Did I miss the memo about housing builds skyrocketing?

I must be saving ALOT more than I thought....building one right now and if I have it figured right, I will only be spending $85 sq ft., contracting myself and doing the work I feel capable of doing.......but I will say that doing it this way sucks. It consumes ALL of your free time

Maybe i am more redneck than most of you but I am having a 30x40 metal building built with all the windows and doors on a 4" slab built for less than 20k. That includes all of my rough plumbing and electrical. About another 40k to finish it out.

Problem around here is, most anything with land is either a really old house that would need major overhaul/demo, or REALLY NICE houses that are out of my budget. We found a few that were close, but the ****ing builder always screwed up some layout with a "keeping room" breaking up the kitchen and the den, or some odd as hell space layout.

We're in a good rental that we can sit in and wait, but I really don't know for how long with the way my luck and the HOA work. And I have thought about waiting, but I just still can't fathom that material costs have gone up that much now.

I know a lot of you dont know me. I am long time creeper. (i dont typically sign in just read from afar.)

Anyhow. I am a builder in the Birmingham area and that price actually sounds about right for our market. We have customers in the $300 a sqft range right now and some at the $140. We do our best not work off sqft price though as it only ends up hurting all parties at the end. We have a different business model from other builders though.

wgamble said:

Maybe i am more redneck than most of you but I am having a 30x40 metal building built with all the windows and doors on a 4" slab built for less than 20k. That includes all of my rough plumbing and electrical. About another 40k to finish it out.

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Nothing at all wrong with that, BUT, that's apples to oranges.

Prices are nuts. When we started getting prices we were getting $90-120 turn key. We just got in our new house. You can save ALOT of money by GC'ing it yourself. And by doing a lot of the work yourself, if capable of course. It helps to have handy family and friends. We built a single story ranch style 2370 heated sq. ft house with 15x15 heated basement/safe room, vinyl siding, and a 30x40 metal shop. Full length 8" deep front and back porches and 550 sq ft of unfinished (but floored) attic space that I will finish at a later date. Final bill was $165K. I researched for over a year before diving in. Just setting up an account at the material supplier of your choice and the concrete plant saves a chunk of money.

customcj7 said:

Problem around here is, most anything with land is either a really old house that would need major overhaul/demo, or REALLY NICE houses that are out of my budget. We found a few that were close, but the ****ing builder always screwed up some layout with a "keeping room" breaking up the kitchen and the den, or some odd as hell space layout.

We're in a good rental that we can sit in and wait, but I really don't know for how long with the way my luck and the HOA work. And I have thought about waiting, but I just still can't fathom that material costs have gone up that much now.

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Sounds like Cookeville.

We've looked at buying a place and moving vs building on our land. As of now it looks like we're just going to stay in the shophouse and pay everything off, then build a house.


If we buy, I'm pretty specific on how I want the land to lay. At the very minimum 5 acres, and that's if it has a really good natural backstop (hill/cliff/hollow).


Anything we've found is either big custom homes @ $400K+, old shitty houses that need to be tore down, or it's just flat farm land/pasture that has houses all around it.

ONE place came up for sale about a mile from where I'm at now, that we should have bought. But I'd still have to build a shop on it.



I actually kinda hope interest rates will go up a little and the prices on **** will go down some

blacksheep10 said:

So wait a year.5 for this bubble to bust again. If you have enough to build now you'll have enough to build then. Everybody wants our house right now I just can't afford to build right now the way I want to. I'm waiting it out a bit.

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Very smart the bubble Is going to bust it's not far off by waiting you'll save yourself and family tons of money!!!

TBItoy said:

Sounds like Cookeville.

We've looked at buying a place and moving vs building on our land. As of now it looks like we're just going to stay in the shophouse and pay everything off, then build a house.


If we buy, I'm pretty specific on how I want the land to lay. At the very minimum 5 acres, and that's if it has a really good natural backstop (hill/cliff/hollow).


Anything we've found is either big custom homes @ $400K+, old shitty houses that need to be tore down, or it's just flat farm land/pasture that has houses all around it.

ONE place came up for sale about a mile from where I'm at now, that we should have bought. But I'd still have to build a shop on it.



