5 Best Ways to Waste Your Money When Building
After working in the construction industry for a long time, I thought I'd share my top tips for the best ways to waste money when embarking on a construction project!
5. Build Anywhere
Don't bother looking into the location, how it's going to be accessed by diggers or whether you've even got any utility supplies. Choosing the wrong location to build can single-handedly cost you a small fortune. If you can't easily get there, you may find that excavations have to be done by hand, increasing the groundworks costs. If the site is that difficult to access, you may find that you also can't get any large steels up there meaning you can also kiss goodbye to that lovely expanse of bi-folding doors you've been dreaming of to access the garden.
4. Draw Your Own Plans
Many people will think that this will save you money, but their wrong. Architects spend at least 7 years of training to qualify, meaning they have oodles of experience and knowledge that can provide added value that more than covers the fees. Preparing your own plans will also likely mean that they won't be as detailed as architect's drawings, meaning the builder will have a harder time pricing the job or an easier time taking you for a ride (depending on how cynical you are).
3. Use Weird Building Materials
If you deviate from using either bricks or timber frame, then don't be surprised if you spend more in design fees and construction costs. Unusual materials will likely mean that your architect will need to spend more time putting the information together and the builder will most likely have to get in specialist trades or send staff on training courses. If you do go down this route, make sure you get advice from someone with experience working with Modern Methods of Construction.
2. Ignore Your Permissions
A sure fire way to cause not only increased costs but stress and heartache is to ignore Planning or Building Regulations. Failing to obtain these permissions, or failing to comply with these permissions can get you into court and ammassing not only legal costs defending yourself, but also charges to demolish or put works right.
1. Use Any Builder
Recommendations from friends and family can be great and if you want an expensive build make sure you prioritise these over any advice given to you by your architect, engineer or any other building professional you've been working with. If however, you have a budget you want to stick to it may be worth getting in someone to run a tendering service for you to ensure that you get the right builder for your project.
