Hello everyone,
I have asked two questions about our house in the past, and the process has taken quite a while (our first contact with an architect was in September 2021), but now we have almost finished plans for our house.
Most of the difficulties arose because we are building in Belgium, in the German-speaking community, and hired a German prefabricated house company. They initially assigned us a German architect who unfortunately had no idea how a building permit application in Belgium should look, which cost us a lot of time... Since April, we have been working with a Belgian architect, and things are progressing much faster with him.
Furthermore, we spent a lot of time dealing with the municipality regarding the "watercourses." In reality, there are just two small streams, but since July 2021 the municipalities have become extremely cautious. We were still in the process of purchasing the property during the flood and visited the site at that time; even then, there was only a gentle trickle. The watercourses have no natural springs and merely consist of rainwater from the few surrounding houses (maximum 10), but after a long back-and-forth, we agreed on this bridge, which will cost us around 15,000€ (about $16,000). However, we will live with a provisional pipe culvert and embankment for the first few years and complete this part eventually.
I had already asked here about the roof overhang, and as you can see, the house has changed significantly. The municipality eventually blocked the original plans because we were not allowed to build up the terrain so heavily. The German architect we had was unable to produce proper site plans, so this issue only came up quite late, and we had to completely redesign in April this year because we needed to reduce the size considerably and could no longer build a garage. Hence, the basement and a more compact house.
The basement naturally costs more than a simple slab foundation, but since we might have needed deep foundation anyway due to the slope, the additional cost is probably manageable (I never had a concrete offer for the pile foundation, but it was expected to be very expensive).
On average, you can see the ceiling heights, insulation of the exterior walls and basement. The ceilings are still incorrectly shown in the plans; they will be exposed wood, as shown in the attached pictures.
I came across the forum again because I had some questions about basement wall insulation.
If you have any questions or suggestions regarding our plans, feel free to ask! Looking forward to your comments!
I have asked two questions about our house in the past, and the process has taken quite a while (our first contact with an architect was in September 2021), but now we have almost finished plans for our house.
Most of the difficulties arose because we are building in Belgium, in the German-speaking community, and hired a German prefabricated house company. They initially assigned us a German architect who unfortunately had no idea how a building permit application in Belgium should look, which cost us a lot of time... Since April, we have been working with a Belgian architect, and things are progressing much faster with him.
Furthermore, we spent a lot of time dealing with the municipality regarding the "watercourses." In reality, there are just two small streams, but since July 2021 the municipalities have become extremely cautious. We were still in the process of purchasing the property during the flood and visited the site at that time; even then, there was only a gentle trickle. The watercourses have no natural springs and merely consist of rainwater from the few surrounding houses (maximum 10), but after a long back-and-forth, we agreed on this bridge, which will cost us around 15,000€ (about $16,000). However, we will live with a provisional pipe culvert and embankment for the first few years and complete this part eventually.
I had already asked here about the roof overhang, and as you can see, the house has changed significantly. The municipality eventually blocked the original plans because we were not allowed to build up the terrain so heavily. The German architect we had was unable to produce proper site plans, so this issue only came up quite late, and we had to completely redesign in April this year because we needed to reduce the size considerably and could no longer build a garage. Hence, the basement and a more compact house.
The basement naturally costs more than a simple slab foundation, but since we might have needed deep foundation anyway due to the slope, the additional cost is probably manageable (I never had a concrete offer for the pile foundation, but it was expected to be very expensive).
On average, you can see the ceiling heights, insulation of the exterior walls and basement. The ceilings are still incorrectly shown in the plans; they will be exposed wood, as shown in the attached pictures.
I came across the forum again because I had some questions about basement wall insulation.
If you have any questions or suggestions regarding our plans, feel free to ask! Looking forward to your comments!
The garage is completely unusable; if you drive in forwards, you can’t get out again. Besides, 5.13 meters (16 feet 10 inches) is far too short. The sensors beep loudly at just 20 centimeters (8 inches) of distance, so you can’t use every centimeter. A BMW 3 series is 4.71 meters (15 feet 5 inches) long, and even that is very tight at the front, especially with the rear roller shutter closing—while still needing access to the trunk.
This will only cause frustration over time.
This will only cause frustration over time.
Nutshell schrieb:
A 3-series BMW is 4.71 meters (15.5 feet) long ... and here it is probably drawn to an undersized scale ;-)
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