Design and build your custom home

Dreaming of custom designing your own home?
The most important thing is to make sure that the construction company you choose is given the time and resources to bring your vision to fruition. To create the property of your dreams it’s not worth compromising on quality in order to shave a week or two off the construction time.

It’s also important to ensure that the project doesn’t suffer endless delays and stretch out long beyond your projected timetable.

When it comes to designing and building a custom home, there are generally two different approaches you can take. Which one you choose will have a massive effect on both the cost of the project and the time it takes to come to fruition.

The design and build route

In the world of construction, the phrase “design and build” refers to a specific procurement process and the type of contract associated with it. In layman’s terms, this means engaging one company to handle all of the designs, planning permissions and construction logistics. houseUP will create a bespoke design and build package especially for you, including definition of all of the property’s specifications and all planning permission applications.

One major advantage of tackling the issue in this manner is that the specifications are tailored to your particular budget, since the company which authored those specifications is the same one that will build it. As a result, you’re far more likely to stay within your initially agreed budget. Meanwhile, by only having one firm with whom you deal, you’ll increase efficiency, simplify things and expedite the whole process. From start to finish, including design, planning permission and construction, the design and build route takes approximately 18 months for completion of a custom home.

The tender route

The (perhaps more traditional) alternative to the design and build route is contracting an architect to handle the initial design and planning permission applications. While this may be a tried and tested route for tackling those two problems, things become more complicated once the actual construction gets underway. For this, the architect will employ a structural engineer to fashion the home’s structural design, while also creating the tender documents for the project, which contain its specifications and technical records.

The competitive tender

The tender package is then given to one or more construction companies for them to bid upon, with their quotes often 20% to 25% higher than the original budget that was agreed with the architect. All of the above normally takes around nine months to complete, with the tender package the most expensive part of the process. After that, it will normally take around six weeks to evaluate the quotes, choose a construction company and negotiate the contract with them. Finally, the actual construction itself will take approximately one further year, resulting in a total of two years to complete the custom home when using an architect for the design.

The negotiated tender

If you already know which construction company you want to carry out your project, you can choose the negotiated tender route. Your selected contractor will produce a quotation, which is negotiated until an agreement is found. It’s extremely effective when you have tight timelines and a trust relationship with the contractors.

Win-win for everyone

Of course, this mode of operation benefits the clients, since they will be sure to achieve the best possible results for the agreed price. However, the construction company itself will also profit from taking an assiduous approach to selecting the right materials for the job. For starters, high-quality building materials are easier to manage, install and work with in general. They also result in fewer defective pieces, generating less waste from the project, while superior supplies also allow for faster speeds on site.

To achieve the optimal value for cost rate, building companies constantly strive to select the best suppliers on the market for each construction material. Often, they will create long-lasting partnerships with suppliers, so that they always have access to the best materials at the best prices from a source that they know they can trust.

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