When Should You Hire a Residential Architect to Help Design Your Home?

Construction & Contractors Blog

If you're having a new home built, you may work with a builder who offers a set number of designs for a home, with the ability to choose some cosmetic touches such as paint color and carpeting. This might work well if you aren't concerned about other personalized touches, but there are times when you may want to consider working with a residential architect instead. He or she can design your home from the ground up, or work with a builder to change out some major structural components of their design. Note when it might be good to work with a residential architect versus a builder with limited home designs available.

When you're concerned about the environment

Many new homes today will be built with very efficient windows and perhaps some type of thicker insulation than you would find in older homes, but might not offer much more when it comes to eco-friendly options. A residential architect can include solar panels in the design, a water recycling system that allows you to use water from the kitchen sink and shower for flushing the toilets, and other features that help to conserve power and resources. It can be difficult to retrofit many of these options into a home once it's built, so having an architect work with you to create an eco-friendly home from the ground up can be the better option.

When you want to work around natural features on your property

A builder's home may be designed to work on a flat concrete slab, as these homes are usually the easiest and quickest to build. If you want your home to be built into a large hill or to have a lakefront view, you might work with an architect instead. He or she can include larger windows or the structural support needed to accommodate these features, without requiring you to level the property or otherwise neglect to include these natural features in the home's design.

When you want to use specific materials for the build

To accommodate their limited number of designs and to build home quickly, builders often use specific material that is fabricated for them by a particular supplier. You may want to use recycled products, materials that are locally harvested, or materials that will be easy to recycle if you want to have them removed. You might also like the look of particular materials, such as a copper roof versus asphalt tiles. To use different materials, the design of the home might need to be changed to accommodate its overall weight. An architect can consider the use of those materials in his or her design and ensure your choices are respected with the home build.

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17 June 2016