House with roof terrace in Passau

Hello everyone!

Since we have now had a few days to let the draft from our architect sink in and have also adjusted the ground floor according to our ideas, I would now like to present the floor plan to you. Ideally, construction should begin next year, but ultimately we are not really in a hurry.

The plans are a 2nd preliminary draft from our architect with an initial cost estimate. Unfortunately, still without dimensions. The first draft only served to illustrate that with our initially planned budget our dreams are not achievable.
Development plan/restrictions

Size of the plot => approx. 450-500 m² (Not yet fixed, the plot is a gift from my parents and we are not quite agreed yet on where the future boundaries should run.
Slope => slight slope from west to east. (approx. 1m over the length of the house)

[I]The house has nearly ideal north/south orientation. The entrance + carport and driveway are therefore located on the north side.[/I]

- There is no development plan

Requirements of the builders:

Style, roof shape, building type => flat roof with roof terrace
Exterior dimensions => [I]11.80m x 7.2m with a bay window of 4.4m x 1.5m (no requirement from us)[/I]
Basement, floors => basement with a granny flat + 2 full floors + roof terrace
Number of people, age => 2 adults in the main residential unit + 2 children in the near future + 1 person in the granny flat

Office: family use or home office? => My wife is a teacher, so she will regularly have to do some work at home. I will work up to 4 days a week from home in the future.
Open or closed architecture => open living/cooking/dining area
Conservative or modern construction => modern construction
Open kitchen, cooking island => open yes, but without an island (if possible without wall cabinets)
Number of dining places => 6-10 people (table 2.4 x 1.0 m + 8-10 chairs)
Fireplace => uncertain (wife yes, I no - tendency is no)
Music/stereo wall => no
Balcony, roof terrace => roof terrace
Garage, carport => 2x carport
Utility garden, greenhouse => no

House design
Who designed it:
- Architect we trust.
What do you particularly like?:
- open kitchen, cube on the roof with covered roof terrace, small utility room on the ground floor for washing machine and dryer
What do you not like/what still needs optimization?:
Basement - layout of the cellar still needs to be optimized for a technical room.
Ground floor - should be completely mirrored from west to east, also we are worried that the living room with 3.5m width will feel tube-like. I want to put the sofa on the north side, the TV on the south side.
Upper floor - 45° walls in the children's bathroom

Preferred heating technology:
- gas boiler/solar vs. heat pump (air/water or geothermal). Completely uncertain yet, first the floor plan should be finished, then the heating load will be calculated.

If you have to give up, on which details/expansions
… can you do without:
for the time being carport and basement expansion, as well as expansion of the children's rooms + children's bathroom, since children do not yet exist) Otherwise we would like to have everything included
… can you not do without:
- open living area on the ground floor, granny flat, roof terrace

Since our architect is now on vacation until early December, we currently have a bit of a pause, which we have used to reshape the ground floor to our ideas.
[I][I]
We are now considering extending the longitudinal side by at least 50cm (preferably 1.0m) to expand the living room width from 3.5m to 4.0m/4.5m (we extended the building by 1m). [/I]
We mirrored it from west to east to create a greater spatial separation of the living room from the granny flat. In addition, we have planned a niche for a side-by-side refrigerator – unfortunately this goes at the expense of the already small utility room.

Sorry that there are no dimensions yet, I will add them as soon as possible, but for now I can give you measurements if you want to know any.

Now to the architect's cost estimate:

Development: 7,000€
Surveying: 2,500€
Main house 285,000€
Carport 12,000€
Controlled residential ventilation 10,000€ (requested by us)
Sun protection 7,500€
Ceiling spotlights 2,000€ (requested by us)
Terrain areas 2,500€
Paved areas 20,000€
Kitchen 15,000€
Fireplace 7,000€ (originally requested by us, now uncertain)
Architect services approx. 29,000€[/I]
Specialists, structural engineering, fire protection, energy saving ordinance approx. 11,000€

Total: 410,500€

In his calculation, he assumes a calculation value of 326€/m³ including VAT for the building costs of the enclosed volume.

The living area is currently approx. 156m² + approx. 38m² granny flat + 30m² utilizable area in the basement.
Calculated only on the living area, this is a price of approx. 1,470€/m² living area.

Including all costs, it comes to 2,110€/m².

Does that seem realistic to you?

What do you think of the draft? What would you improve?

I look forward to your suggestions!

Best regards Mathias

I consider the EG worth revising ... both versions. Just look at the path from the kitchen to the terrace .. slalom. Although .. sloping site, the original drawing shows the terrace on the left in the west .. so completely through the living room to the terrace. Really such a distance from sofa to TV? And why can’t the living room be above the granny flat? I don’t understand the spatial separation.

