Building a house in Donegal Costs...

ShowMeTheCash

Hey all, I know this question has been posted before in a number of different places, but it is an ever changing question more so due to the economic climate... Also I am from Donegal so I want to know what costs are involved in Donegal or if anyone has recently or currently doing the same.

So I plan to build a house possibly in the next 12 months.
Assuming I have already have the land and planning...

I am looking to build a 4 bed house, a family home, I know the cost of this will depend specifically on what I plan to build but I am looking for a rough estimate...

If anyone can outline maybe a rough estimate of the different costs involved it would be of great help.

Also assuming I have the land, does anyone know what kind of mortgages are given for someone building a home?
Is a deposit required? Or can the value of the land be taken into account and collateral?

Any advice would be appreciated.

homer simpson

How long is a piece of string???

There are far too many variables involved for anyone to give you even a rough idea of how much it might cost.

Contact your bank / mortgage centre for info on that & lift the phone and make a few appointments with builders but they will need to see plans before giving an estimate.

There is no easy way around it.

muffler

You will be required to achieve a BER rating of C1 minimum and given the amount of works involved I would expect you to pay in the region of €100 - €120 per sq. foot or possibly more depending on design and other factors. That would be for a builders finish and wouldn't include the cost of site and maybe the services. If you have family/friends in the trade who would chip in if you went down the direct labour route you could be looking at saving something in the region of 10 - 20 euro per sq. foot but again it varies an awful lot.

For mortgages you will be required to have at least 20% - 30% of the value in savings. Again this varies from lender to lender and no, site/land will not be used as collateral.

I'll move this to the prices/costs forum where you should also have a read at a few of the other threads there which contain lots of valuable information and advice etc.

ShowMeTheCash

So spoke the bank.
So yeah for the normal, fixed or variable rate mortgages you are roughly looking at 25% of the value of the home.

In terms of building and possibly purchasing land it comes down to a few things.

1. You need to purchase the land.
Bank has indicated if you have savings with the bank i.e. Mortgage deposit, it is better to allow the bank to lend you the money to purchase the land, keep the savings in tact, when you are ready to build a mortgage can be drafted to incorporate the loan amount for the land.

i.e. you have 40K saved, the land you are purchasing is 40K, you have worked out the cost of the home to build is going to be 120K.

Bank lends you 40K normal non secured loan.
You then take out a mortgage for 120K + 40 = 160K
You use the 40K as the deposit on the 160K

On the how long is a piece of string, yeah this I know this, what I was looking for was if someone has done this before, like muffler said it can cost 100eure ps.

I know a few years ago people talk about per block, builders may build for a euro a block etc....

Also, cost of getting electric or water put in with the council.....
I will do this when the time is right, this was more just to get an idea of what other people did and they cost they experienced.

caddy16

ShowMeTheCash wrote: »

So spoke the bank.
So yeah for the normal, fixed or variable rate mortgages you are roughly looking at 25% of the value of the home.

In terms of building and possibly purchasing land it comes down to a few things.

1. You need to purchase the land.
Bank has indicated if you have savings with the bank i.e. Mortgage deposit, it is better to allow the bank to lend you the money to purchase the land, keep the savings in tact, when you are ready to build a mortgage can be drafted to incorporate the loan amount for the land.

i.e. you have 40K saved, the land you are purchasing is 40K, you have worked out the cost of the home to build is going to be 120K.

Bank lends you 40K normal non secured loan.
You then take out a mortgage for 120K + 40 = 160K
You use the 40K as the deposit on the 160K

.

Having dealt with numerous banks over the years this would be most unusual, most banks would require your cash or cetainly a reasonable % of it to be input into the deal at the initial stages ie towards the purchase of the site.

The 40k wouldn't be unsecured - the bank would be taking the site as collateral and would require the site to have full PP.

Casati

muffler wrote: »

You will be required to achieve a BER rating of C1 minimum and given the amount of works involved I would expect you to pay in the region of €100 - €120 per sq. foot or possibly more depending on design and other factors. That would be for a builders finish and wouldn't include the cost of site and maybe the services. If you have family/friends in the trade who would chip in if you went down the direct labour route you could be looking at saving something in the region of 10 - 20 euro per sq. foot but again it varies an awful lot.

For mortgages you will be required to have at least 20% - 30% of the value in savings. Again this varies from lender to lender and no, site/land will not be used as collateral.

I'll move this to the prices/costs forum where you should also have a read at a few of the other threads there which contain lots of valuable information and advice etc.

Agreed with the advice given- however i thought B1 was the min level at the moment, moving to A3 in the future?

bombadil

Hi Showme

Depending on what part of Donegal you are thinking of building in it might well be worth considering buying one of the many part finished houses on sale at the moment... and Donegal has plenty! Myself and girlfriend were full intent on building and even had family site but cost of building compared with buying made no sense at all. I know there is a lot to be said for designing you own home etc but from personal experience we ended up buying and finishing a 2500sq ft house that we could never have afforded to build... just a thought!

However if you are going to build there are plenty very good experienced tradesmen working for very little at the moment... anything to keep going really. I have found from finishing the house that cost does not equal quality... local is best as word of mouth is all that is getting work at the moment and you are only as good as your last job.

cost of elec. connection will be 1800 euro.. council development charges can be truely shocking!

ShowMeTheCash

Thanks Bom,

Yeah I know of a lot of half finished houses even round my area.
My Girlfriends Dad is a builder / contractor, he actually built her sisters houses in full, and he has said he would build our house... Also my brother is a plasterer... Or was.... so in terms of the labor I think I will get it pretty cheap.

I just wanted to get an idea of the cost if I have to pay the going rate...

bombadil

No problem... looks like you are in a very good position to build so! From looking at boards the past 2 years I think the general feeling is that 100euro a sq ft is about the mark... depends on the quality of finish though. There is an Irish company offering build estimates.. maybe try google cost house calculator and see

beyondpassive

For pricing purposes €120 is now the cost of building as Part L 2011 kicks in, and thats with standard finishes. You really are requiring A3 BER in order to meet the EPC, the renewables obligation and the windows TGD table 6 requirements. Part L 2011 is a game changer for builders and subbies. Its getting more difficult to ignore building regulation compliance (even in Donegal hi :-). Banks are looking for clean title for final drawdown.

Carmel Quigley

beyondpassive wrote: »

For pricing purposes €120 is now the cost of building as Part L 2011 kicks in, and thats with standard finishes. You really are requiring A3 BER in order to meet the EPC, the renewables obligation and the windows TGD table 6 requirements. Part L 2011 is a game changer for builders and subbies. Its getting more difficult to ignore building regulation compliance (even in Donegal hi :-). Banks are looking for clean title for final drawdown.

I am thinking of building a house in malin and was wondering how much this might cost me.

ShowMeTheCash

I think 120 is probably a good figure.
If you get the labour cheap you might get it cheaper.

Talking to someone recently 80k built there house excluding finish and fixtures.