Customer Reviews

How to Plan, Contract and Build Your Own Home

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is lives up to the first two parts of the title - Plan & Contract. It falls short on the building process but if you know you are going to use a Builder or General Contractor, it is a great source of information.

I haven't got the time to manage the building process but I know I can intelligently talk with my contractor. This book gives the reader a firm footing in dealing with the house design and contractor processes.

This is an excellent book with a lot of great advice. The part of the title that says "build your own home" is misleading -- it does not mean it shows YOU how to build your home, it means it in the general sense of whether people will buy a pre-owned or build-your-own-home. I was fine with that because that is exactly what I was looking for.

I spend a half hour poring over a wide selection of similar books. This one looked best. I spent another ten minutes on it before selecting it as the best. I was looking for specific tidbits that I know that I would give other home builders. After reading the book, I was even more impressed. There is a tremendous amount of good advice in an easy-to-read format. Highly recommended.

This book is very helpful for you to work with and speak the language of your contractor. It is not designed for you to be your own contractor, but to work with one that you select. In Part II "How to Build It", the book shows how a house is put together. If you never lift a hammer throughout the entire construction process, it still pays to know how a house can and should be put together. The difference between mediocre and excellent construction involves a ridiculously small materials cost. Knowing construction methods and materials will also assist you in your dealings with whichever contractor you choose.

I bought the book with the intention of using it as a guide as I built my new home. I found it more of a research guide to use in the process of preparing to build or purchase a new home. The "how to" portion is absolutely not there. It is a good book and well worth the money, but not what I was looking for. I was looking for something to "knock the cobwebs off my brain", since it has been over 20 years since I was involved in home construction in my late teens. I just bought another book on line, "How to design, build, remodel and maintain your home", hopefully this will meet my needs.

This book gives excellent strategic advice. It is not a tactical manual on how to build a house with your own hands, but rather informs a buyer on how to get the job done and which decisions are critical (e.g. site selection, architecture design selection, and builder selection). If you want to learn how to install drywall, then this is not the book for you. If you want to get a general idea of how it is done, but want to learn more about specifications from an owner's perspective, then this is the book for you. Some of the best advice in the book is really in the chapters on builders (how to select them, and how to work with them). This 'soft sceince' is the critical knowledge that I needed to build my own home that I would not have obtained otherwise. The sample specifications list using a HUD form proved to be invaluable to me. I didn't need an architect after that.

I found this book to be great! It gave me alot to consider that I had not even thought about. It you are planning to build a home this is a great book. It starts out giving you advice on what to look for in your floor plan then walks you thru the complete building process. I was hoping for a little more advice on how to go about being your own contractor but the book did not promis that. This book will be by my side for a while.

I have a slight problem with the title of this book. Will it enable you to build your own home? Yes, if by build your own home you mean hiring carpenters, plumbers, electricians and the like. But no if you mean grabbing a hammer, pipe wrench and a roll of wire.

This book is a general introduction to the concept of building a house. Here's what to think of when you are planning a house. Here are some of the basic concepts of plumbing. Think about wiring like this. It's a general introduction to nearly every aspect of building a house from footers to roofing.

Could you use this book to act as your own contractor. Probably if you study it really carefully, have some experience yourself or someone you trust to spend a lot of time talking to you.

The orientation of the book is for you to really get a contractor. But by reading the book, you know a lot more than most people, you'll save a lot of time, and you'll understand the jargon that they use to describe parts of the house.

FIrst, it should be noted that the editorial review and back cover both note, "Know when you'll move in with a helpful calendar-style checklist" and "Select the right mortgage". Neither of those are covered, at least not in this 4th edition. I see the number of pages were reduced from 824 pages in the 3rd ed. to 791 in this edition. Part of the mystery may be that the index does have an entry that says, "moving in timeline, 783-803". Well, not only does it NOT have 803 pages, the index is on pages 775 - 791! Finally, the back cover also says "Evaluate doing it yourself vs. subcontracting". This my be presented in a round-about way, but it really goes right into using a builder - never presenting the "do-it-yourself" versus contractor analysis.

With that said, the book DOES provide a lot of great information. Every part of the building process seems to be covered. The pros/cons of the various construction methods (such as foundation types, wall construction, etc.) is very useful.

The bottom line is this is a very good book that I would recommend for anyone building a home, but just keep in mind things noted in the editorial info, back cover, etc. are missing. I can't believe the editorial staff at McGraw-Hill were so negligent in this matter, and it makes me wonder what other inconsistencies can be found throughout the book.

We bought a house to be built, but had no experience or background in construction. This book was a tremendous help in getting us up to speed and it allowed us to be conversant, and more importantly watchful, of the developer and contractor. I was able to intelligently review plans and specs after reading through this book. It did not make me an expert, but I am light years ahead of where I was before I picked it up. Essential for anyone planning to build or buying new construction that is yet to be built/completed. Highly recommended.

As I am planning to build a huge home,and will probably be my own contractor, I have bought dozens of books so that I am well informed. This book is one of the best and has been extremely helpful to me in understanding the details of foundations, framing, roofing etc.The book is a great value providing over 700 pages of clear and useful information. Although you may not need to read every one of the 35 chapters, you will surely get your money's worth and learn very important things you need to know. Highly recommended to anyone building a house. This book is not full of hype and presents tons of information in a no-nonsense manner that is appreciated. It also has many good diagrams and illustrations which help to clarify the text for the beginner trying to understand the basics. Whether you are building yourself or hiring a builder, you will have the necessary knowledge to make sure your home is one of high quality.