Custom Home v Project Home

eshan · Mar 24, 2019 9:29 pm

Hi All,

My build cost excluding landscaping and pool is turning out to be approx $670k with rawson homes for a 5 bed, 4 bath house, with 2 alfrescos and all display home items included. It is a 43 sq. home.

Just need some suggestions if i am better off building with a custom home builder given the price range.

Please share your thoughts and let me know.

Thanks,

gogo65 · Mar 24, 2019 10:11 pm

43squares is approx 400sqm, so $1675sqm, that’s pretty good.
A custom home would Start at $2000sqm so $800k, assuming you’re in Sydney?

eshan · Mar 25, 2019 12:58 am

gogo65

43squares is approx 400sqm, so $1675sqm, that’s pretty good.
A custom home would Start at $2000sqm so $800k, assuming you’re in Sydney?

Thats what i have been reading everywhere else as well. Would that include any landscaping and pool though? Adding another 50 k for pool and 20k landscaping does add up to almost 750k on my rawson build.

gogo65 · Mar 25, 2019 7:20 am

Absolutely not. Custom builders build the house.
50k for a pool seems way to small, once you include pool fence etc and 20k for landscaping wouldn’t include driveway refining walls.
Don’t forget you’ll probably still add more to your tender for electrical tile kitchen etc.

Forg · Mar 25, 2019 8:36 am

Yeah, look we had a similar decision to make, except we went the other way around. We wanted to at least cost a custom build, because we wanted a design that incorporated appropriate shading, encouraged breezes, etc. When it came out around $1.2m with the only feature we couldn't get with a project builder being solar hydronic under-floor heating, we started looking at instead modifying project home designs.

By the time the house was done, without landscaping it came out about the same cost as you're looking at, eshan. It's probably not quite right to extrapolate & say an equivalent custom build will therefore cost you $1.2m, but it's certainly true that it could easily cost you $1.2m.

Joker · Mar 25, 2019 6:24 pm

Did a full custom home build,using project manager,home 48 squares,includes 2pac,3merbau decks, massive double sided stone entrance,top range German appliances,gas log stove,6star heating,air con,4step cornices throughout home,200mm skirtings,2.7 ceilings,40 metres of engineered retaining peaking at 2 metres high and rendered,40,000bricks used and home half rendered,solar, several skylights, cost 620,000,so saved anywhere from 200-300 000,point is volume boys can't do high end custom home especially if it has some shape ,has volume generally do more boxy houses dressed up, there are many ways to do a home.

eshan · Mar 26, 2019 1:28 pm

gogo65

Absolutely not. Custom builders build the house.
50k for a pool seems way to small, once you include pool fence etc and 20k for landscaping wouldn’t include driveway refining walls.
Don’t forget you’ll probably still add more to your tender for electrical tile kitchen etc.

Driveway and retaining walls are included with the builder. So 20k for rest should be ok. 50k for pool may be a small pool but think thats all we can afford at the moment.

eshan · Mar 26, 2019 1:29 pm

Forg

Yeah, look we had a similar decision to make, except we went the other way around. We wanted to at least cost a custom build, because we wanted a design that incorporated appropriate shading, encouraged breezes, etc. When it came out around $1.2m with the only feature we couldn't get with a project builder being solar hydronic under-floor heating, we started looking at instead modifying project home designs.

By the time the house was done, without landscaping it came out about the same cost as you're looking at, eshan. It's probably not quite right to extrapolate & say an equivalent custom build will therefore cost you $1.2m, but it's certainly true that it could easily cost you $1.2m.

We have tried doing the same. Modified an existing home plan to suit our needs. Looks like custom build is not affordable at this point. who did you build with?

eshan · Mar 26, 2019 1:32 pm

Joker

Did a full custom home build,using project manager,home 48 squares,includes 2pac,3merbau decks, massive double sided stone entrance,top range German appliances,gas log stove,6star heating,air con,4step cornices throughout home,200mm skirtings,2.7 ceilings,40 metres of engineered retaining peaking at 2 metres high and rendered,40,000bricks used and home half rendered,solar, several skylights, cost 620,000,so saved anywhere from 200-300 000,point is volume boys can't do high end custom home especially if it has some shape ,has volume generally do more boxy houses dressed up, there are many ways to do a home.

