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Having Your House Built

GQgeek

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Originally Posted by Piobaire
Thanks again for all the input gents. We are going to set up an office visit with the builder in the second week of June and see if this still sounds like the thing for us.

Have you given a thought to designer modular homes? There was a thread on this a while ago and some of them were really cool. I don't like most family homes. They all look the same to me, both inside and out. If I'm ever in a position to buy a plot of land and stick whatever I want on it, I'd want something a bit unique, and filled with high-end materials. The other benefit with modular is you can eliminate a lot of the hassles of building from scratch and know what you total costs will be before you start.
 

spertia

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Originally Posted by Piobaire
What exactly were the headaches? And wouldn't the headaches be in the short run? Or is this house messed up forever?

Good point -- it was a poor choice of phrasing on my part.

The house itself is fine, but only after huge price overruns, construction delays, etc. It simply took a lot more time, work, and money than was ever anticipated. Just getting plans and such approved can involved lots of jumping through hoops, depending on where you're trying to build (granted, this was in Southern California).
 

Piobaire

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Originally Posted by spertia
Good point -- it was a poor choice of phrasing on my part.

The house itself is fine, but only after huge price overruns, construction delays, etc. It simply took a lot more time, work, and money than was ever anticipated. Just getting plans and such approved can involved lots of jumping through hoops, depending on where you're trying to build (granted, this was in Southern California).


Ah, thanks for the detail. I won't deal with the hoop jumping, that's why I'm paying a builder. Plus he has built this basic plan before; it is not a from scratch bespoke custom but rather more like a MTM suit. I asked someone in the know about build times in this area and he said in 2006 people were often bumping into their 18 month construction loan limit but in 2008, homes are getting done in nine months.

I have done mucho contracts in my time, I will be reading my contract thoroughly and then getting my friend, who is an attorney in construction/real estate law (a large part of his practice is construction cases) to read it too.

Thanks for the issues though. One is going to come up in this thread that I have overlooked, and that might be the one that saves ******.
 

Piobaire

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Originally Posted by GQgeek
Have you given a thought to designer modular homes? There was a thread on this a while ago and some of them were really cool. I don't like most family homes. They all look the same to me, both inside and out. If I'm ever in a position to buy a plot of land and stick whatever I want on it, I'd want something a bit unique, and filled with high-end materials. The other benefit with modular is you can eliminate a lot of the hassles of building from scratch and know what you total costs will be before you start.

I am going to stick with a traditional build. Those things look all gee-whiz but come resale time, and that time always comes sooner or later, what people are used to sells the fastest and for the best price. In our time house shopping, we have noticed that the most heavily customized homes stay on the market the longest.
 

briancl

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Originally Posted by GQgeek
Have you given a thought to designer modular homes? There was a thread on this a while ago and some of them were really cool. I don't like most family homes. They all look the same to me, both inside and out. If I'm ever in a position to buy a plot of land and stick whatever I want on it, I'd want something a bit unique, and filled with high-end materials. The other benefit with modular is you can eliminate a lot of the hassles of building from scratch and know what you total costs will be before you start.

Some of the prefab stuff I've seen is very cool. It definitely matches our aesthetic and should we ever make it out of the city, we may end up going that route.
 

LabelKing

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I'd build a luxe version of East German design. I think I'd like a tortoiseshell room veneered in tortoiseshell but designed entirely like what I imagine a top DDR official's office looked like.
 

Piobaire

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Originally Posted by LabelKing
I'd build a luxe version of East German design. I think I'd like a tortoiseshell room veneered in tortoiseshell but designed entirely like what I imagine a top DDR official's office looked like.

I will keep that in mind.
 

TheFoo

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Originally Posted by Piobaire
I am going to stick with a traditional build. Those things look all gee-whiz but come resale time, and that time always comes sooner or later, what people are used to sells the fastest and for the best price. In our time house shopping, we have noticed that the most heavily customized homes stay on the market the longest.

Sure, but what's the point of building a custom house unless it's customized for you?
 

odoreater

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Originally Posted by mafoofan
Sure, but what's the point of building a custom house unless it's customized for you?

I think what he was trying to say is that those modular houses are not his taste.
 

Piobaire

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Originally Posted by odoreater
I think what he was trying to say is that those modular houses are not his taste.

I was trying to say that.

I was also saying you can customize a house to the point where it is probably useless for anyone except you, so keep that in mind come re-sale time. As I do not plan to live the entire rest of my life in this house, re-sale is a consideration. We looked at one house for over $2 million that had only one bedroom, and a small one at that. It also had no pool or spa/hot tub, but had a 10 car garage and a very nice aviary in the front room for exotic birds. The house has been on the market for 18 months or so.

We found a floor plan we are in love with. Our changes are going to be along the lines of setting up a particular room designated "Bedroom #5" into an exercise room with either tile or decorative cement flooring. Instead of the "formal dining area" in the "gallery." I intend to have a nice custom bar installed. A large walk-in closet in a hallway marked "Storage" will be a walk in wine cellar. Several more things like that, and trust me, this will be OURS, but should be something that will still attract multiple buyers when it comes time to sell in 10-20 years.
 

odoreater

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Sounds pretty sweet to me. My "gym" is in my garage. Heh.
 

Piobaire

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Originally Posted by odoreater
Sounds pretty sweet to me. My "gym" is in my garage. Heh.

Thanks, it sounds sweet to me too
smile.gif
Trying to set up a meet between us and builder in two weeks to take this to the next level. Still just kicking tires and test driving though. No ultimate decision will be made until I see who's elected POTUS. We might just stay put if Barry has his hand on the Bible in January.
 

gumercindo

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Piobaire: just out of curiosity, what state are you in?

The project sounds exciting! But, b/w the purchase of the land and the construction of the house, is it really that good of a deal (in general)? Curious...
 

Piobaire

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Originally Posted by gumercindo

The project sounds exciting! But, b/w the purchase of the land and the construction of the house, is it really that good of a deal (in general)? Curious...


That's what we are trying to figure out gumer, if it is a good deal or not. Meeting with a building consultant in 2-3 weeks to look into it more. As I said above, it seems if done right, you can build something that will instantly appraise for 20-30% more than what it cost you to build it. That would certainly be a really good deal IMO.
 

Jumbie

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It might be fun to play with Google Sketchup http://sketchup.google.com/ to give you some ideas of what things will look like. My father was building a garage (obviously much simpler than a house) and we used it to get some ideas of how different options would turn out.
 

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