ᐅ Building an End-Terrace House as a Self-Managed Project with a General Contractor
Created on: 27 May 2019 10:48
G
goalkeeper
Hello everyone,
some of you might have already followed one of my threads about us having to or being allowed to build our end-terrace house on our own responsibility – depending on how you look at it. This means that we are buying an end-terrace plot (215 sqm (2315 sq ft)) in a new development area in the Rhein-Neckar district and will be building on it ourselves – but in coordination with our two terrace neighbors.
The municipality, which sold the plots through a local resident model, ideally wanted applicants to apply as a complete housing group with several families and then build accordingly with a general contractor, construction manager, or architect. Of course, that didn’t really work out, so now there are only individual applicants and also homeowners.
After we were awarded the plot, the addresses of the other terrace neighbors were shared to discuss certain matters, such as roof style, whether or not to have a basement, etc. It was immediately clear that everyone preferred to do their own thing. However, we were still able to agree that the housing group will have a gable roof with a pitch of 35 to 40 degrees (within this 5-degree range).
As the end house, we will build without a basement, while the middle house and the other end house will have basements. This obviously presents a challenge as we would have to make a deep foundation or simply skip it, and the middle house would have to support us, as we will start construction first. The current agreement with the middle house is that we will build a deeper foundation at his expense, as supporting our house later on would be considerably more expensive for him.
We are currently close to signing with the construction manager, the notarization appointment for the plot is at the end of June, and we hope to start construction in the fall of this year. Meanwhile, several other freely planned housing groups are being built around us, which might get in the way with their cranes.
I will document the progress here from time to time – such a self-planned terraced house doesn’t come along very often.
some of you might have already followed one of my threads about us having to or being allowed to build our end-terrace house on our own responsibility – depending on how you look at it. This means that we are buying an end-terrace plot (215 sqm (2315 sq ft)) in a new development area in the Rhein-Neckar district and will be building on it ourselves – but in coordination with our two terrace neighbors.
The municipality, which sold the plots through a local resident model, ideally wanted applicants to apply as a complete housing group with several families and then build accordingly with a general contractor, construction manager, or architect. Of course, that didn’t really work out, so now there are only individual applicants and also homeowners.
After we were awarded the plot, the addresses of the other terrace neighbors were shared to discuss certain matters, such as roof style, whether or not to have a basement, etc. It was immediately clear that everyone preferred to do their own thing. However, we were still able to agree that the housing group will have a gable roof with a pitch of 35 to 40 degrees (within this 5-degree range).
As the end house, we will build without a basement, while the middle house and the other end house will have basements. This obviously presents a challenge as we would have to make a deep foundation or simply skip it, and the middle house would have to support us, as we will start construction first. The current agreement with the middle house is that we will build a deeper foundation at his expense, as supporting our house later on would be considerably more expensive for him.
We are currently close to signing with the construction manager, the notarization appointment for the plot is at the end of June, and we hope to start construction in the fall of this year. Meanwhile, several other freely planned housing groups are being built around us, which might get in the way with their cranes.
I will document the progress here from time to time – such a self-planned terraced house doesn’t come along very often.
G
goalkeeper12 Aug 2020 13:18Many other home builders in the area build normally and without problems, coordinate with their neighbors, for example, digging deeper in advance so that the other neighbor can build a basement, and so on – this can work quite well.
Our path to the house was not easy either – but that is rarely the case with building.
We had already purchased our plot of land back in June, until the neighbor moved in closer in November. By the way, it was the only plot that remained unsold for such a long time.
For us, the plot was the only option: price was reasonable, short distances to school, daycare, and my wife’s workplace. Convenient transport connections for me. Aldi, Lidl, and EDEKA within walking distance – and two major highways right at the doorstep. There is not much choice like this in our region.
Our path to the house was not easy either – but that is rarely the case with building.
We had already purchased our plot of land back in June, until the neighbor moved in closer in November. By the way, it was the only plot that remained unsold for such a long time.
For us, the plot was the only option: price was reasonable, short distances to school, daycare, and my wife’s workplace. Convenient transport connections for me. Aldi, Lidl, and EDEKA within walking distance – and two major highways right at the doorstep. There is not much choice like this in our region.
P
Pinkiponk12 Aug 2020 13:21goalkeeper schrieb:
Many other builders in our area do it the way you described – we would have been happy to save the 12cm (5 inches) and 5,000 € on insulation as well.This is probably a basic question, but I don’t understand what is bad about having an extra thick wall and insulation in a row house block. Isn’t more wall and insulation actually a good thing, especially for soundproofing?P
Pinkiponk12 Aug 2020 13:22goalkeeper schrieb:
Many other homeowners in the area build quite normally and without issues, coordinate with their neighbors, for example by digging deeper in advance so that the other neighbor can build a basement, and so on – this can work quite well.
Our path to building our house wasn’t easy either – but that’s rarely the case when constructing a home.
We had already purchased our plot back in June, but the neighbor only moved in November. Incidentally, it was the only plot that hadn’t sold for such a long time.
For us, the plot was the only option: the price was reasonable, short distances to school, daycare, and my wife’s workplace. Convenient transport links for me. Aldi, Lidl, and EDEKA within walking distance – two major highways right by the house. There aren’t many choices like that in our region.Sooner or later, you’ll have normal, friendly neighbors, and then everything will be forgotten. What remains will be stories for entertainment that probably no one will take at face value.
U
UpperEast12 Aug 2020 13:29Pinkiponk schrieb:
Probably a basic question, but I don’t understand what could be wrong with having an extra thick wall and insulation in a terraced house partition. Isn’t more wall and insulation a good thing, especially for soundproofing?Thermal insulation is unnecessary since the other side is not an exterior wall. Sound is basically not reduced by external thermal insulation systems. Just use 20 or 24 cm (8 or 9.5 inches) of calcium silicate brick on the neighbor’s side, and that’s enough.G
goalkeeper12 Aug 2020 13:31Here, all lintels are made with 11.5cm (4.5 inches) calcium silicate bricks plus 2cm (0.8 inches) fire protection.
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Pinkiponk12 Aug 2020 13:51UpperEast schrieb:
Thermal insulation is unnecessary since the other side is not an exterior wall. Soundproofing is basically not improved by external thermal insulation systems. Just use 20 or 24 cm (8 or 9.5 inches) calcium silicate bricks on the neighbor's side, and that’s sufficient.Thanks. In that regard, I thought "more is better."Similar topics