Considering Owner Building

Hi All,
Me and my wife have built 2 houses before ( both by builders)
We have a block in munster that is 650m and 19.85 front ( prefect rectangle) We are looking at building a 325sqm house
The houses that we are looking at are around 350k from builders
We are considering owner building so that we can save money aswell as putting in our own appliances/ fittings into the house.
We run two businness and have two kids and understand our life will be chaotic whilst building.
I have no tradesmen skills at all.
But I have friends who are a
Painter
Plumber
Electrician
Concreter
Showerscreens
Cabinet Maker / kitchen designer



With the last two houses we did ... doors, painting, soakwells, carpets, tiling, fencing , gates, aircon, patio, paving, range hood, showerscrrens, downlights
etc etc... I have experience dealing with tradesmen
I am worried about blowing the budget by totally sutffing up the house.
I havent been to a draftsmen or anything yet.
I have a salesmen at Premier Homes who is modifying one of their designs to our specs and he is getting back to me with the price. But I would prefer to owner build.


Any feedback you can give me would be appreciated


Thanks all
Jamie

My quick 2 cents;

I'm skeptical about the saving money component; sure, you'll be able to call on your friends to supply & install for cheaper, but anything that goes wrong has to be fixed by you. Going with a builder, anything not to your specifications is their problem, not yours.

Paperwork and etc. might be a hassle as well...

Have a read through the owner builder section. You will read some interesting threads.
You can save money and get a better spec home built just as you want.
But it can also go pear shaped.
I'm owner building and have had a very positive experience, however I'm a carpenter so have a good understanding of building and will do much of it myself.
I can imagine it being very daunting if you don't have any idea as you need to think many steps ahead if you want the building to go to schedule and not waste money.
You could try going to one of the owner builder talks they run at home base. They are fairly frank about the challenges you will face.
Just remember that having a house built for you and building one yourself is very different. There are literally hundreds of decisions that are made by supervisors and builders during a build that you would never be aware of as the owner.
All the best with whatever decision you make.