Is now the time to build?

For some people the answer is yes.  If you have the ability to obtain credit which is rather tight at the moment, you stand a chance of reaping major deals.

Unless you have been hibernating in a cave deep within the Rockies and haven’t been following the news lately, you’ll probably notice that with the collapse of the housing market the construction market took a major hit.  If nobody can sell their home, there is no incentive to build new ones. Ergo, lots of out of work contractors.

So for the person who wants to build or needs to remodel it means that there are deals to be had.  Lately I get calls from contractors, many of whom normally only work on commercial projects, who are looking to be included on any project.  Including houses.  There is an ample supply of contractors available.

The same theory applies to building materials.  There are discounts to be had since the present supply outstrips the demand.

So while the recession is a bad thing for most people, for those with the means or who have to remodel/ build, these are actually fairly good times.  Nobody knows how long it will stay this way.  If the economy picks up and building construction increases, those discounts will disappear along with it.  If the recession continues its downward trend then many contractors will go out of business and the supply side dwindles.  Less contractors even in a down market means less competition to contend with and therefore the ability to raise prices again.

For the home owner watching their equity and value of their home lowered due to surrounding foreclosures, the means to sell and move to a home that has the amenities they desire becomes harder or non existent.  So staying put and remodeling the home to improve its functionality is probably their only recourse if they absolutely had to have that new kitchen or rec room or whatever.  You need not necessarily increase the size of your home by much.  A home can be designed to be small but efficient.  Larger is not necessarily better and in many cases results in inefficient houses that bleed energy (& your money).

Keeping the size of the home in check in turn can keep your construction costs down.  Just as it makes sense to improve the energy efficiency of your home before throwing technology at it, the same goes with the functionality of your home.  Keep it simple, smart and save costs at the same time.

Edit (3/13/09): Follow this link to an article in the AIArchitect newsletter: Falling Material Prices Make a Builder’s Market—Minus Credit

This entry was posted on 25. February 2009 at 14:31 and is filed under Architecture -general. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.

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