uni Martin Upton has now released a range of "styled" kit homes they are pretty cool and range from a small office to a complete house,<O:p</O:p

[Wombat2]

I've done it both ways - the kit was the quickest and cheapest but then it was only a holiday home in the bush, and the other was our family home. If I was doing it again I think I would go kit - there are some nice looking one around.


David L

[elphingirl]

Hello David

Your post has finally pushed me out of lazily lurking, and prompted me to reply with my experience.
My partner and I purchased some land in the country, and designed our own home. We have owner-built, and three years later are finally approaching Occupancy. Throughout it we have met some fantastic tradies, learnt more than we ever considered, had a baby, went two years overtime and almost double the budget.
Immensely hard and rewarding work, but we should have more realistic about how much time and money we were going to put into the process.
Anyway, good luck - it'll be fun whatever you decide.

[seriph1]

I will add my support to Kit Home building, especially the Harkaway option mentioned by the Gruntmeister. I find their homes a decent blend of period appeal with modern amenity.

Either way you will have issues - just be ready for a year of project managing ....and never forget - when dealing with builders of any type, it's business now - friends later. Also, for unskilled and skilled work, do all you can to get an all-up price, as opposed to a daily labour rate...... they want their money and the time taken when paid hourly has been estimated as triple what it takes when a package price is agreed upon.

apols for the godawful english there

have fun!