Renovation Decision Making & Affordability

My initial thinking was that I probably had just enough money to redo the floor plan and to do an addition of some kind. My dream was to perhaps even add a 2nd story, but I wasn't sure just what I could afford. I needed to figure that out and I didn't want to borrow money to do it. I also needed to learn about how this whole process works. I'd never done anything like this before :-\. We started to walk around different neighborhoods taking photos of homes we liked for ideas.. 

The architect I ended up choosing did this new construction that I liked nearby.. That's how I found him.

It doesn't look it but this was a renovation that involved remodeling the inside, extending the first floor, and adding a second story. I thought that it was very nicely done especially the interior.

This one is more or less identical to mine but they put a full basement underneath and preserved much of the historic look.. The town might force me down the road to doing something like this due to it's historic nature even though it's not really what we want.

I thought about how to save money on such a project. Perhaps be an owner builder and work with the contractors directly. Perhaps do some of the work myself (i'd done some projects with my brother the past few years such as adding hardwood floors and painting).

So I started learning.. I figured I needed to learn something about construction, architecture, town permitting, and design. Here are some of the things I began spending a lot of time doing..

• watching DIY - Renovation Realities, Rehab Addict, Sweat Equity
• watching HGTV - Sarah's House, Property Brothers, Income Property
• reading websites and books on being an owner/builder such as www.boyh.com
• poured over floorplans on various websites for ideas and to see if i could simply buy a floorplan.
• visited my town's planning department
• went to a couple of home renovation shows in my area and started talking to builders about the process
• explored various ways of financing such a project (out of pocket, equity loan, construction loan)
• my town offered a historic homes architect tour where I got to visit 5 different historic homes that had been renovated

Ultimately, I decided i needed an architect and a builder. That I wasn't going to try to manage such a project myself. The funny thing about both is you quickly learn they come in all shapes and sizes. Some builders are larger with their own offices and staff including everything from a receptionist to their own architects, finance, and project managers. Some are smaller without any real office or overhead.

Architects aren't much different. I met everything from the new kid with a master's degree from a good architecture school with a few years under his belt to the firm with it's own office and multiple architects working for it.

I spoke to 5-6 of each with a variety of sizes and not surprisingly, those with the overhead were more expensive while those that were younger or didn't have the overhead were less expensive. Give my limited budget, I decided to lean towards that sweet spot of someone that seemed competent & trustworthy but without all the overhead that i didn't want to pay for.

I have to say that the architects that came out all were quite different. Some had great qualities such as bringing great materials, explaining the process, listening, providing input, and showing competence. Some had the reverse qualities. Prices ranged from what seemed inexpensive (under $10k) to the outrageous (Around $50k) despite all of them essentially offering similar services. 

Ultimately, two in particular stood out and I chose one and plopped down my initial couple of thousand to start the design..