Itemized Cost to Build a New House 2018-19

[ocean view]

My guess on the Santa Rosa cost figure being high, even for Bay Area standards, is due to construction demand. There just aren’t enough contractors and laborers to meet the demand.

 

[street]

MS >>> beautiful! We did the same thing but my wife and I were mid 20's when we did ours. I saved a bunch, building it ourselves and had a house payed of by 28 years old, and started investing hard for the future.

Great Job!

 

[mountainsoft]

MS >>> beautiful! We did the same thing but my wife and I were mid 20's when we did ours. I saved a bunch, building it ourselves and had a house payed of by 28 years old, and started investing hard for the future. Great Job!

Thanks. I was 39 when we first started building, my wife was 34. I'm glad we didn't wait much longer. I still do most of the same things at 55 but it takes a bit more effort than when I was in my 30's.

Sadly, while I started my IRA in 1999 we really didn't get serious about saving until around 2015. So now I'm saving every penny I can to try and catch up. We should still be able to retire in just under five years, but it sure would have been nice to start saving more earlier.

On the other hand, once the house was done we were able to enjoy traveling for several years. I am happy we did that while we were still fairly young.

 

[Scrapr]

@mountainsoft
did you post that up over at Fine Homebuilding message board BITD? I thought I recognized your message board name. Then the pictures remembered me

Very nice

 

[Ronstar]

My wife and I built our forever home back in 2004 for $60K (Washington State). We did all the work ourselves; crawlspace foundation, framing, roofing, windows, plumbing, electrical, insulation, sheetrock, flooring, built our own cabinets, tiling, etc. 2003 - Building Our Own House

Granted, not everyone has the time or resources to build their own home. We also had a few things going for us, as we already lived on the property in a mobile home. So there were no impact fees, septic system, or well to contend with (we already did those when we first put the mobile on the property). However, doing it ourselves saved us a ton in labor costs, allowed us to upgrade to nicer hardwood flooring, tile, better window coverings, etc. Best of all we paid out of pocket and a little bit of savings so we had no mortgage when we were done.

Still, there are many things in that chart I would not consider "must haves". For starters, just because the average home size is 2500 sq/ft doesn't mean you need that much space, especially just for two people. Our home is 1495 sq/ft and feels like a mansion to us. We both grew up in homes less than 800 sq/ft and lived quite comfortably. (At $150 sq/ft a 2500 sq/ft home would cost 375K compared to only 225K for a 1500 sq/ft home). More space just equals more junk to fill it, more materials to build, more to heat, more to clean, higher property taxes, etc. Luxury items like granite counter tops, exotic wood cabinets, paved driveways, expensive light fixtures, high end plumbing fixtures, and so on are not "must haves".

$8K for painting? Please. A brush, paint roller, and a couple hundred bucks in paint at most. It's not rocket science and doing some work yourself could save you thousands.

Nice House! And nice video too!

 

[ivinsfan]

Mountainsoft have you priced decent paint lately...no way you can paint and prime an entire house for a couple hundred bucks...we pay a buck a gallon paint purchase fee in this state.

I realize this is small potatoes but everything costs more and the cost just keep going up.

Your house is beautiful, but take 60K and index it with inflation and increased regulation of building costs. Add the things you had already paid for and in today's number that 60 is a lot higher.

 

[mountainsoft]

Mountainsoft have you priced decent paint lately...no way you can paint and prime an entire house for a couple hundred bucks.

Actually, yes, we just repainted my mom's 1400 sq/ft house and garage last year, inside and out including her outdoor shed, for $550 including paint, rollers, brushes, caulking, and other supplies.

Fixing Up The Dallesport House

Yeah, that's more than a couple hundred bucks, but way below the 6K price in the chart. Even if it cost two or three times as much you would still be way ahead.

I restained the exterior of our house a few years ago. Less than $100 for a 5 gallon bucket of Behr semi-opaque stain, enough to do the whole house.

Interior paint is about $30-50 per gallon for most brands at Home Depot. Primer tends to be a few dollars cheaper. Save more by buying 5 gallon containers ($75-100).

1 gallon is usually enough for smaller rooms, you might need 2 for larger rooms. Maybe $200 max per room if you want different paint colors for every room. Using the same color for multiple rooms is a lot cheaper.

Obviously, the larger the house, the more paint you'll need, and the more it will cost. Back to my original comment about large houses not being must haves.

Your house is beautiful, but take 60K and index it with inflation and increased regulation of building costs. Add the things you had already paid for and in today's number that 60 is a lot higher.

Agreed, we would not be able to build for 60K today. Prices have really skyrocketed. One example, I paid $800 to shingle our roof when we first built it. I replaced the shingles a few years ago to stop a pesky leak I couldn't find and paid $4000 for the exact same shingles!

There were no "impact fees" when we first bought our property and moved the mobile home on back in 1991. They were up to 20K by the time we built our house in 2003 but since we already lived on the property we didn't have to pay them.

So yes, it would probably cost 2-3 times as much to build our same house today. In any case, labor is a significant portion of any project (houses, car work, landscaping, etc.). If you can do the work yourself, all you have to pay for is the materials.

 

[mountainsoft]

@mountainsoft did you post that up over at Fine Homebuilding message board BITD? I thought I recognized your message board name. Then the pictures remembered me. Very nice

I don't remember posting there, but it's certainly possible. I visited lots of forums, read lots of books, and studied each step before embarking on each project. And that was back before YouTube videos were a thing.

 

[kgtest]

Actually, yes, we just repainted my mom's 1400 sq/ft house and garage last year, inside and out including her outdoor shed, for $550 including paint, rollers, brushes, caulking, and other supplies.

My ole man is so cheap he re-uses and remixes paints. He gets the paint from neighbors, friends, kids, and even the County Disposal...supposedly people throw away full paint cans, almost unused.

 

[mountainsoft]

My ole man is so cheap he re-uses and remixes paints. He gets the paint from neighbors, friends, kids, and even the County Disposal...supposedly people throw away full paint cans, almost unused.

It's nice he is able to make use of paint that would otherwise go to waste. I don't know that I would want to paint my house with it, but for random projects I'm sure it would work fine.

If you don't care about the color, you can usually find discounted paint at Home Depot or Lowes. They usually have several cans of paint that were mixed wrong and are now set aside for quick sale. It's brand new paint, just the wrong color for whoever wanted it initially.

 

[Omega]

We have found our house desires greatly reduced also.

This! I "downsized" to a townhouse when I separated from my spouse a year ago, and now I wan to downsize again lol.

We bought a semi-custom home in a development about 17 years ago, chose siding, cabinets, floors etc. from about 4 options in each category. I agree that we spent A LOT more than we anticipated after we moved in, but I really enjoyed decorating and making that house our own.

I do not have the same desire in my new place. I just don't care as much about decorating, I'd rather spend my time doing other things.

 

[Teacher Terry]

6 years ago when we downsized some friends of ours that were much older inherited some money so ran right out and bought 3k sq ft house when there old one was 1600. They don’t have kids or big parties so totally crazy. They thought we were crazy and tried to talk us out of it.

 

[aja8888]

6 years ago when we downsized some friends of ours that were much older inherited some money so ran right out and bought 3k sq ft house when there old one was 1600. They don’t have kids or big parties so totally crazy. They thought we were crazy and tried to talk us out of it.

Even our 1,976 sq.ft. house now seems too big sometimes, but there are times when DW and I need to be pretty far apart for a spell.

 

[Teacher Terry]

We each have our own office and 2 TVs in the house)