ᐅ Planning a single-family house (basement + ground floor + upper floor) on a 480 m² plot
Created on: 19 Jan 2022 17:37
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Elias_dee
Hello! In another thread, I was advised to present my project here. First of all, we are still at the very beginning of the planning process, have luckily secured a plot of land, and now need to study everything carefully. Tips, criticism, suggestions, etc., are always welcome.
Here are "our" key data:
- We are 2 adults, no children, and none planned for the time being
- Electricity consumption: about 3,000 - 3,500 kWh
- Hot water consumption: I don’t have exact data right now, but it’s rather high because we shower with warm water every day
- Fairly handy, so we would like to do at least the painting ourselves (interior + exterior), lay floor coverings (except tiles), and do the garden completely ourselves (we already have experience in all these areas)
Here are the key data for the plot:
- Plot size 480 m² (5,167 ft²)
- New development area
- 2 parking spaces required
- 2 full floors mandatory according to the development plan / zoning plan (building permit / planning permission)
- Ridge direction East-West, renewable energy preferred according to the development plan, photovoltaic as an independent roofing layer is possible
And here is what we want for the house:
- Ground floor with living room, kitchen, guest room, and bathroom with shower
- Upper floor with bedroom, walk-in closet, bathroom with shower, office 1, office 2
- Basement with technical room, utility room, possibly sauna and fitness area, but this might shift to just fitness + sauna in the garden
- Central long straight staircase as a design element
- About 80 m² (860 ft²) living space per floor
- Garage: We want an attached (prefabricated?) garage with direct access to the house plus a carport on the opposite side of the house (unfortunately required by the development/zoning plan)
According to the current plan (but I am still very uncertain here, so criticism is always welcome):
- Build according to KfW55 standard, even if there is no subsidy, or at least close to it—KfW40 does not seem worthwhile to me
- Natural gas connection is already laid to the plot, so my current preference is natural gas heating combined with solar thermal energy (for hot water and heating)
- Photovoltaics are currently not planned, as I don’t see the advantage given the low feed-in tariff
- A ventilation system, although I’m not sure yet if it should be central or decentralized
I can’t think of anything else at the moment—comments on anything are always welcome.
Thanks and best regards!
Elias_dee
Here are "our" key data:
- We are 2 adults, no children, and none planned for the time being
- Electricity consumption: about 3,000 - 3,500 kWh
- Hot water consumption: I don’t have exact data right now, but it’s rather high because we shower with warm water every day
- Fairly handy, so we would like to do at least the painting ourselves (interior + exterior), lay floor coverings (except tiles), and do the garden completely ourselves (we already have experience in all these areas)
Here are the key data for the plot:
- Plot size 480 m² (5,167 ft²)
- New development area
- 2 parking spaces required
- 2 full floors mandatory according to the development plan / zoning plan (building permit / planning permission)
- Ridge direction East-West, renewable energy preferred according to the development plan, photovoltaic as an independent roofing layer is possible
And here is what we want for the house:
- Ground floor with living room, kitchen, guest room, and bathroom with shower
- Upper floor with bedroom, walk-in closet, bathroom with shower, office 1, office 2
- Basement with technical room, utility room, possibly sauna and fitness area, but this might shift to just fitness + sauna in the garden
- Central long straight staircase as a design element
- About 80 m² (860 ft²) living space per floor
- Garage: We want an attached (prefabricated?) garage with direct access to the house plus a carport on the opposite side of the house (unfortunately required by the development/zoning plan)
According to the current plan (but I am still very uncertain here, so criticism is always welcome):
- Build according to KfW55 standard, even if there is no subsidy, or at least close to it—KfW40 does not seem worthwhile to me
- Natural gas connection is already laid to the plot, so my current preference is natural gas heating combined with solar thermal energy (for hot water and heating)
- Photovoltaics are currently not planned, as I don’t see the advantage given the low feed-in tariff
- A ventilation system, although I’m not sure yet if it should be central or decentralized
I can’t think of anything else at the moment—comments on anything are always welcome.
Thanks and best regards!
Elias_dee
E
Elias_dee20 Jan 2022 12:06Thank you very much again for all the helpful answers. This forum is really great, and I have already learned a lot from you 🙂
Regarding the ventilation system: I will take a closer look at this.
Regarding heating, solar thermal, and photovoltaics: I’m still quite unsure. The only thing I’m almost certain about is that natural gas is out. Everything else is still undecided... air-source heat pump? Ground-source heat pump? With solar thermal? Photovoltaic system? With storage or without, or none at all? Everyone suggests something different...
Regarding the sauna: true, having it on the upper floor with balcony access is a great idea and saves the cost of an extra bathroom. Yes, I would create some kind of privacy screen for it. Question for @Würfel: how many square meters is your bathroom with sauna on the upper floor?
Regarding fitness: I agree with Würfel, I’m also concerned about heat development here. I would still place it in the basement. Again, question for Würfel: how many square meters is your fitness area in the basement?
