ᐅ Building a House During Parental Leave – When Is the Optimal Time?
Created on: 22 Nov 2012 00:53
S
Selbs86Hello,
what do you generally think about building a house during parental leave, meaning actively participating in the construction and saving as much as possible through own work? To explain the situation, we are both 26 years old, haven’t planned to have children yet, and don’t intend to move into a house immediately. It’s more of a long-term plan. I (male) have a university degree and started working about two years ago. I still have a few thousand euros of debt from loans for furniture, kitchen, etc., but I am confident I can repay around 1,000 euros per month, so I plan to start saving capital in a few months. My girlfriend did not attend university but has been working since she was 16. She has saved about 15,000 euros of capital. We both own cars valued around 8,000 euros, with no loans on them.
My girlfriend wants to stay at home during the first year anyway. So the idea would be that I also stay home the first year completely and contribute as much as possible to the house construction myself. The problem often is that the work has to be done after normal working hours or on weekends. Here, there would be the opportunity to take complete time off. Parental benefits (parental allowance / maternity pay) are only paid for 14 months, so some financial loss must be expected. The question is whether this loss would be less than the value of the own work that can be achieved within 12 months.
Specifically, my plan is to hire an experienced worker for the respective tasks who would guide me and work alongside me, but whom I can support full time. I have no formal training in this area, but I think in principle it should not be a problem. I’m physically fit and an athlete. I would like to work on labor-intensive trades such as the shell construction myself.
I’d appreciate your opinions, suggestions, or general tips on how to balance family planning and building a house in our situation (limited own capital due to university, my girlfriend definitely wants to have the first child before turning 30, and we will soon be 27). By the way, we currently live in a two-room apartment. Although it’s quite large (90 cm (35 inches)), it has only two rooms, so a move will have to happen eventually. A move also takes time, energy, and money.
what do you generally think about building a house during parental leave, meaning actively participating in the construction and saving as much as possible through own work? To explain the situation, we are both 26 years old, haven’t planned to have children yet, and don’t intend to move into a house immediately. It’s more of a long-term plan. I (male) have a university degree and started working about two years ago. I still have a few thousand euros of debt from loans for furniture, kitchen, etc., but I am confident I can repay around 1,000 euros per month, so I plan to start saving capital in a few months. My girlfriend did not attend university but has been working since she was 16. She has saved about 15,000 euros of capital. We both own cars valued around 8,000 euros, with no loans on them.
My girlfriend wants to stay at home during the first year anyway. So the idea would be that I also stay home the first year completely and contribute as much as possible to the house construction myself. The problem often is that the work has to be done after normal working hours or on weekends. Here, there would be the opportunity to take complete time off. Parental benefits (parental allowance / maternity pay) are only paid for 14 months, so some financial loss must be expected. The question is whether this loss would be less than the value of the own work that can be achieved within 12 months.
Specifically, my plan is to hire an experienced worker for the respective tasks who would guide me and work alongside me, but whom I can support full time. I have no formal training in this area, but I think in principle it should not be a problem. I’m physically fit and an athlete. I would like to work on labor-intensive trades such as the shell construction myself.
I’d appreciate your opinions, suggestions, or general tips on how to balance family planning and building a house in our situation (limited own capital due to university, my girlfriend definitely wants to have the first child before turning 30, and we will soon be 27). By the way, we currently live in a two-room apartment. Although it’s quite large (90 cm (35 inches)), it has only two rooms, so a move will have to happen eventually. A move also takes time, energy, and money.
B
Bungalowfür422 Nov 2012 06:45Hello,
I want to respond to you as a mother of a 16-month-old daughter because I cannot estimate the effort involved in more or less building a house yourself.
Please don’t take this the wrong way, but I think you are approaching this quite naively and without enough experience. Surely, you will outsource some trades completely, but even then – how long do you think it will take the two of you to raise a house?
