Bonus: We Answer Your Questions!

We unpack straight answers about new construction: when a barndominium makes sense, the risks of GC’ing your own build, what price per square foot actually means, and which features add real value and comfort. We also weigh trendy versus timeless design choices and how to future‑proof a home.

• true barndominium kits on slabs versus stick‑built with metal siding
• where barndominiums save time and where costs remain
• owner‑GC realities with lending limits and sub priorities
• why experienced GCs reduce delays and rework
• today’s realistic price per square foot ranges
• heated and cooled space versus under‑roof definitions
• must‑have features like encapsulated crawl spaces, AV prewire, efficient windows, EV chargers
• trends fading like fully open plans and the case for defined rooms
• timeless styles with lasting appeal
• tiny home financing basics and foundation requirements

If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to either one of us and we'd love to answer them.

Transcript

Setting Up The Big Questions

SPEAKER_02 0:01

Alright, so we're going to answer some questions that a lot of people have been asking when it comes to new construction. These are just kind of some of the top questions that we've seen online or been asked personally, and we're just going to run through them and see if we can address everybody's questions here. What's our first one we got? What are the pros and cons of a barninium?

SPEAKER_01 0:26

Ooh. So I get this one a lot too. I actually just had this conversation with a gentleman. He got a design done like two years ago. He called us back like yesterday, and uh we were talking about it. He's like, Well, what if I switch it to a barnuminium? Is that more cost effective? And the thing is, like, you gotta ask yourself a few questions. If you're putting it on a basement, you're better off just stick building it. Like a barn a barnuminium is a kit home that you order, have it shipped out, you put it on a slab, and the things that you're saving yourself are you're saving yourself a floor structure because it's a slab home, you're saving yourself some time because those kits go up pretty quick. Um but as far as like cost savings goes, I like I just don't I don't see where a big chunk of cost savings is coming from, other than like the floor structure and like some of the roofing material and things like that. But but grand scheme, if you're still framing rooms inside, you're still putting a ceiling in it, if it's not like a true vaulted thing, yeah, you're still doing all the framing. There's you're not escaping the framing, the plumbing, the electrical, the insulation. It's all still there. You've just simplified it because typically they're a rectangle, there's not a lot of complexity to them.

SPEAKER_02 1:49

Yeah, and I feel like some people get confused when you say barnuminium because you know it is kind of a trending fad in designs right now where builders will build what they're calling a barnuminium, but it's a stick build with metal siding.

SPEAKER_01 2:04

That's right. It so there's an aesthetic that's like I like the barn look. That's not a barnuminium. A barnuminium is a kit home you've ordered and you've put on a slab on your land. So, like the gentleman that called me called, he's got a it's a basement with a main story, and then he was gonna actually go up another short, it's gonna be a three-story house. He's like, Yeah, you know, we're gonna do a barnuminium. And I was like, man, you're on slope development, you're pouring concrete walls, they're not gonna build a kit for you to put on top of that. And it's all chopped up, too. It it's a house that kind of looks a little bit like a barn. Right. And that's just different. You're you're basically just siding it with metal at that point. You're not really right, right. You're not saving any costs.

SPEAKER_02 2:47

That's not a barn dominium. Um, yeah, I get asked them all the time too. I got a call just earlier this week about a guy with barn dominium. Um, generally, when people want to do a barn dominium, though, they have a large shop. You know, like it's most of the time it's combined.

SPEAKER_01 3:06

It's combined living. It's like a portion shop, portion house.

SPEAKER_02 3:09

It is, you know, a larger shop area, and they want to uh kind of square off a corner of that shop and put a bedroom and bathroom back there or something.

SPEAKER_01 3:17

Yeah, that's right. And you know, you see people, and we've done a few. Uh KG Metals is a good one to go to. They're out of Albertville. Um, I've heard people use uh Summertown metals as well. A lot of those like sell these kits. Um, and and there's some pros to it too. It really just depends on your goals, right? So, like if you're looking to get something up really quick and maybe you're gonna do some trade stuff inside yourself, a barnum is not a bad way to go. Um, if it's like a forever home and you have a certain aesthetic you're wanting to go for, that might not be the route for you. But uh, but there can definitely be some pros about them.

