House construction planning: solid house or prefabricated house? With or without a basement?

As far as I know, Picea requires passive house standard, since it is only heated with waste heat from the electrolyzer. And about €50,000 more for photovoltaics. But then it’s definitely a cool thing.

BUT: A relatively straightforward house with 250 sqm plus basement and an inexpensive plot already costs the full €600,000.
+ Passive house standard: €50,000
+ KNX: €40,000
+ Home cinema: €30,000
+ Picea: €100,000
+ Photovoltaics: €50,000

So: I think the plan is very cool. But I guess you’ll have to tighten the purse strings.

By the way, with these plans I wouldn’t look for house building companies, but a good architect. HOW it is then built is something he will tell you. You don’t have to think about that. (oh yes: + €80,000) ;-)

It may be that you are also totally into the topic. If so, have fun! It could be cool!

^^

Yes, exactly, I am completely into the topic ^^ I do the programming (cable laying and installation) all by myself. That is my world. And also my main concern is to do it all by myself when building the house.

(When building the house, it should be considered to lay all cables completely retrofittable on the ceiling in cable trays and to suspend the ceilings in the house so that they can be easily accessed at any time.) We are absolutely crazy about automation houses and want a smart home at the highest standard. I am fully aware of the purchase prices here. Since I want to do all the programming and laying alone, it’s obvious how many euros we would save in labor hours alone :)

I am not professionally involved in this topic, but I have been dealing with it in detail for years and have already set up several test installations.

We currently operate a radio-based smart home, however completely self-programmed with almost 300 components working together.

And I would like to transfer that from radio to cable. And completely avoid an online cloud that would otherwise not be solvable here and there through radio.

Well, regarding the costs, we just want to do what we can ourselves. The rest of the house equipment should be built-in furniture and not Ikea. However, we already have a comparative quote from a carpenter. Equipping the house completely with built-in furniture is ultimately even cheaper than buying and having a similar setup assembled from Möbel Höffner.

The furniture, however, is not included in the above-mentioned price of 600 K. (Not necessarily) The quote refers purely to the house with floors and fittings and walls and technology, or mainly the house itself.

Basically, despite everything, we want to keep costs as low as possible and not make a luxury palace out of it.

We do not need noble fabrics or designer furniture. A basic house off the shelf is enough for us. We just want the house to be a bit bigger because we need the space for wellbeing.

The technology is already included in the price (at least mentally).

But since we really have no idea how to implement all our wishes, that’s why we ended up here.

We are already 27 and 30 and want to invest our long savings into a home. And thereby free ourselves from rent prices and neighbors right above and next door.

Basically, our own realm.

And the technical possibilities should make it comfortable and interesting for us in the end.

Your wishes and your budget do not match by a six-figure amount. For 30k you won't get a basement. Maybe the hole and the disposal of the excavation.

First, read up on all the [Baunebenkosten] costs here. Think carefully about what you want. The statement 200-300 sqm is too general. What bothers you about your apartment? Look at model houses.

So the budget is at an absolute maximum of €600,000 ... Power generation - heat generation is supposed to run via HPS Picea and a ventilation system and underfloor heating (Picea and ventilation system take up a lot of space + control cabinet and 2-3 server cabinets with stands) The heating and ventilation including energy system (hydrogen / solar based) already takes around €100,000-110,000 without hoses for underfloor heating but with finished ventilation system. In case the question arises, Picea is a system that guarantees 100% autonomous power generation and you no longer need a grid connection for electricity. It is supposed to be routed into the house for safety but not connected. ...

