Which personal contribution is worthwhile in house construction?

So, actually nothing works except for assistant work and wallpapering, painting?! [emoji6][emoji87] Your husband doesn’t need to decide which trade or all trades to take time off for if professional companies perform the trades. Just imagine, the customer shows up and acts like an intern. No professional can handle that, it just wastes time, and he has his employees who pull cables or lay bricks with him. He provides a warranty for the work that is finished by the end of the day.

It’s different with the bricklayer’s idea. But how is that supposed to be calculated or billed? I also have to say that not infrequently only 2 bricklayers show up on a construction site without a third helper.

Another problem, of course, is the logistics on the construction site when trades are to be carried out by friends or acquaintances. It has to fit – not infrequently the friend has back problems or simply no desire to work in addition to his employment – and always with the threat of undeclared work hanging over him.

But well: courage! Nothing ventured… but it is a physical challenge. One should expect to put in extra time or have a Plan B

Regards, Yvonne

I think helping out as an amateur doesn’t bring much savings. I thought so too, but every hour in my profession earns me more money than I can make in an hour on the construction site.

6 months x 10 days x 8 hours = 480 h
Each valued at 15 euros (efficiency = 1/3 of a skilled worker) gives a maximum of 7,200 euros savings. In return, you get problems with warranty, time delays,... Spending time on planning, checking offers, comparing, getting into the trades a bit and asking a lot, in my opinion, brings more.

Laying parquet, painting inside, paving the driveway, assembling the kitchen, less to save big money, more to be able to say I built a house

Friends of mine built their house completely by themselves. They saved about 50k. What Tentakel says there, I also find extremely important. I wouldn’t be the type to have a turnkey house put up. I want to do something on my house myself.

1. Can you take out these trades? 2. They have to be very very good friends who sacrifice their time because masonry work is to be done. Then you often get; oh no, I have back pain, oh no, I have to go to football, children's birthday today no time. Only when you can rely on yourself are you not abandoned.

I think you are neglecting the fact that the OP has the mentioned tradespeople in their circle of friends and family. Of course, you don’t need to come to the masonry company as an intern. But the good friend or relative will not bring someone who is then paid under the table. So you have to do it yourself. And I see that this works in my circle of friends. There are also skilled workers among the relatives here, and he himself and many friends have continuously helped.

That already saves a lot!
But it also costs a lot of time and nerves!
And the construction takes correspondingly longer. So double workload. But it still pays off for my buddy!

So I definitely consider it quite possible to save a lot of money there.
Perseverance, good relationships, and coordination skills assumed

Regards Joe

Hi,

our starting point was similar, except that my partner also helped actively.

Besides two full-time jobs each, we have done about 30-40 hours of personal work weekly. This has been going on for 12 months now, moving in is scheduled for the weekend.
I estimate the savings using the architect's calculation to be about €120,000.
Additionally, 4 other family members regularly helped for about 10 hours per week.

What did we do ourselves?

[*]Helper tasks during the shell construction (as already mentioned: carrying stones, cutting, mixing mortar, tying steel cages, placing steel reinforcement, etc.)
[*]Insulation on the floor slab (an extremely simple but time-consuming task)
[*]Complete electrical work except for connecting the distribution board (chasing/grinding slots, pulling cables, milling/setting sockets. (Brother-in-law = trained electrician planned, gave instructions, and connected switches, etc.).
[*]Heating (geothermal heat pump with 700m ground collectors in the garden), sanitary, water/sewage, ventilation was done by my partner’s brother. Of course, we helped a lot.
[*]Complete roof insulation including foil, battens underneath, suspending the ceiling (as well as all other drywall work)
[*]Painting
[*]Rainwater infiltration system + downpipes
[*]Soon, the splash protection strip around the house and the creation of 2 terraces will be done

What did we have done by companies?

[*]Roof truss + roofing (we ordered the tiles together with about 15 friends, so that the actual roofing was done on a Saturday within 5 hours)
[*]Screed (in my opinion, not suitable as personal work because an expensive machine is needed and the costs (cement screed) are manageable. For us, approx. 2000€ for about 180m² floor area)
[*]Interior plaster + exterior plaster (definitely not doable as a layman)
[*]Floors (ground floor + bathroom + guest WC with shower were tiled. A specialist company needed over 300 hours for this! On the upper floor, vinyl was glued down (if click vinyl or click laminate is enough, you can of course do this very well yourself).
[*]Kitchen installation