Semi-detached house in Hamburg with general contractor on own land (two + full attic floor, no basement)

And the thread is partly about exactly this question, whether and how we need the attic / can afford to pay for it / can design it structurally. And about what tips you have on how we should think further.

Until now, I was not aware of what you are concerned about here. You have kept your question very general: mistakes, what are you overlooking, organizational matters..

Total house footprint approximately 165m². There was already a preliminary building inquiry for this.

Let's start again: we agree, based on the same space requirements, but each is their own builder, that it is about a footprint of about 165/2, so approximately 82 sqm footprint. Now I wonder what exactly the preliminary building inquiry refers to, who applied for and commissioned it. Did it already exist before the purchase? Has only one person bought and now sells half to the other? Does the preliminary building inquiry concern a single-family house or also a semi-detached house? Is there already a draft? Will the plot be divided 1:1? What orientation does the plot have? Was the orientation taken into account in the preliminary building inquiry or was it roughly based on a floor area ratio/plot ratio? Were parking spaces requested? How many parking spaces do you need? How many must you have? Then the question: do you have to have the mentioned rooms finished already at occupancy? Are the children born? Could they initially share a room because they are still young? Does there have to be an office because home office is a topic? Are the incidental construction costs and the outdoor facilities already deducted from the 400,000€? Meaning: do you still have enough left to pay for incidental costs and outdoor facilities with a 400,000€ expenditure? What do these ±400,000€ relate to? Is that an assumption or has it been calculated by a bank or Dr. Klein? Here in the forum we also have a subforum where you can have your salary including expenses reviewed to see, conservatively calculated, how far your budget goes. Then you can better assess what you need to save on yourself, possibly with personal effort (except for floor coverings or painting work)

With what you write, @ypg, definitely one room would have to move to a higher floor.

Let's say this: with 65 sqm on the ground floor I don't see an office, rather gladly over 40 sqm as open space, 4-5 sqm shower bathroom, the rest goes for storage space, stairs and hallway/wardrobe. Possibly a closed living room for 5 family members. So all roughly estimated.

Then the attic would be needed as living space.

I don't want to exclude that. As said: the needs are not clearly defined, what must or what can be.

Viebrockhaus & Co. : furniture store GU : local carpenter For clarification

This could be very confusing now. The fact is that Viebrockhaus is a general contractor from northern Germany who delivers your tailor-made house (here). However, I don't see Viebrockhaus here at all in terms of costs. They charge very good/high premiums for everything. Whether also for the house shell, you would have to know how the plot is divided.

(where the details and especially the decisions about what is done as self-performance will vary – but none of the parties will do complete construction phases as self-performance). Your, @11ant, advice was even to select companies independently (and possibly independently of each other) after the shell construction. I think we would prefer a bit more organizational simplicity here, if it is possible price-wise. But maybe that also stands in the way of the other goals?

What other goals are there? – I didn’t have self-performance in mind at all, but "only" freedom in awarding the finishing trades. Experience shows that the family on the left side acts as the electrician and the family on the right side as the tiler – the general contractor is too expensive for the special arrangements. It’s better for neighborly friendship to have a better outlet than compromises. That’s why I see case constellations like yours with a joint planner and shell GC. "Shell plus" is always more advisable than "move-in-ready minus".

Where does the advice regarding wood come from? So far we have always been at stone and massive. What have we overlooked?

What may have driven you to "stone only" is not clear to me. I have been involved in this for four decades and usually request both factions (see also > setting the course). Certainly not to make unnecessary work for myself. But because I can still guess which construction method leads to the better overall solution in the concrete individual case.

The DH with II+D that I quickly found in a few further appearances all have a studio variant upstairs, so that a concrete ceiling + knee wall would probably mean significant replanning and additional cost. Or?

On the concrete ceiling, you will also find an explanation of the connections from me on "Building now." What you want above the eaves height again with a knee wall is completely unclear to me. Draw a basic sketch of the cross-section.

Again on this (I think I understand better now where this advice comes from): So visit an architectural office and have a plan made? But that surely costs money. If I then build with another GC, the money might (partly) be gone. Or first look for a few more GCs, modify their catalog houses and get offers? And only then consider whether to involve an architect’s office? What would be the advice here – and what does the advice depend on? [ / ] Maybe a GC who works according to his procedure would prefer to make his own (re)planning, which would again cost me money, so that I partly pay twice and end up with the additional costs. Or where am I thinking wrong?

I don’t know exactly what had in mind with the advice, but in the end I would also send you to a freelance architect; see also my house-building roadmap. You never go to a GC unadvised. Follow my roadmap, then there are no double actions.

Actually, I wanted to consciously talk about general matters first. Now the numbers are there (and the estimate only to show that we have thought about sqm per floor). [ / ] And the thread is partly about exactly this question, whether and how we need/pay/can structurally design the top floor.