When A Barn Look Isn’t A Barndominium

SPEAKER_02 3:57

Well, let's uh you kind of talked about doing some of the trade yourself. So another hot question that we are asked is what if you want to uh general contract or GC the build yourself? What's something that you should expect?

SPEAKER_01 4:14

Yeah. So we get that one. We get that one a lot. Okay. You can totally GC your house yourself. Um you should expect you should expect to have more money set aside on the lending side than hiring if you if you're gonna hire a builder. If you're gonna hire a builder, it's gonna cost you a little bit more, but lending's gonna go a little bit smoother. I know a lot of lenders will not let you GC your own house. You have to have a qualified licensed builder. You also uh a lot of municipalities won't let you do it like in the city, so it'd have to be out in the county. Um but if you're out in the county and you have the skill set to GC it yourself, if you're just doing it to cut cost and you don't know anything about building, you are far better off and it will cost you far less to hire a builder to do it than to GC it yourself as a project to learn on and make a whole bunch of mistakes. Like they'll just it it will just cost you more. There's no way around that.

SPEAKER_02 5:18

100%. I um I get asked all the time from the lending perspective, yes, you can do it, but your options become a lot more limited. Right. Whereas, you know, if they just want construction on, they have a builder. I have a portfolio of construction ones now. We can find find one to fit everybody. When you decide you want to a general contract yourself, that option goes from you know this big to one. Yeah, you got one option now, right? Uh and it is doable, but you're right, you're gonna require more money.

SPEAKER_01 5:56

Uh and I guess you know, outside of the lending stuff, too, things you need to take into account is you just don't have the weight a contractor has. Like a contractor's got relationships they spent time developing, they got subs they've been keeping busy. That's exactly they know which subs provide the quality. So you're gonna go out and get bids from multiple people with next to zero knowledge of who does the best work. Yeah. And you're just kind of you're kind of hoping that you're getting what they're telling you.

SPEAKER_02 6:29

I mean, you get all those bids, and yeah, you got a general contractor who does this for a living. Yeah, and they work with all these subcontractors. They've vetted and they've picked their best and they keep them busy. But if uh you're bidding all this yourself, those that are busy with the general contractor probably ain't gonna return your call because they're busy and now you're you're definitely not gonna be a priority.

Should You GC Your Build Yourself

SPEAKER_01 6:54

Yeah. Um whereas, like if you're if you're a GC, you know, we've got a home building company. If we've given you five, six jobs in a row and I call you with one more, you're making me a priority versus the guy who's a one and done, right? This is I'm GC in this house myself. Can you come do my sheet work? Well, yeah, they'll they'll do it. But they're gonna put you in line and they're gonna get to my stuff before they ever come get to your stuff because I'm gonna keep feeding them work. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 7:23

All right, so I know you and I were talking about this right before we came on air here, but uh what uh what is the average price per square foot that you can expect to spend?

SPEAKER_01 7:36

Yeah. Um, okay. So it is a different day and age. The house of$100 to$150 per square foot is gone. Just settle on that. That's it's done. You're not gonna see it around here. Um, probably never again, honestly. And I get the question every single week without fail. And so just to explain a little bit, trades are in higher demand than they've ever been. There are far less people that do trades, materials are higher in most cases than they've ever been. Um and so things are just a premium right now. Um, we're seeing houses anywhere from like the 200s per square foot. Um, if it's a custom home, I would expect 225 plus. And and I would say the 225 plus, there are ranges within that. So 225 to like 275 is custom with better than builder grade, but still moderate custom finishes. And you can see these things go as high as like$400 a square foot depending on materials.

SPEAKER_02 8:44

Some of these high-end custom homes, I mean, you know, they are definitely north of$300.

SPEAKER_01 8:51

Yeah, yeah. I mean, we you got people picking marble floors and all these crazy countertops. Um, you got some cabinet guys who charge, you know,$1,000 a linear foot. Um, that's nice stuff, don't get me wrong. This is all super nice. Uh Pinterest has drove a lot of this. You get somebody, hey, you know, I saw this door uh thing, but I didn't want the door, I wanted the wall to recess down. That's a pretty big cost item. Like there's a lot of money tied up in that. But there's a big distinction that I think people get mixed up on. When you're talking to a builder, if somebody tells you, yes, I can build it for$150 a square foot, okay. They are not talking about heated and cooled square footage. So if you got a house plan that's 3,000 square feet of living space, and then it's got a 600 square foot garage and maybe 300, 400 square foot of porches and stuff like that, it's$150 a square foot for all of that. You cannot build a house, a nice house, for$150 a square foot for heated and cooled space. Just doesn't exist. Unless you're GCN yourself and you're cutting costs, you just can't get there.

