Owner Builder Question: What are some affordable options for the house plans for your dream home?
0 Comments | Posted by armchairbuilder in Owner-Builder
Cross Section of Wall
February 25, 2019
Stock House Plans
Have you looked to see if there are any stock house plans out there that come close to what you want? Having an architect design a plan from scratch, as you may have found out, can be quite expensive. By purchasing a stock plan, you get the same detail, but the pricing reflects the fact that the architect’s design cost is spread over many plan purchases. And if you haven’t yet looked, there are literally hundreds of thousands of plans out there for sale. If you go this route, we would recommend purchasing the digital file (in CAD) to allow a local architect to make any changes you might want to make. It costs a little more for the Autocad file, but it makes changes so much easier.
House Plan Designer
The other option you have for creating your specific design, is to give your hand drawn plans to an individual that draws house plans…there are lots of options out there of folks that are trained in AutoCad that aren’t architects. This will get your plans drawn more cheaply, and then once done, you can have your local architect put the finishing touches on them to meet local code and check beam sizes, footing/foundation design & dimensions…etc. Much like everything else you contract out, be very specific when hiring the person to draw the plan…at a minimum you will for sure want all elevations drawn, foundation plan, first & second floor plans, cross sectional wall details, cabinet layouts, electrical plan, roof plan, and any other detail drawings that aren’t obvious from the plans. Check with your local building department to find out what exactly they require for permit.
Armchair Builder House Plan Articles
We have several articles at the armchair builder blog that give information on obtaining your house plans as an owner builder. Here’s a link to the articles…be sure to type “house plans” into the search box in the blog to see all of the articles available. House Plan Articles
