How to actually estimate the cost of your new home
So many options which is the right one?
At some stage in the process of building your brand new dream home you are going to have to come up with an estimate of how much it will actually cost to build your home, When confronted with this often daunting task many people jump to the internet to begin their search for a simple easy to use template that they can borrow and utilize to calculate the cost of their new home. Now while there is lots of options available online it is vital to have some sort of understanding about what is driving these calculations in order to ensure you are on the right path, underestimating your budget can lead to disaster further down the line in the building pipeline and is a nightmare to confront especially for first time home builders or those that have availed of some sort of funding.
Firstly it’s vital to understand that there is a plethora of factors that go into calculating the cost of your new build. The traditional formula of calculating your build cost is the “per square meter” model which is widely known and used but it has its own flaws that often peak through further down the line in the build process, A further refined model which we recommend is including additional parameters such as the perimeter and style of roof in your per square meter model as these can have a vast impact of the cost of your build.
Perimeter length
As you will see in the diagram below we have three separate house designs all with the same square footage but different perimeter lengths, now by using the traditional model the cost of building these houses would be the same right?
Well, in fact, the house that has the largest perimeter length which is house C would be more expensive as there would be a greater wall-length used in the construction of that house which in turn would drive up labor and material cost.
Roof design
Another element which is vital to consider is the roof design that is used for your new home, In NSW typically one of two roof styles are used
#1- Hipped Roofs
#2- Gable Roofs
The style of roof used for your home is actually determined by the design and floor plan you decide to go with, Using the above example House C would require a hipped roof to be used due to the layout of the floor, The other two houses could have a gable roof layout which typically works out less expensive compared to hipped roofs.
Conclusion
Simply put calculating the cost of your build is more complex than just calculating the square footage and putting the figure into some template and then believing the answer it provides you, their is nuances to any cost calculation when it comes to building your dream home and its essential you get it right before moving forward.