You may or may not have the funds, time and an idea yet of what to build at this moment, now the question is "are you knowledgeable enough" and "patient enough" to take some time to do your homework or research into looking at the big picture of your dream and to take the first essential steps in order for your desires to start materializing? If you are willing to learn and become patient enough in realizing a huge undertaking and very expensive project such as your dream house then this article is for you.
Planning, designing, constructing, and managing projects is no easy tasks. A person becomes an architect by studying and training to become proficient with this expertise for at least seven (7) years and engineers take at least five (5) years with their respective professions, which is all you need to properly plan and design a successful project. The value that you get from professionals will pay off from the start of your project up to the useful life of your building. Of course, you can design it yourself and hire draftsman, then hire an experienced construction person but you'll get nowhere near the quality of what a team of professionals can achieve for your project. In every project you will need the combined expertise of at least four (4) professionals, foremost is your architect to coordinate with his/her overall vision of form and space the building's basic structure done by structural engineers, electrical by electrical engineers and plumbing by plumbing engineers. Other professionals are needed in more complex buildings beside a modest residential building.
A responsible buyer/consumer when shopping for an expensive item will try to learn as much as possible about the products or services that are available, looks at reviews and compare options before making the purchase, with buildings, it is far more crucial for one to be more careful before committing to risk huge sums of money to incompetent providers, bad faith contractors or worst fall prey to con artists. Whatever you do, make sure that you keep in mind these 5 essential tips before trusting anyone with your project.
1. Realize that Architecture Matters
A responsible buyer/consumer when shopping for an expensive item will try to learn as much as possible about the products or services that are available, looks at reviews and compare options before making the purchase, with buildings, it is far more crucial for one to be more careful before committing to risk huge sums of money to incompetent providers, bad faith contractors or worst fall prey to con artists. Whatever you do, make sure that you keep in mind these 5 essential tips before trusting anyone with your project.
1. Realize that Architecture Matters
Many people will downplay the importance of architectural knowledge or expertise because they claim that it is an unnecessary cost and that it is easy to come up with designs and draw up plans. Usually, people who tell you these are hard-selling you or are insecure with architects and they want the job by offering free design which they are not good at, or if you yourself think this is the case without any much knowledge or experience then you are bound to fail or lose more money than is necessary. In PH, the practice of architecture by non-registered architects is illegal, see R.A. 9266. but that is not the big reason why architecture matters for your project, it matters because you need a smooth and enjoyable process of service, a finished product that is well designed and well-built that serves your unique needs and that speaks about your personality, values and upgraded status. You want a building that will have a higher resell value than your original project cost if you decide to sell it in due time. You want well-conceived spaces that will have a big and lasting impact on you and your family's living standards that delivers intangible benefits that enrich your family's lifestyle and enable you to flourish. Architecture matters because you want a building or house that only creative architects can provide, a creative product worthy of social display. If you've been to first-world countries who have high living standards, you want that at least in your own yard because you value the best outcome that our modern culture and technology can provide.
Unfortunately, in the race to do business and sell low-quality designs and build substandard buildings, again the same people will claim that beauty or aesthetics is the only component that architecture or architects could provide for your project where magazines or Pinterest can do that for you or their low-quality designs by assuming that you don't know better, that the only deciding factor for you is low price and that again is an uneducated assumption, more and more people are getting exposed to good architectural designs and are aspiring for such while many civil engineers will overplay the role of structural strength as the best determinant for good design and convince you to get them to do the architect's work for you and give it to you for free, what a noble professional (pardon my sarcasm). Architecture, as the Roman architect Marcus Vitruvius defined it as the trinity of Functionality, Stability, and Delight. All three must be present in all good design and that must be kept in mind when designing and judging a building for starters, that is why architects involve structural engineers in their team because they value structure too besides the other two in perfect unity. Learn more about what architects and engineers do and when to hire/consult them or not to hire them for specific concerns in your project.
2. It is very easy to fail if you make major bad decisions
If you failed to realize the first tip and went on with bad advice or believed uneducated opinions by non-architects about how to view your building or house, then you've botched your opportunity to create a lasting image or legacy of you, if not you've paid more and get less. It is obvious that to succeed and avoid too much risk, you must get the right people or professionals, not just professionals but professionals who have the same values as you and that you are comfortable with, someone you agree with in terms of aesthetic tastes or even politics. Hence, choosing your architect is a critical step to success, you don't want to be changing your architect midway your project if the relationship doesn't work out.
