Unless you or a close friend or family member has built a house before, the whole process around building a brand new house can be a bit daunting. You’re not sure what comes first, when to engage a building company or how the whole process unfolds.
To give you more of an idea of how an empty section can become your dream home let’s work through the process below. We’ll be starting at the position of not having a section, if you do already have a section you can jump to Planning/Consent, and skip over Finance & Section or House & Land Package parts, but you might still find the information interesting so do read all parts
The first thing you might be wondering is ‘’when is the best time to engage a building company?‘’ The answer to that would be right now, while you are at the very start of the process. This can even be before you’ve brought a section, before you’ve contacted your bank about finance, or even before you know what you want in your new build.
At this stage, everything is still in motion and nothing is set in stone. Which means, if you get in touch with a building company such as IKON Homes, we will guide you through. We will advise you on the process to make sure that you can get to your end goal of having your new build completed with the least amount of hurdles in between.
Tasks such as finding a section, and navigating finances, can seem like daunting tasks at the start, but with IKON, and our partners we can make sure these processes are seamless. With all of the team working together to make sure what you want is possible.
Step 1 – Finance
Finance will be one of the most important parts about your build, it will determine if the house you want to build is only a dream or is going to become a reality. We recommend at this stage to work with a broker. Squirrel Mortgages is a company we recommend, you can check them out on our website here – (Link to finance page)
Step 2 – Section or House & Land Package
Now you have your finance sorted, you’ll now know your limits when it comes to how much you can spend on your new build. At this point you have two choices, you can either: find your own section and choose a plan from the website or have our in-house architectural designer design a home for you; or pick a house and land package. Each has their pros, with picking a section, you have full control over where the section will be versus a house and land package being a section the building company has available.
Section
Pros
- Build exactly where you want to build
- More Variety
House & Land Package
Pros
- Guaranteed House will fit on the section
- Designed already
- Time Saving
Step 3 – Planning/Consent
If you’ve chosen a house and land package you’ll be able to skip this part, as IKON Homes will have all this sorted for you.
If you have chosen a section this is where you’ll need to get your new home designed, plans created, then consented by the local council. Besides building the actual home this can be one of the most time consuming parts of the process in building a new home.
With a full service building company like IKON Homes we have an architectural designer and draftsman on staff so we will be able to handle this all for you.
Once you have worked with a designer/draftsman to put your new home down on paper, the next step will be getting your plans consented. Before submitting to the council, your working drawings need to be completed and checked. Consent involves having your plans submitted to the local council for approval. A lot of factors go into the approval process, your draftsman will be able to work you through all of these, as their design will already have taken these considerations into account. Once approved your build can begin.
Step 4 – Build
When your build starts there will be many things to be done in order to complete your new home. Most will be handled by the builders, which we have listed below to give you an idea of the process.
As the Homeowner, you will mainly be watching at this part of the process and you will be required for design choices for certain aspects of the house unless already established in the planning/specification stage. This will involve choosing colours for a variety of items around the house, from tiles & carpet through to wall paint and kitchen colours. For most people this is the most exciting part of the whole process as they are beginning to see their home become a reality and also have the joy of choosing colour combinations to best suit your new home.
Don’t worry if you are not confident in choosing colours throughout your whole house. The designer will point you in the right direction.
Building Process
- Mark Out Site
- Break ground
- Foundation Prep – Boxing, Pre plumbing
- Foundation poured
- Frames Standing
- Truss standing
- Roof – gutters
- House is wrapped
- Windows installed
- Internal wiring, and plumbing
- External Doors installed
- External Cladding – Brick, Linear, Hardy Boards
- Insulation
- Gibbing
- Plastering/waterproofing
- Painting
- Kitchen installed
- Carpeting/Tiling
- Bathroom Installed
- Internal doors installed
- Final Clean
Step 5 – House Completed
Once the house is complete, the next step is getting the garden in order. Depending on which option you had chosen earlier (House & Land or Section). This will impact whether you’ll be looking after the garden or IKON Homes will. People can sometimes be surprised by this but when you get IKON to build your home, soft landscaping can be an owner’s care item.
Once the garden is complete this will be the final touch to bring your home to completion and all that will need to be done is to hand the keys over so you and your family can move in and start making memories together in your new home.
Before the keys are exchanged the building company will do a final walk through of the house with you. This will be where you go through the house and both look for anything that shouldn’t be there such as small defects. If anything is discovered the building company will organise a time with you and their team to come back and fix this for you.
Step 6 – After Care
Even though you have moved in and the final walk through is complete. We are not fully done with you yet. About 3 months into you living in the house, we will be back in contact to see how you are enjoying your new home and if you have noticed any small defects that weren’t picked up in the final walk through. Everything going great there won’t be any and you can keep on enjoying your new house.
We hope this has helped you understand the building process from start to finish a bit better.
For more information about building a new home, or building with IKON Homes, simply visit our contact us page and send a quick message, one of the team will get back to you in no time at all.
We want to build you a house that you will be proud to call HOME.