Getting blueprints created.

[JoeE]

Hello. Joe Newbie, here... I was wondering what kind of advice I could get on hiring an architect to formalize the (very) informal home design my wife and I drew by hand. We basically mapped out the desired floorplan and rough measurements.

How do we get from "bar napkin" to the format that a builder would need to put together an estimate? How long does it take and how much does it cost to get a residential architect to put it all together?



Thanks!

-JoeE

[mjpliv]

There are really three choices to have professionally produced plans made for your new home.

The cheapest one would be to hire a draftsperson who would take your hand drawn plans and translate them into either a hand drawn or Autocad drawn set of "blueprints". The positive side of this choice is the price. It would be the cheapest option for you to take. On the negative side, you are hiring someone to reproduce your drawings as you did, complete with any errors or design "faux pas"'s that are included. In addition, you will still be left with any structural analysis work to be done.

The second choice would be to use a home designer. There are basically two type of home designers. Those who are accredited by the AIBD (The American Institute of Building Design) and those who are not. Those who are accredited have demonstrated to the association through an examination process that they have the knowledge required to design homes. This does not mean that they are better designers than those who are not accredited. Like any other professional service, get references and have a look at their work. The positive side of this choice is having an individual who will work with you smoothing out the rough edges of your design and producing a set of professional plans for a house that can actually be built as per plan. The negative side to this choice is that, in some regions, you may still require the services of an engineer for final approval of the plans. Cost is a non-issue because a competent home designer can save you the cost of the design service and more in most cases.

The third choice would be to hire an architect to design your home. As with a home designer, you will work with a knowlegable individual who can smooth out design and structural issues but with an architect you may find that there will be a great deal of emphasis placed on the estetic values of the project. You will be working with highly trained people with a professional work ethic. The positive side of this choice is having someone who can "take responsibilty" for the design and structural integrity of the project. The negative side is the cost which, depending on the architect you choose, can be quite high.

[roger g]

I guess this is the way things are going. What a shame. When I left school I apprenticed as a structural steel draughtsman ( they dont do apprenticeships for that anymore, go figure!) People used to come up to me with drawings on paper napkins and they would pay me to turn them into house plans. I did this as a sideline. These were very basic plans and I didn't have to worry about repeating any of their errors because in most cases there wasn't any information to contain any errors. They would give me a basic shape of the house they wanted with the rooms,closets, windows and stairs in locations that they wanted. I had to juggle all this stuff into a house where all the dimmensions fit and worked out right. As far as being structural sound, I used "common building practices".As example all basements had 10 inch block walls. All walls were 2x4 at 16 inch centres and the list just kept going. Every house was the same. Only the shape was different. A detail drawing of the foundationwall is pretty much the same in 90% of all the homes built today. In fact most detail drawings ( those are the little drawings within the blueprints that show greater detail of certain aspects of contruction) are common to the average home.
I haave found over the years that sometimes the worst built houses I have ever seen have been built by builders, NOT by individuals. Ordinary people do not know how to cut corners in house building. Builders can cut corners to speed things up or to put more money in his pocket.Even hiring poor subtrade workers (cheaper again).
I'm getting off track here. Any building code will tell you what material to use and the dimensional material that is to be used. House building is not rocket science though it seems it is going that way. For the minutely small percentage of houses that should be designed properly due to location or features wanted it has shifted to that most houses should be designed.
If houses are built to code then the design problem has in most cases already been done.
I'll get off my high horse now.

roger

[JoeE]

Awesome information! This is the kind of dialog I was hoping for.

Would an architect actually turn out the drawings that a builder needs to complete the construction? Or is there another step to getting those made?

Also, if you want to get a bank loan to begin construction, what do you need to show them to ensure that you're project is worth financing? What kind of validation is necessary to get thier stamp of approval?

[mjpliv]

The building codes only address what the minimum requirements are. In most cases, basic homes, using basic materials, using basic loads, located on basic support soils will require only basic plans.

Unfortunatley this scenario rarely exists. Load tables in building codes assume uniform loads only, any concentrated or trapizoidal loads require the ability to design the beam/footing or access to the software that does. A 20' girder truss can generate loads in excess of 10,000 pounds. The loads must be managed with columns through the structure down to a support footing that will definatly exceed the capacity of a standard 10'x20" footing. Even neglecting to show a basement drain location or not providing for a window that meets egress requirements for bedrooms can cause grief later on.

