U shaped house with high % exterior walls

MizMix

Hi All,

Back again for some advice- still at design stage and finding it very stressful when I thought this would be the fun part! Background: We met our architect, gave him our budget, discussed what we liked, priorities in terms of budget etc. Budget excluding all professional fees, site cost, council fees, stamp duty etc is 225k. He came back with a design we both love- 185m2, interesting design- u shape with courtyard, excellent internal layout with very little space wasted due to halls, lobby etc (unusual in that its very narrow but as there's very little halls etc it works very well). Delighted. But then I started researching a bit on costs, energy efficiency etc and came back with concerns regarding this- i.e. the cost to build an efficient house and meet regulations (and ideally exceed) of this shape. Obviously you can keep increasing the costs to meet regulations but I'm worried about how difficult it could be to get this shape of house to comply within our budget. To give you an idea- external walls are 60m in a 185m2 house. Almost double a typical box house of that size I'd say. He couldn't tell us whether it would fall within our budget or not which we're finding frustrating.

Architect was pushing to go to 3d stage and then we insisted on a 2nd alternative 'sketch' when our concerns re costs couldn't be clarified (i.e. I'll plug details in to DEAP at next stage). This 2nd option has come in bigger but more compact shape of house- 195m2, typical 'box' shape. He obviously hasn't put as much thought into it but I can understand he wants us to commit to one of the other before doing more work on a 2nd design. 2I kind of feel we're at the other extreme now (efficient but design wise not nearly as nice)- The layout isn't as good. Most rooms are now bigger (and more wasted space) But I know he can move interior walls around so perhaps it just needs more thought.

I'm torn as we're now in love with the u shape design. The box design just seems boring but maybe with more thought and time it won't be. Here lies the problem: Costs- he can shed no light. Originally he had given a ballpark of 1100 to build (based on new regulations). I think that's conservative. We've asked how much more than average this shape of house could cost given the high % of exterior walls- i.e we would need to cap it at around 1300 per square metre and even this is stretching it (for building costs only, no kitchen etc).

Perhaps we are overestimating the costs to insulate etc. Is there anyway at this stage we can find 'roughly' how much the shape of the house could affect cost? Too early for a QS I think? If we go to the next stage we're 'stuck' with it unless we pay the architect for new designs. Heart V Head. Great design V more boring design. One part of me thinks lets go for the U shape as maybe it won't be that much more expensive than the compact house- shape of house is only one part of an efficient house right? He has it positioned to maximise solar gain but just concerned this could be mental money to build!

Any advice re costings and cost differences for different house shapes (all other things being equal)?

RITwing

Time for a QS. Costing is what they do.

Beene

Hi mizmix,
Interested to know if you have made a decision on your house design?