The fact is that your wife receives 65% of her net salary (over the last 12 months) as parental allowance. As you already mentioned, you both get 14 months of parental leave. How do you plan to manage that financially? Let’s assume a salary of around 1500 € (about $1600) just for your wife, that would be 975 € (about $1040)! plus child benefits! It’s also not the case that you both get the full time credited together. One partner takes 12 months, the other 2. That means you would have no income for 12 months.
In my opinion, this is not feasible!
Your idea that you will need a bigger apartment anyway is understandable, although even that could work for the first years. Why don’t you build now and move into a ready house?
Best regards
I want to respond to you as a mother of a 16-month-old daughter because I cannot estimate the effort involved in more or less building a house yourself.
Please don’t take this the wrong way, but I think you are approaching this quite naively and without enough experience. Surely, you will outsource some trades completely, but even then – how long do you think it will take the two of you to raise a house?
The fact is that your wife receives 65% of her net salary (over the last 12 months) as parental allowance. As you already mentioned, you both get 14 months of parental leave. How do you plan to manage that financially? Let’s assume a salary of around 1500 € (about $1600) just for your wife, that would be 975 € (about $1040)! plus child benefits! It’s also not the case that you both get the full time credited together. One partner takes 12 months, the other 2. That means you would have no income for 12 months.
In my opinion, this is not feasible!
Your idea that you will need a bigger apartment anyway is understandable, although even that could work for the first years. Why don’t you build now and move into a ready house?
Best regards
B
Bauexperte22 Nov 2012 11:17Hello,
Your post is difficult for me to digest because you seem to assume that with zero knowledge you can build or help build a single-family house according to the latest standards...
Aside from the fact that for various reasons I cannot recommend building a house almost entirely through DIY during parental leave – many relationships have broken down because of this – you are quite naive despite your studies; sorry. Building a house means taking on 16 different trades – according to your own statements, you have no clue about any of them. The worst part is that you are totally dependent on others without any way to check or influence their work, since you probably wouldn’t even notice if something was done completely wrong. If you were, to counter that argument, to hire a construction expert for close supervision, that expert would be so expensive that it would likely no longer be worthwhile for you. In short, you can provide assistance, but that’s about it!
When someone with these ideas comes to me, I usually send them home because I do not want to be responsible for a disaster. Normally, I would advise you to buy an advanced shell construction and do "only" interior work during parental leave. However, that "only" is already too much for you, since you also have no knowledge of interior trades; aside from that, even during parental leave you will need a certified professional for plumbing and for electrical work, or else you will have problems with the relevant utility providers.
I strongly recommend that before you even consider building a house, you speak with an independent mortgage broker. In a 2-3 hour consultation, they will explain your financial possibilities. If the result is that you should save more equity for a few years – which I expect – then it was a good conversation.
Many people build their first house after age 30, and quite a few even beyond 40 or 50.
Kind regards
Selbs86 schrieb:
What do you generally think about building a house during parental leave, meaning actively participating in construction and saving as much as possible through your own labor?
..... Specifically, my idea is to hire an experienced worker for each task who guides me and works alongside me, but whom I can fully support. I have no formal training in this area, but I believe it should not be a problem in principle. I am physically fit and athletic. I would also like to work on the labor-intensive trades such as shell construction.
Your post is difficult for me to digest because you seem to assume that with zero knowledge you can build or help build a single-family house according to the latest standards...
Aside from the fact that for various reasons I cannot recommend building a house almost entirely through DIY during parental leave – many relationships have broken down because of this – you are quite naive despite your studies; sorry. Building a house means taking on 16 different trades – according to your own statements, you have no clue about any of them. The worst part is that you are totally dependent on others without any way to check or influence their work, since you probably wouldn’t even notice if something was done completely wrong. If you were, to counter that argument, to hire a construction expert for close supervision, that expert would be so expensive that it would likely no longer be worthwhile for you. In short, you can provide assistance, but that’s about it!
When someone with these ideas comes to me, I usually send them home because I do not want to be responsible for a disaster. Normally, I would advise you to buy an advanced shell construction and do "only" interior work during parental leave. However, that "only" is already too much for you, since you also have no knowledge of interior trades; aside from that, even during parental leave you will need a certified professional for plumbing and for electrical work, or else you will have problems with the relevant utility providers.
