Browse Forums Owner Builder Forum Re: Owner Builder - was it worth it? 6Oct 11, 2018 7:29 am Designer,Engineer (Civil,Const & Envir),Builder,Concrete & Masonry Contract.Struct Repairs Re: Owner Builder - was it worth it? 16Nov 24, 2018 9:23 pm My suggestion is.. to be an owner builder, there is only one thing you need to think thru. TIME. Either you have a lot of time to attend to your own build.. or you don't mind taking a long time to finish the build. And you will need quite a bit of time to study and plan what you are to do with your house. One advise is to take your time in the planning process. You will learn a lot while you do your planning and by the end of the planning process, you will understand more on where you will need help when start building. Re: Owner Builder - was it worth it? 17Sep 29, 2019 8:01 pm One extension and one little holiday home as owner builder. Get a plan, either from a TAFE designer or architect for $750-$1,000, get your own soil/footings report ($300) and contours/features ($550) and get up to three quotes for the build. Contact this forum for builders or use the web to get prices."Productreview" is also a web site with four star reviews and one star ("do not use this builder"!) reviews and look at the percentages. One builder topped the charts with 25% being one-star reviews, so a quarter of his customers would not recommend him! Get your own quote for the earthworks and compaction and access way and compare them to the builder's quotes. That way you can see the 100% mark-up available as a saving for you. Learn from the mistakes you, the designers and builders make and ask them to correct their mistakes in their plans and quotes. My architect made two major mistakes by not knowing specific R-Code requirements and the builders also differed in their designs.. Compare the specifications of the builders. One builder, e.g., quoted a "meter box" and another quoted a "lockable meter box". As thieves cut the power to cut the cameras, I asked the first builder if his box is lockable, no, extra cost $200! The first builder then forgot the $200, when told other builders quote for lockable boxes. So you learn that the standard specifications are the bare minimum offering. One builder may ask $500 for a quote and others will do it for free if the jobs are scarce as they are now in WA, after all, from a floor plan and your roof specification, the base build cost can be very quickly estimated for you via software builders have. During the build you will have to try to see the house almost daily as owner builder definitely and less often so with a project builder. Regardless how you build, you will have to know what you want. Do I want 28course bricks or 31c? Homes used to be built with 31c or about 2670mm high, now builders have dropped the hot ceilings onto your heads with 28c walls. Bricks used to be 4" or 100mm, now they are 90mm. Do you allow the concreter to lift the steel after pouring of the foundation or do you expect the steel to stand on chairs, which is the correct standard? Do you let the builder get away with 85mm slab thickness, which may only be 60mm somewhere or will you insist on 100mm footings, because you have some experience as an owner builder from a course or reading the Internet or talking to trades? Will you insist on anticon with tiled roofs as water will get in and damage the timbers? Once you select your own trades based on recommendations and quotes, you will constantly have to check the quality of the build and not let a trade or builder promise to fix it and demands to get paid; the web tells me builders cannot be told a progress payment will be held up until what is not according to contract or standards gets fixed, You will be sued. When you hire your own trades, you will not be bound by a HIA/MBA contract, which works in the industries favour, not your own. Such a contract demands you prepay most of the work I found out. As an estimate, you can save yourself about $30 - $40,000 as an owner builder. This is why industry lobbied our politicians to restrict owner builders. And I hope you do not rent a place too far away from the site. You can hire a building inspector and one hopes the trades listen to him, especially if they do not get paid until it is fixed, a builder will not have to listen to a building inspector, only to a lawyer and surveyor or engineer combination. Good luck! Hi VK, Think it's worth investing time in an Owner Builder course to equip you with basic knowledge on Australian Building Industry and its regulations. Also, I suggest… 11 22824 Hi all. Anyone know when the $11,000 limit was set in legislation for renovations in QLD? Ive been renovating for 5 years now and this was the limit back then. As we know,… 0 4249 |