Home plans

[Andrew B.]

Been a while since I've been on here.

I'm building a home (under 2000sqft) and a double garage. I need detailed electrical, HVAC, plumbing, foundation, etc. Thinking about customizing a little bit, but would like to see detailed plans for a house to research.

For a good set of plans what should one be willing to spend? I imagine there is alot of garbage on the web. but locally.

Thank you
Andrew

[Aaron McGinnis]

If you can start with a situation where you can do absolutely anything you want with very few restraints, AND you have a lot of patience, AND you've done massive renovations/builds in the past, AND you're a total house nerd with a true appreciation for space and architecture, then I MIGHT suggest that you take a shot at the floor plan yourself.

The sort of houses I build and renovate often are on tight lots, with zoning restrictions galore. Myself and my designer are both basically house-nerds with a deep appreciation for space and architecture. Our idea of a good time on weekends is to go look at houses and critique floor plans, space use, etc.

What I've found is that a good architect will, for a few thousand dollars, crank out a floor plan faster and better than I can and with much less strain and stress on my heart. For a full set of house plans, I'd expect to pay $4000-8000 depending on size, detail level, and how many hoops the architect has to jump through to satisfy zoning, etc. (Bear in mind, this is City of Atlanta... and they hate builders and renovators with a personal passion)

For that price, I also expect the architect to take my license and go pull the permit himself, walking the plans through the building department. In Atlanta, this is a process that takes about a month if you don't run into problems any any phase of approval.

The only things I don't ask the architect to design are the electrical plans, HVAC, and plumbing. Electrical I do like to kick out myself (And it doesn't take long to do), and HVAC/Plumbing generally doesn't really need a plan to do their thing.

I outsource foundation design to an engineer. For about $900 I expect them to make a site visit and give me a framing and foundation design. The architect will draw it, then the engineer stamps his approval on it.

So to recap - in my experience, an architect will save you time, money, frustration, and lost building time. He may also enable you to dodge potential bullets by pointing out small things like, "This roof will create a 20' tall attic" (Seen it happen on a job where the owner tried to save pennies by designing the house themselves), or "This window is too small to meet the City's egress code, which exceeds IRC requirements"