Which custom builder dis you build with?

Forg · Mar 26, 2019 4:12 pm

eshan

We have tried doing the same. Modified an existing home plan to suit our needs. Looks like custom build is not affordable at this point. who did you build with?

Unfortunately this doesn't help you; a mob named Alkira Homes who were bought by (and I'm not 100% sure this is correct) one of the Rawson brothers & now only does house+land packages under a different company name.

The finishes etc they had by default were pretty akin to what Rawson & Eden Brae were pushing.

Eco Builder · Apr 24, 2019 7:07 pm

As mentioned above it really does depend on the quality of finishes you want
Cookie cutter home builders (Volume Builders) tend to get good pricing for their materials due to economies of scale, and they also get much better pricing from their trades for ongoing work.
The issue is usually they stipulate the prices for their trades!
So the trades generally look at getting things done faster in order to make the right money
I used to work for a few volume builders in Brisbane that paid a decent SQM rate - higher than most. My partner and i could build a 2 storey 400sqm home from slab to roof in 10 days, including straightening walls, studs etc. Problem was that sqm rate made us $20 per hour working 10 hour days. The only way to increase the hrly rate was to build even quicker - dont straighten walls, dont straighten studs etc etc. It would all still meet code but was not ideal which is why I went custom.
Haven't seen many volume builders at the Master Builders Awards ceremonies

Joker · Apr 24, 2019 7:12 pm

eshan

Joker

Did a full custom home build,using project manager,home 48 squares,includes 2pac,3merbau decks, massive double sided stone entrance,top range German appliances,gas log stove,6star heating,air con,4step cornices throughout home,200mm skirtings,2.7 ceilings,40 metres of engineered retaining peaking at 2 metres high and rendered,40,000bricks used and home half rendered,solar, several skylights, cost 620,000,so saved anywhere from 200-300 000,point is volume boys can't do high end custom home especially if it has some shape ,has volume generally do more boxy houses dressed up, there are many ways to do a home.

Which custom builder dis you build with?

Owner built with a project manager whom I interviewed and checked out several of his builds and spoke to home owners and his trades,then let know I knew a bit and was a quick learner who would be heavily involved, went brilliant,PM's name was David Bauer from Bauer homes.

milo123 · Aug 10, 2020 11:53 pm

Does Access homes Australia still exist? They were formally known as Alkira homes & had display homes at Kellyville Homeworld.. Cannot find any info on Access Homes Australia now. Does anyone know new contact details for Acchess Homes Australia. Built with Alkira 6 years ago.

gogo65 · Aug 11, 2020 10:56 pm

Hall and hart bought out their display homes and their copyright to plans, not sure if Alkira completely folded after they sold.

ECHB · Nov 18, 2020 3:01 am

Eco Builder

As mentioned above it really does depend on the quality of finishes you want
Cookie cutter home builders (Volume Builders) tend to get good pricing for their materials due to economies of scale, and they also get much better pricing from their trades for ongoing work.
The issue is usually they stipulate the prices for their trades!
So the trades generally look at getting things done faster in order to make the right money
I used to work for a few volume builders in Brisbane that paid a decent SQM rate - higher than most. My partner and i could build a 2 storey 400sqm home from slab to roof in 10 days, including straightening walls, studs etc. Problem was that sqm rate made us $20 per hour working 10 hour days. The only way to increase the hrly rate was to build even quicker - dont straighten walls, dont straighten studs etc etc. It would all still meet code but was not ideal which is why I went custom.
Haven't seen many volume builders at the Master Builders Awards ceremonies

What about California?
It's an expensive area too, man
I went out to these guys https://www.constructelements.com/ and decided to build on my own. What do you say, bad idea? Could anything go wrong with companies like this?