I strongly recommend that before you even consider building a house, you speak with an independent mortgage broker. In a 2-3 hour consultation, they will explain your financial possibilities. If the result is that you should save more equity for a few years – which I expect – then it was a good conversation.
Many people build their first house after age 30, and quite a few even beyond 40 or 50.
Kind regards
C
ClaasCPunkt22 Nov 2012 18:09A colleague of mine did something similar: he took six months of parental leave and helped with the house. However, his father-in-law is a building contractor and carried out the main part of the construction. I believe that without such a situation—close relatives or very good friends with sufficient expertise—it doesn’t make much sense.
At the moment, I can comfortably set aside an additional 1,000 EUR per month on top of rent. My girlfriend can probably save around 500 EUR as well. We also pay a base rent of 500 EUR. That totals 2,000 EUR. Plus, there are salary increases—my last one, for example, was a 7% raise. But I really don’t want to pay 2,000 EUR per month for the house. My parents pay a mortgage well under 1,000 EUR, and they have a nice semi-detached house in a very good city location.
We might prefer to build a little outside the city (suburb, nearest community, etc.) but have a detached single-family house instead of a semi-detached house. I am estimating a land price somewhere between 60,000 EUR and 120,000 EUR. This concerns the Dresden area or nearby suburbs like Weißig, Bannewitz, Ottendorf-Okrilla, etc.
We even have a civil engineer in our circle of friends, but more than occasionally reviewing things is probably not possible. He works away Monday through Friday and is only home on weekends.
Trades like plumbing, electrical, roofing, etc., I wouldn’t do myself anyway. I was rather thinking there is great potential in the shell construction phase (brick by brick), and then for trades like interior doors, hardwood floors, paint/wallpaper, landscaping, and possible insulation (I have read there are methods very easy even for amateurs). The planning I would of course hand over to an architect, who should know what is possible and what is not.
Alternatively, I could really only do the “foolproof” and non-time-critical tasks myself. I plan to take parental leave anyway—at least two months, and I think a few more months wouldn’t significantly affect income (for example, due to progressive taxation). So something like: the ground floor is finished and ready to move into, but I would handle the interior doors, parquet flooring, paint/wallpaper, and the upper floor on my own plus the landscaping.
In that case, it means saving some more equity. I think 15,000 EUR per year is feasible for both of us together. Then we would have about 50,000 EUR in two years, and wages will likely have improved somewhat as well. I just hope interest rates remain this favorable in two years.
We might prefer to build a little outside the city (suburb, nearest community, etc.) but have a detached single-family house instead of a semi-detached house. I am estimating a land price somewhere between 60,000 EUR and 120,000 EUR. This concerns the Dresden area or nearby suburbs like Weißig, Bannewitz, Ottendorf-Okrilla, etc.
We even have a civil engineer in our circle of friends, but more than occasionally reviewing things is probably not possible. He works away Monday through Friday and is only home on weekends.
Trades like plumbing, electrical, roofing, etc., I wouldn’t do myself anyway. I was rather thinking there is great potential in the shell construction phase (brick by brick), and then for trades like interior doors, hardwood floors, paint/wallpaper, landscaping, and possible insulation (I have read there are methods very easy even for amateurs). The planning I would of course hand over to an architect, who should know what is possible and what is not.
Alternatively, I could really only do the “foolproof” and non-time-critical tasks myself. I plan to take parental leave anyway—at least two months, and I think a few more months wouldn’t significantly affect income (for example, due to progressive taxation). So something like: the ground floor is finished and ready to move into, but I would handle the interior doors, parquet flooring, paint/wallpaper, and the upper floor on my own plus the landscaping.
In that case, it means saving some more equity. I think 15,000 EUR per year is feasible for both of us together. Then we would have about 50,000 EUR in two years, and wages will likely have improved somewhat as well. I just hope interest rates remain this favorable in two years.
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