SPEAKER_02 10:06

And when you're looking at selling the house or purchasing it, you're looking at heated and cooled space price perfectly.

Lending Limits And Subcontractor Realities

SPEAKER_01 10:13

And that's the difference. People look at an MLS and they go, oh, that's a 3,000 square foot house. I just want to build something like that. I could build it for the same. Not necessarily true. Uh, some cases, yes, some cases no, but you need to understand the difference between heated and cooled and under roof and or under beam square footage. So that's that's everything with a roof over it. That's covered porches, it's garages. Because people get this idea, and I don't know if it's just builders doing a bad job communicating or what, but this is another one we see every single week. Um I I had a gentleman call me. He said, Hey, I need this house plan, and we want to build this house, and my budget's like$450 to$500. Said, okay, send me the plan. So he sent it over and we're looking at it. I was like, brother, you got$7,500 square feet under beam. Even if it's$140 a square foot, that's still a million-dollar house. So square footage is a big deal. No, when you're actually getting your bid, a garage does not cost the same per square foot as your living room. We're just talking about average numbers that after the total price of the house is done, you can divide it against the square footage to figure that out, just as a conversational thing. Um, but people still charge for porches and garages, they don't give them away for free.

SPEAKER_02 11:43

Yeah. All right. Um kind of change uh pace a little bit here. What are some of the must-have features that you would want to put if you were building a house?

SPEAKER_01 11:59

So it'll be a split camp on this. May uh me and my dad, we actually disagree on this. But uh I like a crawl space house. Yeah. Yeah, I'm a big fan of crawl space. Um I think it just better on joints over time. I think accessibility. Um now with that being the case, you gotta do them right.

The Real Cost Per Square Foot

SPEAKER_02 12:20

Yeah, no, that that's true. Um, I would say if you're gonna do it, make sure it's encapsulated.

SPEAKER_01 12:26

Yeah, yeah, 100%. Uh like encapsulated crawl spaces. Um, so I I actually just got done with a meeting today before I come over here uh with a company called A VIQ. They're over in Huntsville. So it's an A V company. Uh and one of the conversations we were having is there is a basic like wiring that needs to happen for houses for uh Wi-Fi and just your A V stuff. Even if you don't want to do anything right now, being able to kind of plan for the future and future technologies and stuff that are coming. So I would say allowing for a little bit of budget and you're probably talking eight, ten thousand on the basic side of uh just having those wires put in there. But if I was building a house, I would I would just make sure that that's in the home for sure.

SPEAKER_02 13:17

Because you can always go back after the fact and add them, but just to make sure up front. Yeah. You know, something that I would I would really want to look at too is plenty of windows, plenty of natural light. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:30

Make sure they're good windows, good windows with a good R value, uh, watching your efficiency.

SPEAKER_02 13:37

Yeah, I've lived in a house with I remember the front of the house had like one window and it was a bedroom. So then and then the other side was it was one of the garages on the front side. There was no window in the living room. Oh man, it was it was dark.

SPEAKER_01 13:57

Dude, so side note here, but that meeting that I was in, there was a rep from uh I believe his name was Matt from Lutron. And so they got these lighting packages that they put in that it is the wildest thing. So it will watch where you're at. And so if you're in North Alabama sitting on Lake Gunnersville, it knows the the lighting temperature of the sun on that given day, and it adjusts your lights inside so you can have what feels like natural light. So, like in that room, it would have felt like sunlight is just in the room. It is the craziest thing. And the thing is, it's the way you explain it, it's a variation of white. So the lights all still look white. It's not like they're changing color, it just feels like sunlight in there instead of artificial light. That's cool. Super, super cool. So I do that. I think another big thing people need to just put them in houses, whether you have one, whether you disagree with it or agree with it, EV chargers. Put an EV charger in the garage.