Well, my brother-in-law is a building services engineer with 35 years of experience and wanted to install such a system for his son (also from the industry, but with a bachelor’s degree ;) ). Planning started around 2019. Whether your mentioned system already existed back then, I don’t know. It is definitely still experimental, but I certainly wouldn’t say because of that to just forget it! Back then they also had offers in a similar size range, but hydrogen tanks were installed outside. It ultimately failed due to binding commitments regarding consumption and performance. At that time, I made a plausibility calculation (photovoltaic yield, hydrogen energy density, electrolysis losses, etc.) and could hardly bridge the cold months (the calculation clearly showed that it wouldn’t have worked!). I hardly imagine that so much has changed in 2 years, but on paper, "snowball systems" also look good at first. Also, as others have already written before, I see clear divergences between wishes and budget.

As far as I know, Picea requires passive house standard, since it is only heated with waste heat from the electrolyzer. And about €50,000 extra for photovoltaics. But then it’s definitely a cool thing.

BUT: A relatively straightforward house with 250 sqm plus basement and a cheap plot already costs the full €600,000.
+ Passive house standard: €50,000
+ KNX: €40,000
+ Home cinema: €30,000
+ Picea: €100,000
+ Photovoltaics: €50,000

So: I think the plan is very cool. But I guess you’ll have to tighten the purse strings.

By the way, with these plans I wouldn’t look for home building companies, but a good architect. HOW it’s then built is up to him. You don’t have to worry about this. (oh yes: + €80,000) ;-)

Yes, I think it’s slowly coming together ^^

So KNX, yeah the €40,000 might not even be enough for our wishes.
But at least we’re slowly getting closer to all the information we were looking for.

Home cinema itself might be an exaggeration.
We’re fine with the good old flat screen with as good an OLED quality as possible, but it doesn’t have to be the absolute most expensive here.
The main thing is that in the end the feeling is good about what has been achieved.
At the moment, we still have the old Sony Bravia three times in the apartment and Sonos speakers, all networked with Logitech and an AV receiver.
That should then be a bit more centralized in the tech room rather than cluttered in the living room cabinet.
Sure, you want a good Dolby system.
However, the especially expensive tech behind it doesn’t have to move into the house right away.

I actually want everything prepared and also have the space in the tech room to install everything step by step myself.
The cables should be thoughtfully planned and laid by me in the end, ready for connection.
Step by step, as the technology is ready, each step should be added as a DIY job.
It’s basically become a huge hobby to technically reach the maximum.

So the most important functions of the house, like lighting, should of course be finished right away where the €40K come into play.

The rest we want to have retrofittable as DIY later.

We’re definitely not rich enough to have all this finished and handed over.
So we don’t want to leave the wrong impression of ourselves.

What really costs money in smart home projects is initially the labor hours (which we want to invest ourselves) and at the end the technology in the tech room itself behind it.
If you are thinking of Control4 and such now.
But that’s affordable if you upgrade it gradually.

In the end, it should really be a true smart home and not some toy stuff.
A house that thinks along, which ultimately can be integrated and used via Apple Watch and facial recognition and so on in the smart home.
That’s the plan due to our own interest to eventually push the technical limits as far as possible.
But I’m optimistic and not intimidated at all.
And in the end there are enough forums and within them enough other crazies who wire their lives exactly as I imagine mine.

And since we’re weird people anyway, for whom vacation means at most a two-day trip to a German city and afterwards we’re rather happy to sleep at home in our own bed, we don’t need a Mercedes in front of the door and a Skoda is enough, so there is also money left from the savings to be able to afford this surplus at home.

Besides, our family and circle of friends is so small that we never go out partying anyway ...
So no vacations, a normal car, no costs for parties and going out, so we save quite large amounts since we simply have no expenses that other people have.

So I want to emphasize again that we are actually quite normal people ^^
But already for many years we’ve been saving exactly for this and basically managing our household so that we could implement it like this.
Only about all the prices, we’re not quite aware yet where we will end up.

Of course, there is still more buffer than the planned buffer, but we don’t want to completely strip ourselves financially, so it makes sense to add more step by step.
That way, the joy in the hobby passion of automating and wiring the house excessively would never fade, because doing it yourself makes it really fun and in the end only affordable for us, since the technology comes from a different segment.