Welcome to Owner Notes, a free newsletter for anyone planning (or dreaming about) a custom home. Each week, we focus on a specific subject that helps homeowners become more prepared and knowledgeable.

Designing for Your Budget

Estimating future costs of a custom home is difficult. The staircase in your building plans may be a part of your overall estimate, but it's still just an estimate. The actual costs you'll pay may not be clear until it's complete and you're on the hook. For this reason, it's important to plan ahead and design with your budget in mind.

The bottom line: complexity and difficulty usually costs more. A complicated, finely finished staircase is likely to cost more than a simple one. How much more? In many cases, it's an unknown. It often comes down to the time and materials required. Applied to an entire home, the question becomes: what's a homeowner to do?

Be Square ⬜️

The most cost-effective and reliable designs use right angles and standard lumber dimensions whenever possible. This approach may not excite architects, but experts agree on this subject:

"There are certain decisions you can make at the beginning of a process to keep costs down. The first and most important is to keep the form or shape of the house square or rectangular. A complex shape costs a considerable amount more because there is more surface area per square foot of interior space."

-- Sarah Susanka in The Not So Big House

"As for shape: be square. The only configuration of space that grows well and subdivides well, and is really efficient to use is the rectangle. Architects groan with boredom at the thought, but that’s tough. If you start boxy and simple, outside and in, then you can let complications develop with time, responsive to use. Prematurely convoluted surfaces are expensive to build, a nuisance to maintain, and hard to change."

-- Stewart Brand in How Buildings Learn

"When someone is looking for a way to make their dollar stretch the farthest, it's impossible to ignore the benefits of keeping the form simple. In general, the fewer corners you have in the exterior perimeter, the less expensive the house will be."

-- Sarah Susanka in The Not So Big House

"With occasional exceptions, make each indoor space or each position of a space, a rough rectangle, with roughly straight walls, near right angles in the corners, and a roughly symmetrical vault over each room."

--Christopher Alexander in A Pattern Language

👉 These quotes and much more can be found in the Getting Started with Build Plans chapter of our Planning Navigator Course.

An Example

Let's consider a deck. The model below is an extreme example, but imagine the extra effort required to build this deck's surface compared to a deck with only right angles. Each board would require a unique cut, which leads to more time and materials.

An architect may look at how cool and creative it will look.
A builder may look at how much time and materials it will take.
You will have to decide if a unique design is worth the extra money

In the News

Lumber prices are back to pre-Covid levels. 🎉

That's what I have for now. See you next week!

Lee LeFever, Build Livable

Build Livable helps homeowners navigate custom home construction. Learn More.
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Build Livable's Owner Notes + Courses for Homeowners

How Design Decisions Impact Homeowners' Budgets (ON #3)

Designing for Your Budget

Be Square ⬜️

An Example

In the News

Why Planning Home is Like Thanksgiving Dinner 🦃

2-for-1 Sale: Course Bundle for Homeowners

The Gap in the Homeowner Experience