An architect we really like quoted us $3/sqft (living area only) plan our $4,000 sqft house. Is his price in the realm of reality or is it out of site? Most quotes we get are for $2 to $2.50 per square foot.

Unless you are a volume customer, that seems like a pretty fair deal for a custom home.

Going bill out rate for architects is in the $125 - $200 per hour range for AIA's, or $75 - $120/hr for draftsmen.

4000SF * $3/SF = $12,000. Guess $150/hr = 80 hours of work. Do you think he's going to spend 80 hours on it?

Is this basically the same thing as meeting with a drafter and coming up with blueprints for a house?

Since this quote is for the living area only, how big is that part of the house? I think a few other posters missed that little caveat.

The Fife said:

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Since this quote is for the living area only, how big is that part of the house? I think a few other posters missed that little caveat.

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It'll exclude garages and attics. We're starting out at 4,000 sq ft basis and he'll charge extra if we go over that.

We're paying hourly...but the "design phase" should come out to about 5 - 10% build cost. We'll keep them involved during construction though too, which I'd highly recommend doing.

Well, my career's on the commercial side of that dance.
You're right...for eternity. But generally not a "funny" back-forth, at all.

Yeah that's exactly the point. Making sure they're on the same page and that the builder executes properly.

I guess I didn't talk to those great architects. Out of the ones I did talk to, 5 - 10% of build was about average. Some were a little lower...some were a LOT higher. We fully intend to keep it closer to 5%, which will end up being about $10/ft for us.

Also...FWIW...our guy is literally just hourly. The 5 - 10% of build is based on the actual dollar number he quoted as "average" for design calculated with our estimated size and build cost. I'm guessing his average cost/build is lower because most of his stuff is bigger and more expensive than ours. If that makes sense... So our numbers may end up being less.

It's hard to compare apples to apples because they all bill/quote differently and each project is different.

Yeah that's why I tried to qualify it by using our numbers. We're building a smaller than "normal" custom house. We don't want gigantic rooms, a media room, etc. We're shooting for about 3000ft2. But we want it to be nice and custom. When you start adding a lot of square footage, the $/ft/build goes down because of economies of scale and those larger spaces don't need as much "design."

I'm sure Rice is very good but I think they work with a lot of big builders who do huge (5000ft2+) semi-custom homes. I believe they're more of a mass production type shop. I don't doubt that his cost is much lower. I'm also not sure if he's an architect, not that that necessarily matters... Just not what we were looking for.

to each their own my man.

And FWIW, some of the residential architects who are known as the best in town are much higher: Dillon Kyle, Jay Baker, Murphy-Mears, e.g.

These numbers are extremely high to me as well. We just built a 3,000 sq ft living custom home ourselves. Custom exterior, ceilings, hidden rooms, all the electrical placement drawn in with a local drafter. Took probably just under 10 hrs. What's the benefit of hiring an "architect" for a residential project?

Maroon Stormtrooper said:

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The Fife said:

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Since this quote is for the living area only, how big is that part of the house? I think a few other posters missed that little caveat.

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It'll exclude garages and attics. We're starting out at 4,000 sq ft basis and he'll charge extra if we go over that.

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Gotcha, I was thinking living space as in excluding bedrooms/bathrooms/kitchen.

Sounds like a decent deal if you like examples of their prior work. We're working with one on our addition/fixing problems with previous additions done on the place. I thought I had a pretty good design to start with but what he came up with is a lot better.

What area did you decide to build in?

Woodland Heights

Maroon Stormtrooper said:

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An architect we really like quoted us $3/sqft (living area only) plan our $4,000 sqft house. Is his price in the realm of reality or is it out of site? Most quotes we get are for $2 to $2.50 per square foot.

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If you are still looking for a good architect that will work for you and with you from scratch to finish with however redraws needed shoot me an email-andresv94 at the y
I've done residential design for over 25 years from small projects to large projects thru out Texas, California and in Mexico

That was pretty good.

Builder...my question AND my post were Both genuine. The only trashing was done on your part. I also never said "do away with an entire profession". I'm happy there are people who appreciate "high end" architecture in a home. But again, my Honest question is in regards to the difference between the work of a drafter, and the work of an architect for a residential project. Thanks for the bash though.

It depends on the scope of services. Is the Arch starting from scratch, how close is the site to the office, do you have a compressed schedule, are you looking for assistance in the bidding/negotiation phase, to what level is he developing the documents ( i.d. "builder's set" vs. "full set" to include specifications etc. Is he providing the structural engineer, interior designer( if needed) permit documents completed, Many variables go into the fee. $12K should get you a decent level of service, including consultants, on a 'typical' house on a 'typical' site.

Would any of you be willing to share those architect references you personally used?

I was quoted 12% construction cost for a very vanilla proposal. Plus there's no guarantee they're going to keep construction cost to a minimum.

There was a good question about whether those high rates are worth it. I'm trying to decide if my money may be better spent elsewhere like carpentry.

Any more details? 12% of a house build to let a builders draftsman come up with something? More info would be helpful.

In regards to where you spend the money, it all comes down to what you value.

Do you want to spend the time and money working with an architect to create something truly unique and custom? Or are you fine if you home looks similar to others, and you'd rather put that money into high end appliances or high grade wood, etc etc.

I can answer more about our process if interested. We designed from scratch with an architect and his team. Spent about a year going from meeting #1 to final CDs and bidding out the project to builders. Currently in month 11 of construction with a few more to go.

This is such a perceived value question and topic IMO. I'll preference my opinion first by saying that i have worked with plans from probably no less than 50 different architects and have worked directly with at least 30 of them during the construction process during a custom build (those that are actually involved after the plans). I have built custom homes from 2500 sqft to over 17,000 sqft and price ranges of $300K to over $5M. Some of the architects are great and plans are clear, clean, and everything builds easily, and some of them have designs that look great, but don't translate to actual building and often end up having to modify or change things in the field due to that. Most architects are not engineers and because of that there are times where the engineering of the plan gets very cost prohibitive for the buyer, and majority of the time they client doesn't find this out until the plans are completed and paid for. They can even set unrealistic expectations of price with clients when they don't have a full grasp, then the client ends up upset with the builder or pricing, when the plans, engineering and details of plans always dictate what the price will be. Not to say there aren't some great architects out there, because there are, but there are also some really bad ones out there as well, and price isn't a direct correlation to quality.

As far as price goes, i have seen awesome architects design from scratch to fit on lot for $1.00-$2.00 per square foot of total covered area. I have seen really bad architects charge $3.00/sqft total covered or charge a % of build to a client, but they get far less than their money value IMO.

The relationships that i have with architects who design for my clients are between $1.00-$1.50/sqft total covered (depending on footages) and they work and do revisions until the client and myself are satisfied with the plans. If people went directly as retail, the price would be about $0.50/sqft total covered higher.

IMO it is hard to justify paying a % or above $2/sqft total covered for plans as i havent been able to see the added value above that, but to each their own and if you are fine paying that price and feel that the value is there for you and your project, then that is what really matters. Peace of mind is always worth something.