Another major decision that you will need to make is how will the project be delivered by an architect, check out this link to see options of delivery or contract methods. The way you deal with agreements is another major decision that you must make, just because you and your architect, contractor, engineer or subcontractors are best buddies doesn't mean you don't need written contracts. Contracts formalize agreements and protect both of your business deal and relationship in the long haul, you and your architect must have a written contract of service and if the other players can't give you a contract then ask your architect to make one for each deal.
Not understanding the process of design and construction will leave you assuming unrealistic expectations, too often, people think that design or plans that architects make are off-the-shelf products that one can just take and pay for in the cashier or that when they find a floor plan in magazines or on the internet that that is it and they only need to hire a builder or their relative or friend who did masonry work lately. You wouldn't want to get a lawyer's office staff to represent you in a legal case or get a nurse to operate on your body, would you? If you're worried about the cost of getting the right professional and went for a lesser substitute like random people with over-confidence without anything to show for, then your risk of failing just gone up ten folds and you'll ultimately regret it at the end and cost you more to repair or you end up living in a building that you didn't intend to build the way it is. Always your choice so be wise. You need an architect first and engineer and foreman and other people later if you decide to involve someone you know to work with you and your architect.
Finally, you need to make sure that the professional that you like do really have a license and not a fraud. Ask for their license number and check it out in the P.R.C. database to make sure they are in the list of registered roosters of what type of profession that they are claiming. Professionals are the best options for your expensive building because they have their legal reputations to protect and are bound to practice with ethical standards that work and protect for your best interest in their mind and not their bottom line. Professionalism must be the gold standard that clients look for before hiring one.
Some signs that your project is failing aren't obvious if you're inexperienced in dealing with projects and will only be apparent when you are expecting at a later date of moving along with the project. Some examples are that; design changes are too many, quality of drawings are elementary, no significant design inputs or advice are being offered by the free designers, design and documentation is taking too long, building officials are correcting your plans, you're encouraged to bribe officials to get permits approved, construction costs are overshooting, no construction schedule was presented and is taking longer, estimates are very inaccurate, no specifications presented or are not being fulfilled in the work, workers aren't paid living wage amounts, no qualified supervisor and bookkeeper on-site, and many more but ultimately you were expecting lower cost because they are not architects but you realized they were winging it or they lied to you about actual costs, but you can't back out by then. Learn more signs of failing projects here.
3. Be clear with your Goals and properly assess your Needs
One of the advantages of hiring the right professional such as an architect is that they can dive deep into your motives, aspirations, idiosyncrasies, values, and personal/social issues and bring out creative ideas or constructive concerns that you wouldn't have thought of which will impact design and cost. Because they are trained in architectural design as a science and art, they are the translator of your dreams (lucid or otherwise) into shapeable reality. Of course, you can come up with your ideas and set goals and objectives for your design like possible space organizations or looks and feels of rooms and style for your building's facade before you decide to hire an architect by organizing it into a "Design Brief" or list of needs and wants and ideas that you want to be incorporated in the overall design and hand it to your architect once you've hired one.
It is very tempting to dream big and hope for the largest rooms and as many features as you can at this stage of idealizing. This is a normal thing and is also a good thing to help your architect gauge your expectations and desires. Once you turn your ideas and lists to your architect, he/she will begin to assess your ideal expectations and check it with what is possible with your budget or technical feasibilities. Your architect may help you to step back and analyze the value of each idea, rooms, or features and try to solve it for you by balancing your absolute needs to your wants. If you have a budget ceiling, it would be wise to get an architect to make the best out of your maximum budget while planning for future additions for later.
4. There are responsible ways of cutting costs while not sacrificing quality and people's welfare in your project
When people are very concerned with cost and is thinking of cutting cost to save money from the outset of design, they tend to immediately discount the role of a paid designer or go price shopping for both design and construction services and see if someone are willing to design and/or construct for them for a very low price from desperate people looking to make small profit but will nonetheless be unenthusiastic overtime when they realized they're charging below a sustainable business, some will even trick over-enthusiastic designers (usually rookie designers) to giving free design work and take it for free and be ghosted, which is just deplorable. Tip number one or the realization that architecture matters is very tempting to put off the table because people will be overconfident and underestimate the value of professional design. We can't blame these people because they don't know better.
