We used Garrell, started with a stock plan (that we found on a random site, like Cool House Plans .com), had Garrell make 20 changes to it. Total Cost was $3,000, and got pdf plans from them. No site plans. Then, we spent about $2,000 (I think) with a local engineering firm to get a framing and foundation plan. Probably could've went to our lumber supplier instead (Stock Building Supply) and got that work done through them. We didn't need an engineer, but it was peace of mind. We used FedEX store for copies ($1 a page for full size).

Brian

@bdpeck-charlotte - thanks, very helpful! Your original plan must have been one of the cheaper ones, correct? The plan we're looking at is $2,500 as is, with no changes.
Yes, we're definitely going to take them to someone local so we can make sure the plans are fully compliant with our county codes. And I think they have to be stamped by an licensed engineer in our state in order to apply for a building permit (I think - just learning all this stuff!).

I'm learning so much on this forum. Thank goodness I found it!

ps - which garrell plan did you get?

I purchased 5 sets of Gardner plans and made quite a few minor changes to them myself using whiteout and an ink pen (I was owner/builder). I didn't think that this was very difficult to accomplish and I made sure that the county received an original plan...they really didn't care if I made interior changes anyway as long as the footprint stayed the same. I did make 2 slight footprint changes but the inspector never once brought out a tape measure to check anyway.

We went over hundreds of plans. Narrowed it down to about 5. Started sketching. Putting boxes on paper until all of our wish list needs/wants were met. Then took it to our lumber yard, lumber king. They were amazing with putting it into cad/making changes, and keeping it all compliant with everything. They also figured out all the spans/beams needed and did the footer and basement plans. They made great suggestions. They included front, back, sides, and angled versions. We paid about $27 to have it printed on 3x5 in multipule sets. Although in hindsight. we probably could have gotten away with the 11"x18" freebees they printed. Our only plan fee was the 27$.

Gardner is an architect but Garrell is not. Neither company can offer services equivalent to those offered by a local architect.

Renovator8 - what is garrell?

Given that they can't offer what local architects can, what if you love, say, a frank betz plan? What should one do in your opinion? Buy the plan and then have a local architect make your desired layout revisions and county code modifications? Or take print outs of the plans you like to a local architect and have them create what you like from scratch?

We looked at hundreds of online plans. Found 3 that were close to what we wanted.
Took them to our builder who called his drafts person. We went over with her what we wanted, what we liked and didn't about the various plans. She made some of her own suggestions, then went to work on them. She's incredibly busy so it took nearly a month to get plans back from her. We made a few minor tweaks. Then a big change to our wrap around porch.
All done we paid $3500 for our plans which are exactly what we want, and they're engineer stamped and to code for our area.
Incidentally, if we'd started from scratch with an architect it would have cost at least 5x's that. We checked.

I would say generally that a local person is going to be the safer bet. They would know what will work for your area the best.

It sounds like that if you need an engineers stamp than you are probably in a high hazard area. (high seismic, wind, water, snow, etc.)

To avoid copyright issues you may need to purchase the online plan either way.

If you are trying to get the job done for the least amount of money you should ask a few local builders what they do.

This forum is a great resource for plan opinions.

I think the original plan was $1,100, about 3,800 sq ft, it's not on their website anymore. Our final plan has our name and can't be sold to anyone else. SC barely requires anything to build.

Garrell may or may not be an architect, but they at least had draftsmen that we worked with for the changes. I used paint on the computer to make the changes to the plan and then they basically re-drew the roofline and elevations.

I stand by my comments. Garrell is a home designer not an architect so he should be called a home designer rather than an architect. No internet service can offer what a local architect can but if there is no local architect then you would obviously have to use some other service.

We've spent at least 6-7 months trying to figure out the whole house plan thing. We had one builder who had his own draftsman, so I took a floor plan from the internet and made some changes, but kept the square footage where he said it needed to be to get the price range we needed. Then he gave it to his draftsman who took FOREVER drawing up plans. Then our builder took the plans and priced them and they were WAY over budget, so we simplified things, had them changed, our builder priced it and it was still over budget. We spend 7 months of this, waiting until the builder and draftsman had time to get to our project and it never worked.

We finally gave up and I emailed a ton of builders in the area with our desired floor plan and budget and asked if any of them could get us what we were looking for.
I got a few responses and we followed up. Some wanted us to go to pay for a draftsman and get the plans drawn up so they could price it and we said no way were we going down that road again. (I think if we hadn't just gone through what we had gone through then we probably would have done this. You just want your builder to have a LOT of experience so they can tell you what will get you in your budget as you are drawing the plans up...but we were burnt out and about to give up)

I finally was talking to my sons 1st grade teacher one day and we happened to get on the topic and she had had her house built by a builder and highly recommended him.
So we went to him with our house plan and desired elevation (it was just the 1st floor b/c I didn't care how the 2nd floor was arranged) He took 2 weeks, came back with a 1st floor plan that had everything we wanted but in a much more efficient layout and even the room sizes we wanted (I still don't know how he did that).

He walked us through the layout, told us what was included, took us to a house he was building to give us an example, took us to another completed house to give us an idea how the outside would look and even though the cost was a little over budget we decided to do it b/c it gave us everything we wanted and after being through what we had been through we knew it was a fair deal. He also has a great reputation around here.

So now we have our land under contract. He he's had a month to draw and finalize plans so we can submit it to the bank. (we are in the final week and a half, we haven't seen the finalized plans but he said he can do it and b/c of his reputation in the area we believe him)

I haven't needed too much time to nail down all the details b/c I've been thinking about doing this for years and I've been pinning (love pinterest) everything I like. I think I have almost everything picked out even though it's not all needed now but I want to let him know everything so there aren't any surprises.
I'll definitely be posting more updates as we go along :)

Thanks everyone for all the great information. This process is becoming much more clear!

It is also true that Gardner may not actually be an architect in most states. (Generally architects are only licensed in a few) and they do not mention stamped drawings. Also Gardner looks to be about mid 70's so you have to wonder how involved he actually is these days.

I'm just say'n. Anyway I am sure both of them will do a good job.

The problem with local people (architects or not) is that there is quite a bit of variability. Architects can charge more than 10% of the total house cost and have almost no practical experience designing houses, on the other hand in most states anyone can call themselves a designer and architects have at least designed commercial and proved that they can pass a test.

So if you go the local route I would say that you should spend some time to call several and ask a few builders and not just assume that they are all the same.

The most basic person is not really a designer, they are draftsman (which is what the above poster ran in to) They are not interested in design and they only want to draw what they are told to draw. There is nothing wrong with that per se (as long as that is the service you want).

Some areas have requirements so it may also depend on local regulation.