Buying a lot and building your home is a huge investment. But it doesn’t mean you can’t achieve your dream house even on a tight budget. Fortunately, there are many ways to save money, even in the early stages of designing and building your new home. Here are some of them.
- Make Sure of the Building Location – Part of designing a house is knowing where to build it. First, it gives you a clear insight into what the foundation will be. This knowledge will also make it easier for your builder to establish the perfect foundation for your house. Another reason why this is important is that moving a house or its foundation even a few metres can be quite costly.
- Understand Your House’s Position – Aside from identifying the best place to build the foundation, it’s also crucial to decide on the positioning of your home. For instance, if you’re living in a hot area, you may want to avoid placing the living rooms where the sun can reach it. Aside from that, you can also position your home so that it can take advantage of natural lighting. By doing so, you can reduce utility cost.
- Make Smart Use of Living Space – Make sure to minimize any wasted space such as long hallways. Instead, think of a design that will maximize the use of space. You may also want to consider the layout of the living spaces. An open living space, where the kitchen, living room, and the dining room is in one place, often cost significantly cheaper than having them separated.
- Keep it Smaller – When designing your home with a tight budget, you may want to reduce the size of each room as much as possible. Even a metre off from your original house plan can save you money. However, it doesn’t mean you should make all rooms small. Knowing what your priorities can help you decide which room can make you a little smaller.
- Make it Simple – Everyone wants their house to stand out among the rest. However, doing so often requires complexities in construction. The harder and more complicated it is to build, the more expensive it will become. Another reason to consider is that it may not be profitable if you decide to sell the house later on. How many people can appreciate the unique and quirky design of your home? With that said, does it mean that you have no choice but to get a plain house? Surely not. There are many ways you can still design a simple, yet beautiful house. For example you may want to create a small outdoor space floored with concrete or you can source for a decking company that is doing clearance decking boards.
- Cut Some Corners – When designing your home, you may want to cut some corners. Of course, you want to save money. But what it means is that you don’t want a house with too many exterior corners. The more corners the house has, the more framing is necessary, which means you need to pay more.
- Do it Yourself – If you have some experience in building and designing your home, you may want to consider areas where you can build it yourself. It will save you hundreds, or even thousands. For instance, you may want to install a deck by yourself, or perhaps do the finishing of the house. There are also many DIY tutorials that you can find all over the internet. However, understand your limitations. Only do things that you’re confident in doing. You don’t want to end up spending money building something only to discover it didn’t go well as planned.
- Communicate and Involve Your Builder – When designing a custom house plan, you may want to stick to what you’ve done. However, it’s best to get the opinion of professionals who’ve been doing it for years. They can offer you valuable suggestions regarding tweaks and adjustments in your plan which can potentially save you hundreds or thousands. Don’t be afraid to ask questions. It’s better than you know what you’ll be doing than blindly barging in.