Have You Considered Self-Building Your next Home?
Self-build is a term that is becoming ever-popular in the housing market. Wait up a minute, what precisely is “self-build”? It’s a home you build yourself. Not necessarily only by yourself, but you set yourself in the position as foreman, architect, planner of your property and allow skilled workers do the job you order them to do. More and more people are doing just that – in fact, there are more self-builders in the UK than the total amount of houses being built by any single developer. The aim of self-build is to make a property to your exact specifications, not a template that the large developers work to.
Already you’re likely thinking: “I can’t build a house”. The pleasant news is that getting involved with a self-build project doesn’t have to involve you with the physical aspects of the property building (as a matter of fact, just 5% of self-builders actually take a role in the actual building of the property). Even the design aspects are often finalised by a professional designer. Self-build, by and large, is about you expressing (in plain English), what you require to the house designer – who then creates a plan based on your demands. This plan then becomes the draft the developers work to. Easy, eh? You don’t need to have any hands-on participation in self-build. Having said all that, the DIY enthusiast can use self-build as an opportunity to save some notes by contributing toward the tasks of self-build they have experience in – it’s your choice how much involvement you want during the construction.
Self-build sounds pricy, but actually it’s in general cheaper than buying an already developed property of the same specifications (roughly a third cheaper). Not only that, self-built houses sell very well too – up to 25% higher than the actual build cost, so self-build can be simply an investment, rather than a house to live in.
You must make sure the group of workers you choose are total professionals and that they build well together. For sure, you will need builders with lots of experience, particularly with specific types of construction machinery, such as concrete cutting chainsaws, Masonry saws, power / disc cutters, floor saws, and wood saws. Skills bring safety to the build too.
This article is simply an introduction to self-build, and I trust it will inspire those of you who are perhaps a little disconcerted by such projects. It needn’t be time-intensive, and you won’t need any specific skills, but employ carefully, and you will need to cautiously work out the budget of the project.