If you want to keep your cost to the lowest possible while not sacrificing the possibility of getting the best design service and quality construction outcomes without understaffing or underpaying your builders and workers, you need to understand the relationship between defining value and cost in your project. Paying for an architect versus doing it yourself or paying the less qualified persons to do design must be explored. Good design and complete and detailed drawings, a close to accurate estimates and detailed specifications can go a long way in managing cost overruns due to fewer uncertainties and open interpretations in construction while mediocre design and half-baked design documents by non-architects can create a domino of problems along the way, not to mention the future effect of bad or mediocre design would entail for your building's functionality and may even give you a design that would cost you more have you considered better design from a professional. To make an analogy, if you want to make a winning product such as an iPhone but you need to hire a creative genius like Steve Jobs who charges higher than a less creative one without much accomplishment as a track record, as a business decision, who would you bet your money to?
The central value analysis question to ask is that if you can save money now but will cost you more later and in a long term like having an inefficient space organization or wasted spaces or unanticipated future expansion a better decision? What if due to wrong detailing which resulted to defects and you building quickly deteriorated and would need frequent repairs or worst needs renovation? which is a wiser decision?
In construction, if you go for a contractor who offered you a very low price but ends up cutting cost by using substandard materials, unsupervised work due to absence of supervision leading to poor construction and underpaying workers to make a profit from low price contract, are you all right with such scheme? What if you cut cost by starting in getting the best planner, designer and honest and fair builder to balance your budget who can come up with an optimal design with a reasonable quality of construction by putting in place proper control and management practices with fair considerations to workers, is that be a wise decision?
The key to saving money is a discipline called "Value Engineering", it is best employed in your project from the beginning, Tip number 3 which speak of properly defining your goals and essential needs is the start of value engineering because good design naturally leads to good outcomes. that will save you money because you don't spend money that is not essential, or find acceptable cheaper materials or methods to use in construction and create value with well-built outcomes. Value engineering is a continuous process from your project's start-up to the end, if you work closely with your architect who takes his/her design and construction as his/her primary occupation, you will save more money without even knowing it, instead of leaving them out in your project's equation. More must be said but I'll end this tip for now with the words of Warren Buffet, "Price is what you pay while value is what you get."
5. Take your time to learn and plan for your project
Ideally, you need to have enough time to think your project over, ask friends who have undergone the same project. Luckily you are reading this and speeds up your understanding of what to think about before you lock into initiating your project. Being a well-informed consumer/buyer is a must to get the most out of your money and getting the best information and looking at options and possibilities need time and effort to payout. Basically, you need time to get into the proper mindset as outlined above and have a basic understanding of the processes and trends in getting your project done the right way. Sadly some of us prefer not to delve much on lengthy research and waste precious time to things that we are not too familiar or aren't much interested in such as design and construction or you just don't have the luxury of time to do all the needed homework. Hence to avoid much risk while in the dark you'll have to be confident that the best expert and professional that you must consult is a reputable architect, you'd be opting for fewer headaches and have more chance in succeeding and even exceeding your expectations if you create a good relationship with one.
To sum it up, the essential mindsets, to begin with, is to not overestimate your capability in terms of know-how, to keep your guard up when talking to anyone about your project of potential misleading advice especially with non-professionals, never discount legitimate experts or undervalue them, and most importantly prepare to do it right the first time and think through every major decision that involves large sums of money and how to become wise about it.
What's next? You can do a Project Planning Workshop to analyze your project's feasibility with some guidance. If you follow my recommendations and instructions here, you won't even be needing too much time to do research and aimless browsing of information, it's all right here. Good luck! 👏
To sum it up, the essential mindsets, to begin with, is to not overestimate your capability in terms of know-how, to keep your guard up when talking to anyone about your project of potential misleading advice especially with non-professionals, never discount legitimate experts or undervalue them, and most importantly prepare to do it right the first time and think through every major decision that involves large sums of money and how to become wise about it.
What's next? You can do a Project Planning Workshop to analyze your project's feasibility with some guidance. If you follow my recommendations and instructions here, you won't even be needing too much time to do research and aimless browsing of information, it's all right here. Good luck! 👏
Read other articles:
- The Project Planning Workshop
- Best Way to have Better Control and Fast-Tract Your Project
- How Much Does Hiring an Architect Cost
- Why contracts are essential when engaging in services
- The Architect's Basic Design Service
- 7 reasons why Architects are seen as expensive and an unnecessary cost in building projects
- How to create a Design Brief for your architect
- Philippine architecture practice and P.R.C.'s position with Civil Engineers' encroachment in the architecture profession
- Architects and Architecture: Myths vs Reality
No comments:
Post a Comment