Is building bigger necessarily better? I think we would all agree, not necessarily. Let’s admit it – we all have some sort of “keeping up with the Jones’” complex within us. And that complex can sometimes come out when we are designing our custom home. Building a large house is not a bad thing (at all) but building intentional is more important. If that means that the house gets built large, so be it – but let’s not focus on building to a certain size simply to keep up with appearances.
There are a lot of factors that come into play when you’re deciding how big you want to build, so we broke down factors to consider when you are deciding how big of a house you want to build.
Design
Design is such an integral part of building a custom home. One of the greatest parts of custom building is designing a house that matches your personality. Blending design styles, breaking traditional “rules” and throwing trends to the wind. The final design of the home is what can really make your home feel, custom. These customizations do have costs associated with them, so blending your design and budget goals may be more difficult with more square feet. A few things to think about:
Design Elements
Design elements are the customized items within your house that really make a space special. These can be custom elements like beams, wainscotting, railings, exterior features, wallpaper, cabinetry, woodworking, etc. But these elements can also be furniture – couches, chairs, dining room and side tables, or even wall art.
The list of custom options is endless. But these features are what transform a cold “box” into a warm, welcoming home. They bring life to the space and make your home unique. But the larger a home becomes, the more of these features are needed to accomplish that welcoming feel. And with additional features come additional cost.
Now you don’t need these features either. If having additional space is more important to you, that is fine too! It really comes down to an understanding of what you are looking for and what you are trying to accomplish.
Yard Space
If you are looking to build a custom home within the city of Saskatoon limits, you also need to consider how the size of your home impacts your yard space. A custom home needs to take everything into consideration and your yard is part of that!
Your finished yard space will complete your home experience. Are you planning an inground pool? Do you need space for a play center and sandpit? Are you looking to plant trees and shrubs to create a garden getaway? These are all things that you should consider while you are designing your plans to make sure you get a holistic custom home.
Dead Space
Dead spaces in a home’s floor plan cause inefficiencies that cost money, and equals wasted square footage that you are paying for.
Now, dead space can be intentional. Maybe you want to create additional space between your kitchen and dining room for entertaining. Or maybe you want to add space in your mudroom for those winter days when the entire family is getting ready to go out tobogganing.
Intentional dead space can be beneficial, but the danger of simply building bigger is that there can be unintentional dead space that doesn’t really add functionality to your family. Those are the scenarios that you want to watch out for.
Cost
The glaringly obvious impact of building bigger is the added cost. With everything else being equal, the price of a larger home is simply more. More material, more time, more inspections, more management, and more dollars. There is no getting around it, building more square feet adds dollars but there may be some hidden costs that you may not think about off the hop as well. Keep these costs in mind while you are budgeting too!
- Construction costs
- Land
- Utilities
- Maintenance
- Furniture
- Insurance
- Property Taxes
- Closing costs
Time
Time is the other consideration when building bigger. Like I mentioned above, if there is a purpose and function to building bigger, do it! But if your custom home becomes bigger than needed without thought you can also simply add time to your experience.
The time to design will take longer, your time commitments throughout the process will add up and the time to physically build will take longer.
More importantly, once you move in the maintenance will take longer. More cleaning, more preventative maintenance, more repairs. This will all take time away from your family or spending time with friends that you enjoy.
Building a custom home is an amazing experience! You get to design a home that is truly unique and functions specifically for your family. The size of that home is a critical piece of the puzzle and affects so many different aspects.
If you are interested discussing your custom home in Saskatoon and the surrounding area, we would love to be part of that process. Contact us and we will reach out to start the conversation around we can help bring your dreams to life!