I actually kinda hope interest rates will go up a little and the prices on **** will go down some

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It will just be patient. Right now is a sellers market. Whether you're selling the old house or brand-new house. Thanks will come back down to earth before to long. Save your money now and Buy cheaper down the road

Wait for them repo's like in 2010, a year and change after the rug gets jerked out

Yeah that's the plan . Hopefully pay cash for an investment property too.

There is a HUGE variation between houses $$$/sqft depending on the quality. We had a house built about 3 yrs ago on a lot we already owned. It was about $150-$155/sqft for the house, but it is brick, stone, and everything(windows, kitchen cabinets, granite, hardwood floors, lights, etc) is higher quality than a typical spec house would have.

Little closer to being under roof..

Congrat got anymore pics???

customcj7 said:

Building a house on a lot that I own. It would be the largest house we've been in, but it's not huge by any means, 2558 sq/ft.

I'm getting quotes from builders and they are all asking for prices at $140 sq/ft. Which puts this house at $360k. I literally about **** myself the first time, now I'm just thinking these people are insane.

There is no way in hell I'm spending that to build a house on my own land, if I didn't own the 3 acres I'm on, I might could understand it a bit, but WTF!?!?!?!?!?!?!

Has Birmingham gone mental on housing costs, or has material really gone up that much (the common excuse). Hell I know people who have 4500 sq/ft on the lake that only spent 425k.

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I actually design engineered floor systems for pretty much Birmingham to the Tennessee state line. We are getting in 5-8 plans a day right now, which doesnt include dimensional floor systems. 80% of which are being built within the next 3 months. 40% of which are over 5,500 sq ft. That being said, most contractors know they can name a price to 2 customers and at least one will say ok. That is why cost are so high down there.

It's pretty much the same over here in Louisiana. We just finished our new house and it was around $139 per heated square foot, but also includes my 30x40 shop. I contracted it myself which immediately saved $50K.
What I found is that it's hard to compare costs because everyone has different tastes and styles as well as most people may calculate their costs differently. Some folks use total square feet vs heated and some may add the cost of land in with it, etc. etc. The style and construction of the houses along with the finishes are really what affect the cost the most. Custom homes with better finishings obviously cost more than "builder grade" stuff.

Re:

Just got a shooting from the hip price to do a standing seam metal roof. 10-12 pitch, 3,000 feet floor space. That's heated and porch.

Said with that looking about 4,500 of sq foot on the roof.
He said 250 to 300$ a sq foot.

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When I used to build in Greystone Country Club(bunch of rich soccer mom MF'ers making doctors famous) and the houses started at 4500+ sq ft all the way up to 28,000 sq ft, with all the bells and whistles. Prices including a $150k lot, realtors rape fees, builders wee profits, direct building costs, we were in the $175-190/ft range. Typical amenities were granite counter tops, marble/ sand and finish hardwood flooring, upgraded fixtures, irrigation system with full usually $20k in plantings, poured wall basements(unfinished but roughed for future) silent floor systems, 50 year roofing shingles, full brick with minimal siding if any, and lots more finishes. To compare prices today for example, I had a contractor give me a quote to add 84 sq ft to an existing dock, 6-6' posts concreted in piers and 5/4" deck boards, $3500!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I priced the materials myself and they were $486, this jackass wanted to charge me over $3000 to frame it in. $36/ foot, ridiculous. Oh, and he asked me if I wanted to go ahead and get on his schedule? I told him I would get back with him but not to hold his breath waiting on that call.

In my opinion the best thing you can do is sell right now at the peak of this market. Hang on to your cash then when this giant bubble bursts, go build your new dream home.

I think today is the worst time to buy a new house as well as build. Everything is over valued. Granted I know nobody cares about my opinion but some strategic moves with patience can pay off HUGE within this next year or two

The evaluation and comments in the above post should be the biggest red flag for anyone about to build.

It's financially impossible to sustain this "phony" explosion in growth. When we add millions of more people on gov benefits, interest rates are at 0 even negative in some places in the world, you can't deny there is problem.

It doesn't have to be yours. If you save what you got until this market tanks, you can build your dream home for half.

Nobody believes me though. Lol

^^^^^^^ Smart guy right here. ^^^^^^^