The best laid plans
The biggest thing I have learned so far (and we are not that far into this) is that nothing is set in stone. I was hellbent on a cordwood masonry house. BZZZZT! Wrong, try again. We found FirstDay.
After looking everything over, I thought the saltbox would be the right thing. BZZZZT! Wrong, try again. FirstDay isn't doing saltboxes anymore, and even if they did they are more difficult to build and more expensive (which would make us wait to build so we could save the difference up, but we really need to do this on the planned timetable).
After looking at the current offerings, we decided that the 40' cape would fit the bill. BZZZZT! Wrong, try again. Turns out that David's new design turned our heads in a big way.
To clarify my last post (It was late and I didn't get as much in as I wanted to before going to bed), the data that David's designs brought up are important considerations. We ended up with some space we didn't have a plan for. In my plan it is a giant labyrinthine walk in closet; In the designs David showed us it could be a playroom/family room, but that made some problems with accessing the bathroom. The roof coming down to the 2' kneewall causes some problems I didn't account for in my plan, like not being able to have passages right next to the upstairs posts due to the lack of headroom.
When we spoke with David on the slab, and the consideration of building to the north of a drop off on our site, David responded that it really depends. At this point, for the extra cost (since we probably wouldn't be able to do a floating slab in NY in his experience, and would need deep frost walls anyway), he thinks the extra room is a steal at like $12 a square foot.
The thing is we don't need a 40' cape with a basement, as it will be way too big. The 32' cape with a basement is plenty of room, but each floor is a bit smaller than I would like and there isn't a middle ground in the cape style (say 36'). We felt that the 18' x 36' Original we visited was pretty close to livable for us. This has 2 feet more on that, and looking at a 16' and an 18' was a world of difference. Since the Canadian house is 20' x 36', and the ridge of the roof is along the 20' measurement and the roof falls away to the east and west to the top of the first floor wall, that leaves a couple of cathedral ceilings on either side of the loft area, as well as 2 floors (the basement half buried and finished into bedrooms).
The more we look at this option, the better it seems.
The pros:
1) Lower cost for Canadian kit - the 24' x 40' cape on a slab is quoted at approximately $14,000* more than the 20' x 36' Canadian house with finished basement (*without foundation costs)
2) It is the same square footage for both houses (1680), so cost per square foot is less for this house
3) The Canadian has the loft, which encompasses the extra space we don't know what to do with right now in the cape. This gives us a separate storage area for present, and space to expand into in the future.
4) The sample floorplans have a basement with 3 bedrooms, a family room and a bath, as well as a main floor with a bedroom, so we could put an office/guestroom on the main level and later convert it for single floor living as we get older if we like. This combo gives us plenty of room and the unfinished space mentioned in point 3 to grow into.
5) The Canadian has 2 1/2 stories of south facing windows. The Cape has 1, which means more light and more solar gain.
6) The sleeping area is at least partially underground, meaning cooler in the summer, warmer in the winter!
7) This solves the problem of putting the house up against the change in level toward the south of the building site, as we don't have to raise the slab with fill or anything silly like that.
8) This also may save some of the hassle of having to have everything (water, drainage, gas, electric, etc) going through the slab itself.
The Cons:
1) We have no idea what it really looks like inside. Looking at floorplans and drawings gives an idea, but it definitely helped us to actually go into the other houses to see what they were like. In some cases we realized that being inside gave us a perspective we didn't get from paper (like how wide 16', 18' and 24' really are). We have no way to really see what it looks like inside, since the first one is going to be built in Canada this fall/winter. We could possibly go see it prior to delivery in the spring, even half completed. In the meantime, I am working on building a 3D model on the 'puter so we can virtually walk through it. This is by no means the best method, but we have to do what we can, you know?
2) Basement Living - I know that when we first started looking at FirstDay, one of the houses they had was an original with a walk out basement which had the sleeping rooms in it. Wendy was not impressed with the idea. So putting it in front of her again, it was an immediate con. After talking about it some more, we thought of people we knew who had bedrooms in the basement, as well as the fact that we lived in a basement at the first place we lived in Colorado. All of a sudden it didn't seem so bad.
3) More Posts - One of the things we recognize we have to learn to deal with is the posts in the middle. In the Cape, in the center of the downstairs only there is a row of 11 posts running the width of the house, aligned with the beams. The Canadian has 2 rows of 5 posts each on the main floor and the basement level, making 20 posts overall. They divide the house into 3 sections fairly naturally though, and there are only 5 of them to see on each side.
4) Slope and Fill - this house is clearly designed for a south facing slope. We have at best a building lot with a flat space to the South. At best meaning we bring in fill for the backside of the house, which raises the cost more. At worst, we have a north facing slope.
Clearly the pros outweigh the cons. The big thing we need to know, then, is what the foundation will cost, as that will tell us how this works out economically. The secret is that I am positive that we will build a Canadian, we just need to complete the research and see everything works.