The really big own-goals start here with single questions about bricks and exterior wall thicknesses. You think about floors with the architect in module A, when the room programs are translated into the building body. Possibly also in two, i.e. one half with and one without a recessed top floor (I haven’t looked back to see whether such would be possible).

I would guess that Viebrockhaus, for example, only builds its own houses. Or they are not a GC and I mixed something up terminology-wise here?

That could be very confusing now. Fact is that is a general contractor from northern Germany, who will build you (here) your tailored house. However, I do not see Viebrockhaus at all in terms of costs here. They charge very good/high markups for everything. Whether also for the house frame, you’d have to know how the plot is cut.

Viebrockhaus is a GC, not only in northern Germany, but not completely nationwide (not even in the NDR and WDR broadcast areas). My advisees build individually with them, but I prefer the type houses. I also see this provider as rather not suitable for you; in my opinion, they focus on privately insured / FDP clientele. Extreme deviations in construction specifications should choose other GCs, otherwise the markups are fair and the offers transparent. As a shell GC, they would be my last choice; they clearly focus on move-in-ready customers (who, however, gladly award the garage or carport "by themselves").

Once again on this (I think I now better understand where this advice comes from): So, visit an architectural firm and have a plan made? But that probably costs money. If I then build with a different general contractor, the money might be (partly) lost. Or should I first look for a few more general contractors, modify their catalog houses and have them create offers? And only then consider if an architectural firm should be involved? What would be the advice here – and what does the advice depend on?

Thanks in any case!

Really interesting thread!

Just a quick note here, from my own experience:
Last year we were so frustrated with trying to make the general contractors comparable (and to get them to comply with the development plan, which also proved very difficult), that we went to an architect with a fixed price for a general contractor plan.

That then led to the general contractors actually becoming comparable.

Altogether, so far the architect has not only cost us nothing but even saved us money. (Part of it was then waived by the general contractor, the architect dismissed an unjustified claim from the general contractor that we had been struggling with, and arranged some service providers with a significantly better price-performance ratio than we found ourselves.)

As 11ant wrote: Create a plan, present the plan to several general contractors and request offers and then review them.
This ultimately saved us a lot, despite the seemingly extra costs due to the architect.

Actually, I wanted to ask more questions and explain further, but time is tight right now. So for now, just this:

That then led to the GCs actually becoming comparable.

How exactly did you proceed? Should I imagine it like this: you paid for the architectural planning and then simply submitted it to various GCs and asked them to calculate what construction costs would result if you chose them? The GCs did not charge you for the calculation of the construction costs themselves? Did all the GCs agree to do it that way?

Actually, I wanted to ask more and explain further, but time is tight right now. So for now, just this:


How exactly did you proceed? Should I imagine it like this: you paid for the architect’s planning and then simply presented it to various general contractors (GCs) and asked them to calculate what construction costs would result if you decided for them? Did the GCs not then charge you for the construction cost calculation itself? Did all GCs agree to this procedure?

Exactly. We paid for the architect’s planning and created an equipment list with “must haves” (also important for comparability! For example, this included shading, heating technology, number of sockets, and various other things).

This was then presented by the architect to some pre-selected GCs (both Holzer and Steiner). Most of them responded. We then compared the offers together with the architect and made a selection.

Ultimately, it is like this: the providers want to sell. It’s about orders, even for a small single-family house that quickly approaches half a million in sales. (Of course, sales are not the same as profit, but nevertheless: that’s what they live on).

Only one GC didn’t answer us and absolutely wanted to give us only an offer for one of their standard floor plans. But none of those complied with the development plan. So we excluded them.

Paying for the construction cost calculation… that didn’t exist. And if a GC had thought about that, honestly, they would have been excluded. How should you compare anything if no offer is made? (Especially since in our case the topic of planning and equipment and so on was eliminated as above, meaning they even had less work than with a customer who first has a standard floor plan put through revisions.)

that we went to an architect with a fixed price for a general contractor planning.

How is one supposed to imagine that?

As 11ant wrote: create the planning, present the planning to several general contractors and obtain and then review offers.

When am I supposed to have written that? – to the best of my recollection, my advice is very different: Planning module A with the independent architect, then resting stage with switch setting, afterwards service phase 3 or the entire module B, never go to the general contractor instead of tendering, but only involve them in the tendering. The offers from the switch setting neither have the suitability nor the purpose that Germany could cast the super general contractor with them. One calibrates the budget-compliant planning with it; in the subsequent search for a construction company after service phase 5, only Steiner or Holzer are involved.

This allowed us to save properly in the end, despite apparently extra costs through the architect.

The most savings come from the seemingly expensive service phase 5 of the architect, omitting which produces learning costs at least of the same amount and additionally, as a cherry on top, drywall warts.