Oh, and of course the most important topic: financing and budget. There is still a bit of flexibility in my mentioned budget, but I want to stay below 900,000. This includes some DIY work (planned are floors, painting, and the entire garden) and also there are things that could be cut here and there if they are not essential – for example, the carport can be omitted at first and just replaced with a gravel parking area. But yes, I still need to do a proper budget plan. Unfortunately, we don’t have much equity to contribute, but we have a good income, so this should be manageable.
@ypg: definitely, the plan will be posted here in the next few days 🙂
Regarding the ventilation system: I will take a closer look at this.
Regarding heating, solar thermal, and photovoltaics: I’m still quite unsure. The only thing I’m almost certain about is that natural gas is out. Everything else is still undecided... air-source heat pump? Ground-source heat pump? With solar thermal? Photovoltaic system? With storage or without, or none at all? Everyone suggests something different...
Regarding the sauna: true, having it on the upper floor with balcony access is a great idea and saves the cost of an extra bathroom. Yes, I would create some kind of privacy screen for it. Question for @Würfel: how many square meters is your bathroom with sauna on the upper floor?
Regarding fitness: I agree with Würfel, I’m also concerned about heat development here. I would still place it in the basement. Again, question for Würfel: how many square meters is your fitness area in the basement?
Oh, and of course the most important topic: financing and budget. There is still a bit of flexibility in my mentioned budget, but I want to stay below 900,000. This includes some DIY work (planned are floors, painting, and the entire garden) and also there are things that could be cut here and there if they are not essential – for example, the carport can be omitted at first and just replaced with a gravel parking area. But yes, I still need to do a proper budget plan. Unfortunately, we don’t have much equity to contribute, but we have a good income, so this should be manageable.
@ypg: definitely, the plan will be posted here in the next few days 🙂
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Elias_dee20 Jan 2022 12:08Oh, and one more thing, because it was mentioned here that I probably live in an old building. No, I am currently renting a KfW55 house built in 2020 with 46cm (18 inches) walls, so everything is well sealed and without a ventilation system. I have never felt that the air quality was so poor that it couldn’t be improved by airing out the rooms for a few minutes. But as I said – I still need to look into the ventilation topic more thoroughly.
Elias_dee schrieb:
@11ant: you wrote again about the stairs, I really need to reconsider that. We can also slightly extend the building permit / planning permission area and make the house a bit larger; maybe that would be better for the straight staircase (or it could simply be omitted, it’s not a MUST).I would N.E.V.E.R. expand a house just to showcase a staircase. No man can be that handsome (that’s what Gitte sang) 🙂https://www.instagram.com/11antgmxde/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/bauen-jetzt/
Elias_dee schrieb:
Oh, and one more thing, since it was mentioned that I probably live in an old building now. No, I am currently renting a KfW55 house built in 2020 with 46cm (18 inches) walls, so everything is well sealed and without a ventilation system. I never get the feeling that the air quality is so poor that it cannot be refreshed by ventilating for a few minutes. But as I said – I still need to look more closely into the topic of ventilation.Check if the windows have trickle vents installed. I would at least consider them for a newly built rental property.
Yes, in my condominium, for example, there is Regelair installed, and a fan in the bathroom regularly starts running at a very low speed to create the necessary negative pressure. Unfortunately, this is not quite enough to counteract the backdraft damper. I will have to take another look at the fans…
I don’t want to just focus on the budget, but your 900k is also a bit shaky.
For example, my rough estimate doesn’t even include an architect (around 50,000 euros (about 54,000 USD)). There’s also no contingency included yet. And since you’re just starting to plan, expect a 5-10% price increase by the time you’re ready.
And just so you know... integrating a sauna into a bathroom—unless we’re talking about a simple DIY infrared cabin from a hardware store—will add at least 10,000 to 15,000 euros (about 11,000 to 16,000 USD) extra.
You already mentioned that the carport could come later and that you’ll do some work yourself. Don’t overestimate that, though. Materials still cost money, especially when it comes to exterior work (do you need retaining walls, for example?).
Regarding the budget, take a look here as well https://www.hausbau-forum.de/threads/ueberpruefung-gesamtkostenschaetzung-und-planungsauftrag.42363/
For example, my rough estimate doesn’t even include an architect (around 50,000 euros (about 54,000 USD)). There’s also no contingency included yet. And since you’re just starting to plan, expect a 5-10% price increase by the time you’re ready.
And just so you know... integrating a sauna into a bathroom—unless we’re talking about a simple DIY infrared cabin from a hardware store—will add at least 10,000 to 15,000 euros (about 11,000 to 16,000 USD) extra.
You already mentioned that the carport could come later and that you’ll do some work yourself. Don’t overestimate that, though. Materials still cost money, especially when it comes to exterior work (do you need retaining walls, for example?).
Regarding the budget, take a look here as well https://www.hausbau-forum.de/threads/ueberpruefung-gesamtkostenschaetzung-und-planungsauftrag.42363/
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