Mistakes sometimes happen. Accidents and bad decisions are part of life. However, there are some really bad things that can happen, with projects going way over budget and way longer than expected if you make some mistakes when it comes to planning the building of a house. You could also end up having to pay for those mistakes for many years to come through poor building quality your materials.

In this article, we’ll take a look at some of the mistakes that you need to avoid when planning and building your home.

Planning of space

Planning the space in your house is absolutely crucial, except if you have massive resources in building a huge mansion. You need to plan space for storage, including those things that will be used rarely and all the clothing that will be used by a family. There’s no point in having a tiny box bedroom for family members and no place for them to put their clothes. It’s just not functional. You need to ask yourself if the master bedroom needs a huge walk-in closet when it could be used for a bathroom or increase space in the bedroom. Do you have space to hang coats during the colder months? Where are the shoes going to go in the hallway? How are people going to come in from the garden without making the carpets filthy? Where are the washing machine and tumble dryer going to go?

When planning the space you need to think a lot more than just about having a dining table, sofas and beds. You need to imagine yourself living in the space and plan accordingly.

Running projects yourself

You can save a lot of money by being the project manager for your own projects. However, do you really have the experience to sort out building regulations, planning approvals, finding the best value materials and labour, liaising with architects and surveyors, and developing schedules for the delivery of all materials? If your answer to all of those is yes, then you may be able to run the project yourself.

The reality of many DIY project manager jobs is that they end up going over budget, taking longer than expected, and there being problems down the line where materials were inappropriate for the task or the job was done incorrectly. If you didn’t have some PHP and HTML skills, you likely will not plan to manage a website development project. The same rationale goes for managing a home building project.

Compromising on the location you choose

It’s really tempting to choose cheaper land even though the location isn’t quite right. Things like local schools, access to amenities and the safety of a neighbourhood can add great value to a property you build. It is often false economy compromising on location, and you can end up with a lovely house where you don’t really want to live. Wherever possible, go for the ideal location and invest a bit more.

Think about the future

Many people plan their perfect home for now without thinking about 20 years time. Build your house for a lifetime. If you are taking the time to build it, you should probably want to live in it. If it’s a property you are building for flipping then by all means think more about your target market rather than yourself. However, if you are going to make it a family home then consider how many steps there are to the top floor. Think about an area that could be annexed in the future for elderly parents. Think about where your kids will bring their kids to visit you during the festive season in years to come. Design a house for life and not just for the next few years.

These are just some of the things that hopefully will add a bit of depth to your thinking as you plan to build your new home. Make sure you get good house building comparisons in order to choose companies that offer transparent pricing and have a good history of success. There are many quality new home builders options available. Read reviews of companies, make sure that you are sifting through those that may be fake, which is a big problem on the Internet these days. If you can, get personal testimonials from people that have had actual projects completed and find out about cleanliness, timescales, costs, and quality of building and workmanship.