Kitchen, the SbS in the niche probably also needs more space to the left of the peninsula .. which I don’t consider ideal here either. It will become a storage place, as it is not sensibly integrated into the kitchen work.

Granny flat .. who is supposed to live there? Try furnishing it. The windbreak there is rather confining, as it doesn’t even offer space for a wardrobe.

Children’s bathroom with tub in front of the window. Window hard to clean and, when they become teenagers or children reach shower age, always showering in the tub in front of the window?

Is the office in the attic really sensible? Okay, it is quiet, but if there are children, it is quite far away. Or, if the postman rings three times.

Maybe consider designing the attic as a living room, making it a bit larger there, and placing the office, possibly as 2 smaller offices, in the ground floor. Then a generous kitchen/dining room.

I really don't like it - it can be better (especially if individually designed for you by an architect) Can you give us some dimensions?

A bit off topic:

I have the feeling that lately architects are increasingly trying to make the willing builders like the idea of a granny flat in order to offset costs.

You get pregnant with the wish to finally own your own independent house, and then you end up with the burden of a roommate. This apartment can’t even accommodate a frail parent. One should ask oneself at what stage of life one would rent a one-room apartment under a family of four. As a party or au pair room, however, okay.

Then I would, in your place, run through the evenings. The teacher sits upstairs working, the husband comes up with white wine (red wine stains across two floors), and wants to watch the sunset romantically with her. The woman is not finished yet. He goes back down, she relaxes briefly in the bathroom afterwards, goes down... a rooftop terrace is out of the question (the sun has also set and the lawn still needs to be watered). You resolve to actually use the rooftop terrace more often, then realize there is plenty of room for plant pots, but there’s still the garden, which requires work ...
When the children are around, the lawn is the favorite anyway, the rooftop terrace is then later used by the teenagers for smoking...
What I mean to say: you always imagine the rooftop terrace so nicely, but you actually have a much better terrace... on the ground floor, because it’s close to the fridge and the garden room, which certainly isn’t as drafty as a rooftop terrace inevitably is.

And a tip: remove the word guest from the planning - otherwise the tax office will cause trouble.

Otherwise, I find the draft quite okay.

Thanks first of all for your answers!

I think the ground floor needs revision ... both versions. Just consider the route from the kitchen to the terrace .. slalom. Although .. hillside location, the original drawing shows the terrace on the left in the west .. so completely through the living room to the terrace. Really that much distance from sofa to TV? And why can't the living room be above the granny flat? I don't understand the spatial separation.

- Yes, correct. The way from the kitchen to the terrace would then go through the living room. That was also a point for us, but in the end, we came to the opinion that we don’t find it bad.

- The distance from sofa to TV is indeed a bit far at 6.40m. However, it does also allow me to implement a potential screen + projector.

- Regarding the spatial separation: a stranger will be moving into the granny flat. Through this distance, he has peace from us and we peace from him - especially in the evenings.

Kitchen, the side-by-side in the niche probably needs more space on the left to the peninsula .. which I also do not consider ideal here. It will become just a storage place, as it is not usefully integrated into the kitchen work.

The kitchen from the architect was just an example. Alone because of the counter, that layout is not an option for us. Attached is an older version from us and a 3D image of the current peninsula. My wife would like a bench - the sense and use of which is another question.
If I leave 10cm space from the left edge of the fridge niche to the peninsula, that should be enough, right?
The island should really serve as a storage area, so the main workspace is not cluttered with everyday items like coffee machine, kettle, soda stream. Additionally, it offers more storage space in the base cabinets, which we would need anyway due to the lack of tall cabinets.
But as said, this is only a first draft from us. We will also soon consult a kitchen planner. Mainly, we wanted to estimate the size of the future kitchen a bit.

Granny flat .. who is supposed to live there? Try furnishing it. The windbreak there is rather confining, as it doesn’t even offer space for a cloakroom.

The granny flat is indeed still very much improvable. With a possible extension of the house, the layout can also become a small 2-room apartment. But more on that shortly.

Children's bathroom with tub in front of the window. Window is hard to clean and when the kids become teenagers or kids reach shower age, always shower in the tub in front of the window?

Same story in the children's bathroom as with the architect's kitchen: that was an initial example which certainly will not be an option for us. The bathtub will only be in the master bathroom, the children's bathroom will have a shower, toilet, and one washbasin. The problem will probably be that the shower will be where the bathtub is currently planned, so a window there will not be possible.
Then that would be the only window on the north side, which is a bit weird...

Is the office in the attic really sensible? Ok, it is quiet, but when kids come, it is quite far out of reach. Or, when the postman rings 3 times

The basic idea of having the office in the upper floor is because of my home office. With 3-4 days a week, that’s really a lot of time I spend there, and I really imagine it great to be able to work quietly up there. Also, the use of the roof terrace would likely be different, since you can easily fit a small under-desk fridge in the office and therefore don’t have to go downstairs for every drink. Still, the way up remains long, but that is true of all roof terraces.

