ᐅ Building an End-Terrace House as a Self-Managed Project with a General Contractor
Created on: 27 May 2019 10:48
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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.
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goalkeeper2 Oct 2024 17:43Alright… I keep being mentioned actively in @11ant’s posts, so I should gradually complete my thread.
Since the question came up after installing our patio roof about how my neighbor finishes the exterior side of his house, here is the update: last week, the patio roof installer already removed two glass panels, and today the scaffolding was set up – the neighbor seems to know what he’s doing and is plastering it himself.
The brick house owner did not give permission for scaffolding on his side and sent my neighbor and the scaffolding crew away again, even though they were scheduled to come today.
Well… a fitting quote from The Dark Knight comes to mind: “Some men just want to watch the world burn.”
Since the question came up after installing our patio roof about how my neighbor finishes the exterior side of his house, here is the update: last week, the patio roof installer already removed two glass panels, and today the scaffolding was set up – the neighbor seems to know what he’s doing and is plastering it himself.
The brick house owner did not give permission for scaffolding on his side and sent my neighbor and the scaffolding crew away again, even though they were scheduled to come today.
Well… a fitting quote from The Dark Knight comes to mind: “Some men just want to watch the world burn.”
goalkeeper schrieb:
I continue to be regularly mentioned in the posts by @11antYes, especially these days finally as an example of a house of this size, instead of always just as a warning example for the construction of a townhouse or semi-detached house in mixed-use areas. I sometimes feel a bit embarrassed by this "misuse," but at the same time, I’m grateful that this thread hasn’t been hijacked by outsiders like the construction blog of @i_b_n_a_n.https://www.instagram.com/11antgmxde/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/bauen-jetzt/
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goalkeeper23 Jan 2025 23:09To finally bring this topic to a close:
The plastering work was completed within about four weeks, and everything was properly cleaned up on our side by the neighbor and his team. After that, our canopy was reinstalled without any issues.
So, peace has now returned on our side, and I have finally found peace of mind — simply because too much happened at the time.
I always feared that the plastering would turn into another rash, last-minute job where we’d be faced with faits accomplis — fortunately, that fear turned out to be unfounded.
Looking back now, in hindsight, the whole matter could have been approached differently, for example by building a basement or laying the foundation deeper, etc. But who can really imagine, when building their first house, what kind of issues they might later have conflicts with the neighbor about?
In the end, at least our municipality and the building authority seem to have learned something from this: in the following new development area, it was no longer possible to purchase individual row house lots; instead, these were allocated only to companies that build an entire block at once and had already completed similar construction projects in the past.
I hope my remarks have offered some useful insights or food for thought to those currently in the planning phase.
The plastering work was completed within about four weeks, and everything was properly cleaned up on our side by the neighbor and his team. After that, our canopy was reinstalled without any issues.
So, peace has now returned on our side, and I have finally found peace of mind — simply because too much happened at the time.
I always feared that the plastering would turn into another rash, last-minute job where we’d be faced with faits accomplis — fortunately, that fear turned out to be unfounded.
Looking back now, in hindsight, the whole matter could have been approached differently, for example by building a basement or laying the foundation deeper, etc. But who can really imagine, when building their first house, what kind of issues they might later have conflicts with the neighbor about?
In the end, at least our municipality and the building authority seem to have learned something from this: in the following new development area, it was no longer possible to purchase individual row house lots; instead, these were allocated only to companies that build an entire block at once and had already completed similar construction projects in the past.
I hope my remarks have offered some useful insights or food for thought to those currently in the planning phase.
goalkeeper schrieb:
So, peace has finally come from our side, and I have now found peace of mind – it was just too much back then. Congratulations, I’m very glad to hear that!
goalkeeper schrieb:
I hope that with my explanations I was able to give some food for thought to one or another person during their planning phase… Thank you very much, yes, you definitely did!
You’re probably number one among the thread starters I’ve quoted.
.
goalkeeper schrieb:
In the end, at least our municipality and the building authority learned something from it: in the subsequent new development area, individual townhouse plots could no longer be bought separately but were only assigned directly to companies that develop whole blocks and have already completed similar construction projects in the past. It’s wonderful that I get to witness this. Hopefully your municipality will share this experience at municipal and regional meetings so that others take notice. This simple measure is an incredibly powerful key to the benefit of everyone involved and hardly restricts the freedom of choice for prospective homebuyers.
https://www.instagram.com/11antgmxde/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/bauen-jetzt/