ᐅ What features did you include in your house, and what did you decide to leave out?

@Bauexperte Regarding drying laundry: We will have a controlled residential ventilation system, and the biggest issue is expected to be dry air. The room is, of course, also planned as an exhaust air zone.

@Masipulami
Triple glazing, like most of the other stuff, is definitely not standard... and if it is offered upfront at no extra cost, it usually means that the house only just meets requirements like KfW-70 standards or similar... in other words, compromises were made in the wall construction or other areas.

Also, especially construction companies want to make a profit and won’t give you anything for free, absolutely nothing...

@willWohnen
Yep, bay windows are affectionately called “wall warts” by architects...
Yes, the bottom third of the window is fixed glass... since we don’t open the windows anyway, the exterior appearance was more important to us...

@Mycraft Yes, if a bay window doesn’t serve a real purpose, it can certainly be called a wall protrusion, because it costs a lot without adding value. We also have 2 bay windows—actually 3. Two are so-called secondary gables and one is a bay window in the living room. But our bay windows do serve a purpose. Without them, we wouldn’t have a separate children’s bathroom and the parents’ bathroom would be just a minimal solution. We also needed the bay window in the living room to position our table properly. Our architect never called any bay window a wall protrusion or tried to discourage us. On the contrary, he thinks it’s a good thing. So there are architects who don’t see every bay window as a wall protrusion.

And with our main contractor, triple-glazed windows were standard. The walls are also solid and well-insulated (solid brick house with Poroton T9 36.5cm (14.4 inches) walls—also at no extra cost). We only had one quote where double-glazed windows were included, and that was from a so-called discount provider. Low base price but everything cost extra.

@Mycraft:
Sorry, but I really find your reasoning illogical. Just because a supplier initially offers triple glazing doesn’t automatically mean they cut corners elsewhere. That’s a strange way of thinking.

We are building with a high-quality solid construction provider, where triple glazing is simply part of the standard package. And no, this is not at the lower end of the price spectrum. On average, we were already at about 1,700 € with the standard features. Now that we’re almost finished and have added a few extras, we are close to 2,000 €.

And as I said:
No matter where we went, triple glazing was included as standard with all providers. We already had double glazing in our old rental flat 15 years ago. I would never consider installing that in a new build today.

This is not strange reasoning but simply market economy: if money is spent in one area, it has to be recouped somewhere else...

The example about the wall construction was just that—an example. There are thousands of other areas where costs can be saved for the general contractor; then they can offer you something cheaper in the building services or elsewhere.

And triple glazing doesn’t always mean much; a standard triple-glazed unit can sometimes perform worse than a high-quality double glazing.

By the way, there are still many houses today with double glazing, sometimes by choice, sometimes because of better performance values... but sometimes simply out of ignorance. Many houses are built with the “just build a house” approach...

Sorry, double glazing out of principle? Maybe if you encounter militant glass protectors with glass panes from free-range sources.