Using a design/drafting professional of some sort does not eliminate the possiblity of costly construction errors or code violations - but it sure does minimize the possibility.

Be carefull about painting "builders" as a group of shysters who are only interested in putting up a house at the lowest cost using sub-standard materials, labour and construction methods. In my experience, this is far from the truth. Like any profession there are "bad apples" but for the most part you will get value for your money. In most cases I find that dissatisfied home owners are the ones who choose a contractor/builder based on price and price alone. The industry is far too competetive for people to quote jobs with big profits and still expect to get work. The best any contractor can hope for is fair value for the materials used in the home, a fair wage for him/herself and those that work for the company, be able to operate and maintain the required equipment and realize a fair profit when all the dust has settled.

[mjpliv]

Most architects can/will produce a working set of plans for you although they may contract out the drafting portion of the job(hey - draftpersons have to eat too!).

From what I have seen most banks will need a set of plans (or feature summary) of some sort for them to apply whatever formulas they use to determine the "mortgagable value" of a home based on lot assessment, square footage, number of bedrooms, etc.

[mjpliv]

Something to note, most banks (in my area anyway!) are reluctant to provide construction mortgages to people building thier own home. Generally they prefer to work through interim financing or a line of credit and then complete the mortgage when the house is finished. In the case of a builder building a house then you would have access to a construction mortgages with draws at predetermined construction points (ie - foundation in, roof tight, pre-drywall).

[mjpliv]

Another note,

With regard to my first response I was making the assumption that you are building in the United States and therefore referenced the AIBD. If you are building in Canada there is no national home design association offering accreditation but some provinces and/or municipalities are working on it.

[JoeE]

Thanks, I really appreciate all the info.

[Rich]

For construction loans most financial institutes will require 20% equity or downpayment.
I strongly suggest to take mjpliv's advice on some type of designer/architect/etc. I have created plans for many people from "bar napkisns" but they were essentially rectangles with very straight forward spans, etc. There were a few projects that I completely designed and drafted myself for people, but I consulted an engineer to design load transfer beams etc.. as it was beyond my capabilities. Builders and architects typically have a poor relationship but that has begun to change in the last few years (10) where there are more design/build firms and the 2 factions have seen that they can benefit from each other. You might want to look into a design/build firm for that reason - they agree ahead of time on the details as they are the same entity. Just a suggestion.

[roger g]

My final 2 cents on this.As I said before that probably 95% of homes built are basically basic in nature. (How's that for a twist of words) Even those houses that are "custom built" are really basic homes jazzed up a bit but the home owner feels or is led to feel that his house needs " special" desgn needs. Over the years I have seen (even on this site) the common use of using engineers and architects. On contruction sites I have been on , to cover someones tail they have brought in those people for some minor situations. The catch phrase is always " are you willing to assume responsibilty?" You can always make a case for hiring these people.
I give you one small example but it is typical. In fact too typical. A few years ago I was project manager (one of many) at the world games in Edmonton Canada. One of my jobs was to arrange approximately 2000 banners to be hung around the city on the lamp posts. Apparently a few months before we got there one of the light standards had rotted (rusted) and had fallen over. The city engineering department wanted me to have an engineering study done of every light standard that I wanted to put a banner on! That's 2000 studies!!!! They were afraid of the extra wind load might topple the pole. Of course "they" made a case for these studies and to be honest they made sense but was not reality. No one wanted the responsibilty. I even pointed out that by doing all these studies it showed that the city was concerned about the poles and what would happen if a pole thst didn't have a banner on it killed somone. How would the city lawyers get out of that hole. Scaring people is easy especially when safety is concerned. The " what if " phrase, spreads.
Anyways, I didn't get any studies done and just sat on it for a few weeks untill one of the big wigs came up to me and asked how the banner program was going. I told him it wasn
t going anywhere and the city wasn't going to get any banners (another scare tactic) Needless to say a letter was written to the chief engineer and the banners were erected. Architects and engineers ARE needed in some cases but not as often as sometimes mentioned. I have a nephew is one and he can make a case for enginnering to water your grass!
Nuff said.

roger

[Rich]

I was always taught to shed the risk in any situation. That doesn't mean disregarding my knowledge of construction - it means you better get someone to CYA. I always figure I'm better safe than sorry. Even the smallest miscalculation and if something were to go wrong.. it's my butt, my income, my family, my way of life.. and I'm not about to give that up because I was too cheap to hire an arch/eng.