After looking everything over, I thought the saltbox would be the right thing. BZZZZT! Wrong, try again. FirstDay isn't doing saltboxes anymore, and even if they did they are more difficult to build and more expensive (which would make us wait to build so we could save the difference up, but we really need to do this on the planned timetable).
After looking at the current offerings, we decided that the 40' cape would fit the bill. BZZZZT! Wrong, try again. Turns out that David's new design turned our heads in a big way.
To clarify my last post (It was late and I didn't get as much in as I wanted to before going to bed), the data that David's designs brought up are important considerations. We ended up with some space we didn't have a plan for. In my plan it is a giant labyrinthine walk in closet; In the designs David showed us it could be a playroom/family room, but that made some problems with accessing the bathroom. The roof coming down to the 2' kneewall causes some problems I didn't account for in my plan, like not being able to have passages right next to the upstairs posts due to the lack of headroom.
When we spoke with David on the slab, and the consideration of building to the north of a drop off on our site, David responded that it really depends. At this point, for the extra cost (since we probably wouldn't be able to do a floating slab in NY in his experience, and would need deep frost walls anyway), he thinks the extra room is a steal at like $12 a square foot.
The thing is we don't need a 40' cape with a basement, as it will be way too big. The 32' cape with a basement is plenty of room, but each floor is a bit smaller than I would like and there isn't a middle ground in the cape style (say 36'). We felt that the 18' x 36' Original we visited was pretty close to livable for us. This has 2 feet more on that, and looking at a 16' and an 18' was a world of difference. Since the Canadian house is 20' x 36', and the ridge of the roof is along the 20' measurement and the roof falls away to the east and west to the top of the first floor wall, that leaves a couple of cathedral ceilings on either side of the loft area, as well as 2 floors (the basement half buried and finished into bedrooms).
The more we look at this option, the better it seems.
The pros:
1) Lower cost for Canadian kit - the 24' x 40' cape on a slab is quoted at approximately $14,000* more than the 20' x 36' Canadian house with finished basement (*without foundation costs)
2) It is the same square footage for both houses (1680), so cost per square foot is less for this house
3) The Canadian has the loft, which encompasses the extra space we don't know what to do with right now in the cape. This gives us a separate storage area for present, and space to expand into in the future.
4) The sample floorplans have a basement with 3 bedrooms, a family room and a bath, as well as a main floor with a bedroom, so we could put an office/guestroom on the main level and later convert it for single floor living as we get older if we like. This combo gives us plenty of room and the unfinished space mentioned in point 3 to grow into.
5) The Canadian has 2 1/2 stories of south facing windows. The Cape has 1, which means more light and more solar gain.
6) The sleeping area is at least partially underground, meaning cooler in the summer, warmer in the winter!
7) This solves the problem of putting the house up against the change in level toward the south of the building site, as we don't have to raise the slab with fill or anything silly like that.
8) This also may save some of the hassle of having to have everything (water, drainage, gas, electric, etc) going through the slab itself.
The Cons:
1) We have no idea what it really looks like inside. Looking at floorplans and drawings gives an idea, but it definitely helped us to actually go into the other houses to see what they were like. In some cases we realized that being inside gave us a perspective we didn't get from paper (like how wide 16', 18' and 24' really are). We have no way to really see what it looks like inside, since the first one is going to be built in Canada this fall/winter. We could possibly go see it prior to delivery in the spring, even half completed. In the meantime, I am working on building a 3D model on the 'puter so we can virtually walk through it. This is by no means the best method, but we have to do what we can, you know?
2) Basement Living - I know that when we first started looking at FirstDay, one of the houses they had was an original with a walk out basement which had the sleeping rooms in it. Wendy was not impressed with the idea. So putting it in front of her again, it was an immediate con. After talking about it some more, we thought of people we knew who had bedrooms in the basement, as well as the fact that we lived in a basement at the first place we lived in Colorado. All of a sudden it didn't seem so bad.
3) More Posts - One of the things we recognize we have to learn to deal with is the posts in the middle. In the Cape, in the center of the downstairs only there is a row of 11 posts running the width of the house, aligned with the beams. The Canadian has 2 rows of 5 posts each on the main floor and the basement level, making 20 posts overall. They divide the house into 3 sections fairly naturally though, and there are only 5 of them to see on each side.
4) Slope and Fill - this house is clearly designed for a south facing slope. We have at best a building lot with a flat space to the South. At best meaning we bring in fill for the backside of the house, which raises the cost more. At worst, we have a north facing slope.
Clearly the pros outweigh the cons. The big thing we need to know, then, is what the foundation will cost, as that will tell us how this works out economically. The secret is that I am positive that we will build a Canadian, we just need to complete the research and see everything works.
posted by SKelly | 10:20 PM
2 Comments:
Sean - check out Google's free Sketchup 3D modeling app.
As far as subterranean dwelling goes, it's about all I've ever known. Get yourselves some heavy duty slippers and don't skimp on the underlayment for the basement floor. Is radiant floor heating an option?
Stu
Hey guys. How's the progress? Decide on any plans yet?
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