Construction Cost - Building a home. (Boise, Sandpoint: real estate market, 2013, loft)

[Nushagak]

We are relocating to northern Idaho, Sandpoint area. We will be building a new home. Has anyone on the forum built recently in the last year or so in this area? Can you give us a ballpark figure per sq foot for a semi-custom home?

Thank you.
Nush.

[Cnynrat]

You might send a DM to Oldafretired. He built near Spirit Lake a couple years ago. I haven't seen him post for a while, so he may not see your question for a while.

We thought about building, but ended up buying a home. In our research one thing we kept hearing is that is very difficult to talk about average cost/sf since cost varies widely based on the way you decide to finish the interior and many other factors.

Dave

[Clark Fork Fantast]

We're in the process of building a custom timber hybrid 1100 sq ft retirement cabin (ground floor 800 sq ft, loft 300), but it's very hard to say what the price per sq ft is going to be, since we have a small construction budget per year, and that's how much work gets done each year. We're going into year 5 now! It is definitely going to cost more than we anticipated! But like Dave says, that's because of our choice of materials. We decided not to use particle board or anything with harmful chemicals, and since it is such a small place, it's doable without breaking the bank.

We had an earlier thread where some numbers were mentioned. You could try to do a search.

Best of luck with your project! I expect you'll have 20 percent frustration and 80 percent exhilaration, like us! Have you found your dream property yet?

[Lacerta]

We only build in the Boise area, not up north, but as a general tip, we always say you can build the same floor plan for 3 times the cost if you want. So you can build a 1500 square foot house for $150k or $400k, for the exact same floor plan, depending on what you finish it with. So price per square foot is almost impossible to answer. Depending on building codes for that area, you might even be allowed to leave part of the house unfinished, which would make the price/square foot very low.

Also, if you are going to do a lot of the work yourself, the price per square foot will be much lower.

In short, that is a very difficult question to answer.

[javatom]

I design custom homes and I get this question all the time. Just to be clear, there is no such thing as "semi-custom". You either buy a tract home or it is custom. The size will influence cost of course but so will a bunch of other factors like location, terrain, how many levels, how many windows. A cost per square ft could be anywhere from 125 to 325 or higher. It is kind of like asking how much does a car cost per pound.

[DvrGrl]

We were looking seriously at building a home in the Sandpoint area for the past six months. One architect said $250/sq foot was on the low end for his custom homes. Spoke with a builder we really liked and he said that for a reasonable home not in a development we should plan on more like $125-175/sq foot, depending---but that was after buying land, putting in a road/driveway, electricity, and architect fees. Everyone said you that the cost of building is more expensive than buying a comparable house. On the same trip while we were looking at building, we came across a house that ticked all of our boxes. It isn't exactly what we would have built, but the tradeoff is being able to retire two years earlier, and that was our priority. Good luck!

[Cnynrat]

I might add that we were also told that it would be cheaper to buy vs. build a comparable home. My research tended to support that opinion. That was in the context of the north Idaho real estate market in 2013, so things may have changed since then.

Dave

[Nushagak]

Thanks everyone for the input. The quote for 250 a sf is insane at least in my world. We are not spending over 400k including land. Not interested in a tract home we have some pretty specific ideas for our home, retirement. With that said I wouldn't say we are over the top on anything either, plans for just under 2000 sq feet modest home.

Thank again.
Nush

[javatom]

I have designed plenty of homes under 2000 sf. Most people just want one that is bigger. The problems arise when someone has a budget for that size but the desire for one twice the size.

[Nn2036]

Originally Posted by Lacerta

Also, if you are going to do a lot of the work yourself, the price per square foot will be much lower.

In short, that is a very difficult question to answer.

I don't know what work that we can do as a homeowner that would save much money. All I can think of painting and may be hardwood floor. I would trust myself doing tile.