I’m passionate about high quality housing. I always have been. During my master’s studies I proposed a housing-based project to my tutors for my thesis, and they told me that they wouldn’t allow it. I was told it was too easy and that I would be done halfway through the year. At the time, I thought that they were wrong and I still believe they were. I argued that we spend a majority of our lives in our homes, and our homes deserve to be the best designed and constructed buildings in our cities. This belief has sustained me in the years since. While my work centers around statement homes, I remain committed to building better housing across all levels.
However, every homeowner is shocked to find out just how much it costs to build their dream home. You are not imagining it. Costs continue to go up and to understand why custom homes cost as much as they do we have to pull back beyond individual design choices and take a look at both all types of residential buildings and the market as a whole. Costs for office buildings, schools, and datacenters all affect the cost of housing since there is a limited supply of contractors and subcontractors who can actually do the work
The housing market is downstream of all other building types so what affects one will affect all. Understanding this phenomenon, I joined the AIA Utah Housing Affordability taskforce in the hope that working together we can make a difference in the lives of all Utahns. Our goal is to work across the industry and with policy makers to bring down the cost of housing. This goal is very specifically quite broad. We really have to pull back to look at costs and identify issues which ae impacting our ability to build homes. Through our conversations and research we have identified many variables that impact affordability. Among them are: rising land costs and zoning restrictions, city discretion in design approvals, and labor shortages. This is the short list. There are many variables that can be considered, but in reviewing all the pressures on cost, one common thread can be found beneath the surface: policy decisions turn the wheels of pricing. Impacts may be felt immediately, or long into the future. For example: interest rates set by the Fed, educational priorities that lead to staffing shortages in the trades decades later, spurious tariffs on imported materials, and flat wages over the past 5 decades can all be traced back to legislative agendas that – often well-intentioned – have had a negative impact on building costs. Furthermore, seemingly mundane bills that pass through our legislative bodies can have far reaching impacts that may not be well understood for a generation. It is easy to let your eyes glaze over when reading down the list of over 500 bills the legislature passed in the recently closed Legislative session, but important changes with subtle impacts are often made to address issues we face today without fully understanding the impacts those changes may have decades later.
Beyond this, supply and demand have an impact as well. Land becomes more scarce, the materials you want for your home are in demand across a worldwide market, and labor shortages mean sub-contractors may be less motivated to offer competitive pricing.
This all fells really heavy to bear, and can feel discouraging. So, what can you do as a homeowner to bring down the cost of your new build? At once simple and complex: work with your architect to keep costs down. Use fewer materials, limit travel distance for materials that are chosen, avoid custom detailing and use off the shelf products with wide availability, pick a brownfield site (land previously built on; soil conditions are known), simplify the building massing, choose a building system that saves on labor, and the list goes on. There are many ways to save cost without sacrificing on the final quality of your home. However, this all boils down to decisions made early in the design process and require engagement by your Architect and Builder.
Most importantly, do this early in the design process when your decisions will have the greatest impact. Trying to reduce costs at the end of design is a heartbreaking process that disappoints every owner I’ve seen go through it. Don’t put yourself in a position where you have to leave behind some of your favorite elements of a design because the cost estimate came back too high. Commit to working with your design team early to fully refine the vision, the strategies that will be in place to bring this to fruition, and the team dynamic that leads to the collaboration necessary to see it through. On budget homes are absolutely possible, but it requires transparency and engagement. Understanding what is driving high costs doesn’t make the numbers smaller, but it does put you back in control of what decisions matter most.
If you are interested in bringing building costs down long term the best thing you can do is reach out to your legislators and let them know that building costs are one of your major concerns. If we can bring costs down for high-rise apartment towers, condominiums, and production homes, that translates to lower costs for luxury single family homes too.
If you are working on a home project and are worried about what unexpected costs might be, give me a call so that we can go over some of your project details and put in place a strategy to keep you on budget.