For us, the advantage of the roof terrace over the garden simply outweighs:

Complete privacy versus neighbors
Great view over the Inn valley towards Austria

The architect plans to roof the part left of the staircase and also make it wind-protected. (Alternatively, the office to the left of the staircase, a covered seating area to the right of the stairs)
Additionally, we want to keep the option open up there to set up a whirlpool and possibly even a small garden sauna.

I am aware that it often leads to false hopes when you have both a garden and a roof terrace. But it also depends on what you make of the roof terrace.
If it's just walkable, with a few plants, then I agree you won’t really spend much time there.
But if I consider that up there I can have a whirlpool, seating area, fridge, grill, and garden shower, enabling almost everything as downstairs, but with the view and enormous privacy which I cannot fully ensure in the garden, then I personally don’t have to think twice.

Maybe consider designing the attic as a living room, making it a bit bigger there, and put the office, maybe divided into 2 smaller offices, in the ground floor. Then create a generous cooking/dining room.

That would indeed be an interesting option which sounds exciting to me. But that would be at the expense of the large open area on the ground floor. Let’s see if I can make that appealing to my wife, thanks!

I really do not like it - it can be better (especially if planned individually by an architect for you) Can you give us some measurements?

Will provide them as soon as possible. For now, I don’t have a scanner at hand.

A bit off topic:

I have the feeling that lately architects increasingly want to make an accessory apartment appealing to willing builders to offset costs.

You get pregnant with the wish to finally own your own independent house, and then you burden yourself with a roommate. This apartment can’t even take in a frail parent. One should ask oneself in which life stage one would rent a one-room apartment under a family of four. However, it’s okay as a party or au pair room.

The accessory apartment idea didn’t come from our architect but from us. The building project is taking place in a very central location in Passau – 5-10 minutes on foot to the university (students), the hospital (young doctors), and several schools (trainee teachers). My parents have been renting out 4 smaller apartments with 20-30 sqm next door for 25 years, and these have only been vacant for about 3-4 months over that time.

With a high-quality standard, a private garden portion, and in this location, I found that a cold rent of 10€ per sqm is easily achievable based on research. If it’s then possible to achieve the KFW 55 standard, next year alone we could probably get a 100,000€ KFW loan just for the accessory apartment. Not enough, due to the repayment-free period of the KFW loan, we could also pay off a private loan of 50,000€ interest-free in the first 5-7 years.

What I want to say: Over 20 years, the apartment will probably bring me rental income of about 80,000€, plus the interest relief from the 2nd KFW and the private loan.

Against this stand the extra costs for building the accessory apartment, but after the initial calculations, I don’t have to think long about whether this is financially sensible in our area or not.

The argument remains that you are bringing a stranger into your house. That’s true. However, if it is well thought out, we probably won’t have much contact with the tenant, and they won’t with us. Everyone has to weigh for themselves whether the financial advantages are more important than a detached house for themselves alone.

Then I would play through the evenings in your place. The teacher sits upstairs working, the man comes upstairs with white wine (red wine leaves stains over two floors), and wants to romantically watch the sunset with her. She’s not finished yet. He goes back downstairs, she then relaxes briefly in the bathroom, goes downstairs... no longer thinking of the rooftop terrace (sun has also set and the lawn still needs to be watered). You plan to really use the rooftop terrace more often, then realize there’s lots of space for plant pots, but there’s still the garden that requires work...
When the kids are here, the lawn is the favorite spot anyway, the rooftop terrace is then later used by the teenagers for smoking. ...
I want to say: you always imagine the rooftop terrace so nicely, but you have a much better terrace... on the ground floor, because it’s close to the fridge and the garden room, which surely isn’t as drafty as a rooftop terrace is by nature.

See above, it always depends on what you make of the rooftop terrace. But I fully agree that in times of small children it can certainly lead to the rooftop terrace being neglected. However, there is life after small children as well. My wife is also rather skeptical about it, which has however subsided after I showed her the possibilities. Since I definitely want the rooftop terrace, we probably can’t avoid trying it out in the belief that we belong to the few who really use something like that, no offense intended.

And a tip: strike the word guest from the plan – otherwise the tax office causes trouble.

Other than that, I find the design quite okay.

Definitely that, but the appointment with the tax advisor (also regarding the accessory apartment and its additional costs) is still due. Thank you!

I definitely don’t want to come across as resistant now, hope it doesn’t come off that way. ops:

What do you think about the architect’s cost estimate, does that sound about right?

Thanks! Regards