Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Cost to build in your area

Just curious to see the differences to have a home built. It’s running about 150-175sq here in Craig, Ak. 200 if you want high end everything. Not including land and dirt work.

This may be of interest to some of you. Nothing fancy but the price per square foot is substantially lower than what some the others are quoting. Coastal MS area.

http://www.rhinetta.com/plans.html

That's just crazy. Are folks making that much money? I always wondered if a guy had to have a super high income to live in those areas or a pile of cash to put down.

That's just crazy. Are folks making that much money? I always wondered if a guy had to have a super high income to live in those areas or a pile of cash to put down.

That's about 80 a square foot, minus land and utilities. A couple years ago you could get one at that price here, but not anymore. Track homes are going at $125. I spent some time at the space coast in ms, working at stennis. Nice people but you can keep the heat and humidity.

No idea of build cost but we are on six acres outside San Antonio in the Hill Country. I would rate the house very high end with 4500 square feet with all but a game room on the first level, an eight burner Viking stove/oven and equivalent, etc. It is built with full 2 x 6 construction including the garage, stone and tile interior and exterior, metal seamed roof, +15' ceilings, a full stone fireplace, an 1800 square foot garage with a distant pool surrounded by native stone. The lots are selling for $150'ish and the home would go for $1M. Back out the previously suggested profit and there you go.

Hiring cheap, you better be on the job 24/7. The will give you cheap work if not steal you blind.

Its not that hard to sub it yourself IF you trust your subs.

But saying a jackleg is a general, well some are, some aren't. One around here is one heck of a general, IIRC about 175 a foot and you get a quality solid house out of it. They still nail shingles by hammer... they don't have a Mexican working for them that I"ve ever saw, which is neither here nor there.

Now if you want to slap some stuff together for rental that will get torn all up or resell crap to an unsuspecting buyer, I can see a reason to go cheap.

That said last house built in our family, we did almost all the work ourselves except the slab.

BTW why are you putting paper etc... in a toilet, thats what a trash can is for....

You cannot frame for 6 a foot here period.

6 bucks a SF is just labor right? no way is that materials, framing, windows, doors, etc.

I have 4 framing crews and also general contract 6-10 homes a year.
Framing=$4.00/ft for simple spec type houses up yo $8-$10/ft for really cut up customs.
Complete turnkey home on your lot; starter ranch = $95/ft minimum up to $200/ft for really nice high end custom. Most mid-range homes $125-$150/ft. With hardwood and tile, fiber cement with some brick, 9' walls.
Framing materials, labor, truss, windows and doors should account for roughly, 18-22% of the project for a low to mid level home, at least in our area.
As far as hourly rates, $30 min. For carpentry, concrete, sheetrock etc... Trades like electrical, plumbing and HVAC more like $40/hr. This is in MY area. YMMV if only obviously...... Messican, usually slightly cheaper.

Prices can REALLY vary even in the same area. I charge more to a homeowner than a GC when framing. Partially because it's one job, partially because lack of organization which costs me time.
Lots of guys price things according to how busy they are too.

Most generals in this area are charging/making 12 - 15% on top of cost.
We do as much in house as possible, footers, framing, roofing, trim, siding, etc.... so you make $ on the labor you provide as well as the management portion. Downside is keeping employees and dealing with the B.S. of 17 men that act like drama queens nonstop, plus the high cost of workers comp and all the insurances you have to have, plus keeping tools and equipment for that many jobs at a time.

Seems like the trend now is someone with zero job knowledge and zero time in the field with a bankroll trying to sub everything out and make money for scheduling subs and paying the bills. They last a few years til word gets around and they move on to starting a restaurant, carwash or whatever else.

of course "it depends." One can certainly build here for around $160 sf (I include dirt work in my costs, but not land). The upper end can push $1,000 sf, but that's "rock star" spending.

I'm currently building a 5,200 sf custom that will come in around $366 sf. The one I built before this, same size, came in at $236 sf.

Land costs here are stout relative to the local economy. A 1 acre lot in a decent subdivision starts around $250K and goes north rapidly.

Yes Bob, Bozeman. Both houses I mentioned above had moment frames, one quite substantial (3 stories tall). Your $40 sf price is about right for Big Sky IMO given the complexity (that place sucks).

Spent a couple years in Jackson building. Overall quality (local labor and building codes) is so much higher than Big Sky it's crazy, yet we were still able to build 13,000 sf for just under $600 sf... of course that didn't include the 8 million dollar 40 acre lot the house sits on

The large builders can build cookie cutter homes for around $85/sf (their cost) and sell for $125-150sf depending on size. I GC'd my own home about 4 years ago and my cost was about $200/sf. Lowest bid from a contractor was just under $250/sf for what is considered high end around here (all brick and stone exterior, geothermal heat, plaster, custom cabinetry, granite, separate bath/walk in closet for each bedroom, hardwood/stone floors, high ceilings). The finishes are quality but not over the top imported BS that you find in the really fancy places. We kept the size down and focused on quality because this is our 3rd and final home and built on a small farm property that we had been trying to buy for about 10 years. We did the finish carpentry and painting ourselves but subbed out all of the other trades or I'd still be building 4 years later.