So you’re looking to purchase a new
home and contemplating on whether or not it makes sense to buy an unfinished
home to save money.
An unfinished home is great way
to get into a new home and save dollars. Buying an unfinished home can lower
your initial investment and keep the monthly mortgage payment lower. In
addition, you might be able to buy an unfinished home with a larger
foundation size, such that someday when you finish the home you’ve gone from
a “Starter Home” to a large highly sought after custom home.
|
|
Typically an unfinished starter home
(e.g. Colonial/Gambrel/Cape of around 24x36 or 26x36) means that the upstairs is
unfinished. How unfinished is a question of how much sweat equity you are
willing to put into it. I have seen some unfinished homes where the only thing
done to the upstairs was a framed center bearing wall to support the roof
trusses. Others have included all of the rough framing, electric and plumbing.
Based on my experiences, not finishing the upstairs will save you around 15%-20%
of the finished cost of the entire home.
|
For example, a normally finished
home of $200,000 would cost you around $160, 000 to $170,000 unfinished
(upstairs not completed).
If the homes you are considering
have attached garages planned for them, you could possibly save another
$25-30K if you were to forgo the garage. Also, if there is an attached
family room planned, you may achieve similar savings as the garage by
forgoing it as well.
Another possibility for savings,
if the home is planned to include a fireplace you could suggest to the
builder to forgo the fireplace for the short term and have him build a cap
on top of the jog in the foundation for the fireplace. You may be able to
save several thousand dollars by eliminating the fireplace.
You need to remember though, when
builders get a piece of property to build a home on they want to do
everything possible to make as much money on their investment as they can.
So you might get them to accept some of these ideas but probably not all of
them.
The other thing to be aware of is
what the banks will accept. Assuming you get a mortgage, they will want to
make sure the unfinished home is livable and to local building codes. Thus
the downstairs will probably need to have a room that can serve as a bedroom
(with a door and closet). This means your future dining room, den or living
room may need to be designed and built to support a closet and door that
they may not have otherwise had.
The banks will frown upon
unfinished homes that they may have trouble selling/auctioning if you were
to default. So typically the downstairs rooms will need to have flooring
installed, trim installed, etc. This
will also hold true for landscaping. You may be able to save a little money
on landscaping, but the builder will probably need to satisfy the bank with
at least spreading some topsoil and grass around a 50 foot radius of the
home.
Buying an unfinished home is a
great way to enter into the housing market and to get a piece of the
American Dream. It allows the potential buyer to grow into the home as their
family and financial resources do so. Talk with your builder about the
options you may have for buying a home unfinished. You could save a bundle!
For more information on building
a new home, see the
New Home Construction Bid Sheet from
HomeAdditionPlus.com. The
New Home Construction Bid Sheet
provides extensive and important advice to the
future homeowner on how to work with a general home contractor and his
sub-contractors in order to ensure your home is built the way you want it to
be.
Fill out our 3-5 minute quick and easy form, and receive a
free price quote on a home addition from one of our prescreened and licensed
home addition contractors. This process is free and there is no obligation to
continue once you receive your home addition price estimate.
