Why You Can’t Build Your Own Home By Yourself

 | 
author/source: Jennifer Franklin

Photo Courtesy of thayran-meloYou’ll Need An Architect

Building a home isn’t just about bricklaying and plastering; even if you’re great at those things, you’ll still need an architect like those at http://cbidesign.net/ to bring your ideas to life. In fact, the whole process should really start with the architect because you’ll have to have a good idea of size and layout, as well as what materials will be needed before you can budget or plan for anything else, let alone get started.

You’ll need to find an architect you can work with and who understands what it is you want in your new home but who can put their own knowledge and experience into the planning as well, ensuring that not only will the house look great, but that it will be comfortable and functional too - the last thing you’ll want is a building that looks wonderful on the outside but that you can’t actually live in comfortably.

Remember as well that an architect doesn’t just design your home, but they’ll also be able to help when it comes to getting permits and licenses for your project, saving you a lot of time and effort cutting through the red tape.

You’ll Need Contractors

There’s a lot of work to do when it comes to building a house out of nothing, and even if you’re a keen DIY-er, this is a huge project to tackle by yourself. For one thing, you’ll more than likely have work to do, so you can’t give the project your full attention, and secondly, unless you’re an expert in building houses or even constructing walls and putting in doors and windows, you really might end up with a home you’re not proud of - it might not even be a safe place to live.

Photo Courtesy of This Is EngineeringWhen you hire contractors to do the work for you, everything will be better. These experts will bring a wealth of knowledge with them that most people aren’t going to have, and they’ll have a lot of experience too, as they will have done similar work in the past. This means your home will be up to standard. Plus, because this is what contractors do all day, every day, they’ll be able to work much quicker than you could, ensuring your new home is ready to move into many months earlier than if you had tried to build the place yourself.

Even better is the fact that contractors will usually have a project manager (or you can arrange for one), meaning that you can essentially just leave them to work on your new home while you focus on your family, hobbies, work, and so on. This will be a lot less stressful and, as we’ve said, when experts are in charge, the end results tend to be a better one.

You’ll Need Specialists

General tradespeople are wonderful, and it’s clear that they’ll be a big part of your new home build if you decide to engage them (which you should), but don’t forget that you’ll also need specialists to help you finish things off in the right way.

Specialists will work on your electrics, plumbing, interior design, any eco-friendly elements you want to include, and so on. Essentially, anything the general contractors don’t do, you’ll need to find a specialist to do it for you. This is usually non-negotiable as, even if you did decide to do the bulk of the work yourself, these specialist skills are unlikely to be anything you’ve ever encountered before, no matter how much DIY you like to do. Plus, some of the work, including electrics and working with gas, requires qualified technicians to do the work and sign off on it to prove it’s safe. If you don’t have this element, then it could become impossible to sell the property later on, not to mention the fact that you might be living somewhere that’s massively unsafe.

As you can see, the idea of building a home is a great one, but it’s definitely not a solo job.