FAQ

Home-Cost is only designed to accurately estimate a freestanding single family residence. However, there are some “workaround” techniques that can be used to estimate the cost of an addition in some design situations. Please Contact Us for more information.

Home-Cost will estimate almost any style of single family detached home up to two stories plus a lower level and garage, attached or detached given the limitations described below.

Over 4,000 options are available for your home design resulting in virtually unlimited design and material possibilities. For example, you can select from over 15 countertop options including granite, quartz, tile, concrete and more; over 30 flooring options including carpet, cork, tile, stone, wood, vinyl, linoleum and more. Exterior options include over 30 siding options such as vinyl, aluminum, wood, cement fiber, log siding, stucco, stone, imitation stone, etc. Roofing options including asphalt, wood, tile, slate, metal, concrete, rubber, flat and so on.

Green design construction options are also available. Home-Cost provides structural system choices including ICF (Insulated Concrete Form), SIP (Structural Insulated Panels) in addition to stick-built wood framing or concrete block construction. You also have the option of Timber Frame construction.

LIMITATIONS / EXCLUSIONS
Home-Cost does not offer estimating for the following home design considerations:

1. Swimming pools or other outdoor structures other than a detached garage;
2. Flat roof or low slope roofs having a roof pitch of less than 4:12;
3. Specialty structures requiring engineering such as pier foundations, stilt foundations, hill-side construction, cantilever construction;
4. Garage apartment designs where the first floor of the building is predominantly garage space with most finished living space on the second floor;
5. Second floor porches

Yes, just complete whatever page you are on and click the “Next Step (Save and Continue)” button at the bottom of the page. Your selections are saved until you come back later.

If you leave a page without clicking the “Next Step (Save and Continue)” button at the bottom of the page, your selections for that page will not be retained.

“Cost per SF” for cost estimating is fundamentally unreliable and can be an estimating trap since it only applies the “Cost per Square Foot” against Finished SF and not the entire Constructed SF of the home.

“Cost per SF” estimates also do not consider varying quality levels within an individual home design and often omit costs for site work, excavation and appliances.

Construction cost however is determined by the Constructed SF of a home and the quality level of materials and finishes, not just Finished SF.

Although “Cost per SF” budgeting may seem quick and easy, it is unfortunately also incorrect.

Finished SF only includes livable areas such as bedrooms, kitchen, great rooms, etc.

Constructed Square Feet includes all areas that are being constructed whether livable or not such as an unfinished basement or crawl space, garage, bonus rooms, enclosed porches, etc.

An “Assembly” is a grouping of components that are included in the cost of an item.

For example, cost for a “sink assembly” in Home-Cost includes the sink, faucet, waste and vent line, hot and cold water lines, labor and sales tax.

A “window assembly” includes the window unit, finished casing and trim, labor and sales tax.

An “exterior wall framing assembly” is priced at a cost per square foot of wall area and includes costs for the wall framing, insulation, sheathing and vapor barrier, labor and sales tax.

See also Assemblies of Construction – What Are They?

Unlike take-off estimation, “Assembly” based estimating can be used at a conceptual level for early stage costing or at a detailed design level for final blueprint stage estimates.

Assemblies carry costs for their components and the unit of measure that makes sense for that assembly. For example, wall framing is measured in “wall square feet” not board feet of lumber. As quantity of an assembly goes up or down, costs for all the corresponding components are always included and cannot be accidentally forgotten or omitted as with take-off estimates.

See also Assemblies of Construction – What Are They?

First of all don’t panic. Over 95% of home projects are initially over budget. With
Home-Cost however you now have the power to evaluate your design decisions and vary the quality level and scope of your home’s design to meet a realistic budget.

You are over budget for one or more reasons including:

• You may have selected expensive construction materials or finishes. Go back and reconsider all your construction material quality levels. Make sure you have selected the most economical construction selections and quality levels except where you absolutely needed the increased quality.
• If you still are over budget, your home design may be too large and the scope of construction needs to be reduced. Look at ways to reduce the home size and amount of finished square feet and constructed square feet.
• If you have gone back and reduced the quality of materials in all acceptable areas and reduced the home size and are still over budget, you may have had an unrealistic budget in mind to start with. Home-Cost will allow you to model and simulate the costs of various designs and materials of construction until you are in budget. It is easier to fix a budget problem on paper than while a home is being built.
• One last option exists, although we do not recommend it unless you have the experience and time, is to be an Owner-Builder. This is where the Owner does not hire a General Contractor but rather directly hires the multiple subcontractors and manages their scheduling and work. This can save between 10% to 20% of your home’s construction cost if managed well, but you will add at least that much to your costs if handled incompetently. If you choose the route of an Owner / Builder, be careful and do the research needed to fully understand your responsibilities.

Yes it can. All projects have three interrelated variables that must be balanced. They are Quality, Cost and Size. You can pick any two and the third is determined by your selections. For example if you know your budget (cost) and you know how big your house is (size) that will drive the quality levels of what you can afford. Home-Cost allows you to vary your home’s Quality levels and Scope (or size) until your budget is in balance.

In an over-budget situation improper Quality and/or Size decisions have created an out of balance condition with Cost. The solution in an over-budget circumstance is determining how to vary the Quality or Size variables to meet a predetermined Cost.

The power of Home-Cost™ is that you will be able to model and change any of these variables to see the impact on the other two, until you get things in balance.

Home-Cost process puts you in control of modeling “what-if?” options to building materials, design characteristics and home size, until you are satisfied and within budget.