Single-family house Bauhaus style living area 180m with double garage

I don't know any architect who does Leistungsphase 9. That's 2% fee, if I remember correctly, for an incalculable task. That is correct. 1-8 is normal or 1-4 if the execution goes to a general contractor.

Update:

We have mutually parted ways over the weekend with Architect 1, whom we had given our handshake agreement. The distance between us was noticeable from the start. It felt like he had "resigned" to planning our house. It was not a partnership.

So we went to Architect 2 - the one with the designs - and are now working diligently with him. Completely different chemistry - great, interested people. The first designs including floor plans will follow in the subforum [UNTRANSLATED].

-> here you are:

For South Baden, I’m leaning more towards Freiburg, right? It’s probably an art to find a general contractor (GU) who comes from the immediate area. In the Palatinate, there is a GU we’ve heard good things about. But he already resisted driving "only" 25 km across the Rhine. What kind of heat pump system are you actually planning?

I would like to ask, even though the post is a few days old, which GU from the Palatinate is meant?

Hello everyone,

the suffering never ends... After we have now evaluated the floor plans, we have come to the conclusion that it makes no sense to continue with the current architect, as none of the designs matched our wishes or partly had major mistakes.

We just received an invoice from the architect amounting to EUR 13,200.00. He accepts the termination of the contract, even though he cannot understand the reasons for it. He would offset his fees incurred so far based on our verbal flat-rate agreement (EUR 55,000).

Is that lawful? I mean: a) there was no written offer, b) no signature to accept the contract, and c) all designs were not as we wanted, we had to call back multiple times and the status was still poor. Here I could see a trick.

What is your opinion? What is the legal situation?

The legal situation is difficult, neither a), b) nor c) are an advantage for you. He probably charges roughly for service phases 1-3, depending on whether the 55k was meant with or without tax, a bit more or a bit less. Has he provided the services? He definitely created drafts. Basically, he owes effort, i.e. functioning drafts, but not necessarily success, which would consist in your satisfaction with the drafts. I would classify the invoice for now as a kind of defensive reaction, i.e. he wants you to continue working with him. If you definitely do not want to do that, in my opinion there are two possibilities. a) Transfer amount X (which you consider justified, e.g. 5000€) and write to him that in your opinion this corresponds to the effort made to draft to your satisfaction. He will accept the money 95% of the time and leave you alone, maybe he will go to court as well. b) Pay nothing at all and wait for a letter from the lawyer / court. The result here will also very likely be a settlement, but with significantly more effort / hassle involved. Do you really see no possibility at all to come to an agreement with the architect?