Design and build companies have been around for a long time…
If you walk through the streets of our inner city suburbs, or if you take a drive through the inexpensive suburban subdivisions that were opened up in the 1960s and 1970s, chances are you'll be looking at homes that were built by Group Home Builders.
In some streets in Ponsonby, Auckland whole rows of villas were built to almost exactly the same floor plan, with the same lead-light windows and the same ornate timber fret-work around the verandahs. These were the work of early Group Home Builders who offered their clients homes built from a small range of pre-existing plans. Charming though these Villas may be today, they didn't allow their original owners much scope for choice or individuality.
That same ‘lack of choice' or acceptance of the norm, was the hallmark of the Group Home Builder of the 1960s and 1970s. When subdivisions were opened up on the edges of our cities, Group Home Builders moved in churning out low cost ‘cookie cutter' homes for young families.
That was then… this is now.
Of course there will always be a need for low-cost mass-produced housing. But today a new breed of large scale residential building companies (known as ‘Design and Build' companies rather than Group Home Builders) has emerged. These companies offer clients the cost advantages of their bulk-buying power, without the ‘one size fits all' approach that used to go with it. In fact, if success in the Registered Master Builder House of the Year Competition is anything to go by, many of these companies are designing and building ‘cutting edge' homes across a wide range of price categories.
Christchurch Design and Build Company, David Reid Homes, has had more homes in the finals of the competition than any other building company. And all the other Design and Build Companies featured on TV Showhomes have had success in the awards too.
Although most of these large residential building companies do have existing floor plans available, these tend to be viewed as a starting point for discussions with clients rather than a ‘fait accompli'.
Advantages of the Design and Build process
- Most companies provide a full service from concept drawings through to landscaping. As a client you deal with fewer contractors and subcontractors.
- No communication gap between designer and builder means accurate costings and designs that are achievable on the budget available.
- Fixed contract price means that there are no nasty surprises.
- Larger companies have bulk purchasing power which may result in savings to the homebuyer.
- Pre-existing house plans can provide a good starting point for determining what you do and don't want.
- Design and Build companies usually have Show Homes that you can visit to get ideas and assess the quality of the design and construction that they offer.
Brent Mitchell, from Auckland Design and Build Company, Mitchell Homes explains the advantages of working with a Design and Build company:
“The beauty of being a Design and Build company is that clients can either chose to have a house built to a standard plan, they can amend existing plans to their own needs, or work with our designer to design and build a unique home from scratch. In all three cases, the great advantage of working with a company that designs and builds is that the budget and quality control is there from day one because there's no gap between the designer and builder. Also, because we work with Auckland's most reliable and skilled building specialists and sub-contractors, it helps to keep projects on time, on budget, and finished to the highest expectations.”
Lorraine Parry of Landmark Homes Canterbury says that although their company offers a range of existing house plans, approximately 80-90% of the homes the company builds are designed in-house to meet the client's specific needs, either from scratch, or by adapting Landmark plans to suit.
“The advantage of designing and building homes all under one roof is that there is total communication and collaboration between the designer and builder and our quantity surveyor to make sure that we're all talking the same language, and the same budget!” says Lorraine.
“Typically people visit our Show Home and are impressed by the quality. Then we work out a design brief with them and sit down together with our architect to begin the design process. It helps clients to know that they can be totally involved in the design and build process, but that they're not alone in it, negotiating the territory between designer and builder, or having to worry about the legalities and council requirements. We do all of that, which takes a lot of the worry and stress out of it for them.”
The importance of good communication with their clients is something that all the Design and Build Companies featured on TV Showhomes stress.
David Reid of David Reid Homes says that communication has traditionally been the builder's Achilles heel.
“The process of building a home should be fun, but for many people it's one of the most stressful processes they'll ever live through. Our philosophy is to put in the time up front with our clients to help them figure out what they really want, to help them establish priorities, and ultimately to give them the best quality home that their money can buy.
One thing we never lose sight of is that each home should be as individual as the people who live there. We offer a complete design and build service, as well as a great range of existing house plans. A lot of clients find these a great place to start and then work with our designers to modify them to suit their family needs.
Once the initial planning stages are over, the client can choose to be as involved or uninvolved as they like. They can leave it to us, and walk into their house when it's finished, or they can be fully involved right through the process. The big thing is that there won't be any nasty surprises. With a fixed contract price which includes everything from building consent through to landscaping, it takes the stress out of building and puts the fun back in.”
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