SPEAKER_02 15:04

Especially moving forward, I mean 100%. They're becoming more popular for uh EV cars, and it will make, if anything, your resale value uh just that much easier.

SPEAKER_01 15:13

What kills me is somebody talking about reselling their house, they don't want to put an EV charger in, but they're worried about like what a bunk room looks like. I'm like, you should put an electrical charger in your in your garage. Even if you don't have one, if you don't like electric cars, still put a charger in there.

SPEAKER_02 15:30

Yeah. Um, so what floor plans and fixtures are trendy, and what can you add to make the home feel timeless? Hmm. I mean, I would say going back to barn dominiums and the aesthetic of a barn dough is the trendy thing right now.

SPEAKER_01 15:49

Uh I would say so. Um so timeless stuff, I I think a lot of your French country type styles, uh the cotswalled type style, um even even like your southern living, like plantation and farmhouses, those those will be here forever. Like we'll mean you'll be 80 years old and people will still be building those houses.

SPEAKER_02 16:17

I agree. If you got the the plantation style house with the wraparound port, it's like beautiful house.

SPEAKER_01 16:22

Just never go. Beautiful house. Brick ranchers, those were trendy, barnuminiums are trendy. Now, one thing, and I think there's a split camp on this too, um, but I think the open floor plan is is a trendy thing. I think it's trendy, and uh we're seeing more people go away from it.

SPEAKER_02 16:42

I I'm in the camp of going away.

SPEAKER_01 16:44

So that's me too. And uh me and my wife, we've designed like three or four houses for ourselves so far. We're just kind of like d doing different stuff. And we've done open floor plan for the most part, but every time it comes down to it, it's like, hey, if you're in that room trying to have a conversation and they're cooking and they're watching a ball game, like all of a sudden it's just noise. Yeah, it's just all noise.

SPEAKER_02 17:06

Especially most of the time in an open floor plan you're gonna have higher ceilings. That's as typically and then it just becomes echoing.

SPEAKER_01 17:14

I think it's the cheap way to entertain. It is people are like, I want to make a house for entertainment. Well, then you would have entertainment sections of your house, but if you're like, I just want a party barn, open floor plan is the way to go.

SPEAKER_02 17:29

I'm more of a fan of the two different two separate living rooms. You know, a formal living room and like a room. That's me.

SPEAKER_01 17:35

And it costs more, and and don't get me wrong, open floor plan is a beautiful look. You can get a really, really good looking aesthetic. But I do think it's a trendy thing. Uh you know, we used to have it, every single client was asking for it. I would say like 60% are doing it now. And we've had just in the past year, about 40% are, hey, I want to go back to more of a traditional layout. I don't like the open and stuff like that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:04

Um this is always a fun one. I get I get asked probably two or three times a year. Uh can you finance a tiny home? Short answer is yes. Yeah, yes, you can. Uh it would be considered financing like a manufactured home. Uh so it would have to meet kind of that manufactured home criteria where you are putting it in place, it has to be on a fixated foundation, and you can't be able to finance it and roll it around and take it across country.

SPEAKER_01 18:35

So, what qualifies a tiny home? Is there like a square footage that what once you hit it, that's the tiny home?

SPEAKER_02 18:44

Uh, for me, it's just it's a manufacturer's home. You could have it 25 square feet or 900 square feet.

SPEAKER_01 18:52

So, what happens if they stick build it?

Heated And Cooled Vs Under Roof

SPEAKER_02 18:54

Uh it's still gonna be looked at as a manufacturer. Manufactured home. Gotcha. Okay. But for you, I don't know. Well, what is it what's qualifies as a tiny home for a builder?

SPEAKER_01 19:06

I would say like less than a thousand square feet, it it starts getting into a tiny home range. Um for sure less than 900. I mean my opinion is less than a thousand. I don't know if there's like a standard out there for tiny homes, but most time when people come in and want to design one, they are well under 900, like five, five hundred to like 350 square feet somewhere in there. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:30

Um I mean, that's kind of really all the questions we put together. Um, have you got any more that have popped up?

SPEAKER_01 19:38

No, I think those uh those are the basic ones that we had, and uh we'll just kind of loop back and do some more of these uh as they as they kind of pop up, try to answer as much as we can and just keep this educational. If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to either one of us and we'd love to answer them.