Cost per Square Foot?

The number one overriding desire of everyone in the home building business is to build a home for the client. To that end the value or cost of the home is foremost in the mind of the builder and their efforts and recommendations are biased to that goal. IT is very rare to meet a client who says just go spend whatever and send me a bill. All clients fall into the cost per square foot trap and believe that if they are at some certain cost per square foot then they are gong to get what they want.

Cost per square foot is probably the greatest misnomer in the home building business. This does not take into account the porches, garages, unfinished basement space, potential attics, screen porches and other amenities that can drive the cost of a home. Also the basic requirements of supply and demand will drive this cost. An owner moving from another city or area of the country may be used to one cost but that cost may not be reflected in the new area. Equally different is the material and building techniques from one area of the country to another

As an example two clients are each building a 100 square foot kitchen. One client wants a Wolf range and the other wants a Kenmore. Virtually the same product but the cost of each is vastly different. The wolf at $5000 costs $50 per square foot whereas the Kenmore at $1000 coast $10 dollars per square foot. How much is the addition going to cost to someone else and how can the cost per square foot be applied to a third party? All though this is not as pronounced in a house because of the magnitude of the square footage the principle still holds the some. Your house and you neighbors house probably are not the same cost per square foot.

Many clients over the years have found ideas thru plan sites and other books that you can pick up at the home center. All of these plans have a square foot number for the plan and some even have some build costs associated with them. In the decades that I have been building homes I have never seen one of these to be compatible with actual square footage of the home. Most plan book plans will only count stair areas once and do not count two story areas in their second floor listing. This provides a misleading accounting f the actual square footage of the home since everyone charges for that “empty” space. In most instances it is harder to not build a floor in a two story hours than it is to complete that floor. Additional beams, bearings, and columns are required to carry what are normally floors that no longer have walls below.