Is that strictly for the blueprints or will the architect be advising along the way? What is the cost of the house to build?

That's for the blueprints. The architect will play no role in the building of the house. He is estimating $425K to build, but a builder friend of mine thinks that is a gross overestimation. He says more like $325K. The finished basement will simply be a big carpeted space with a small half bath, so nothing fancy there.

Well 9700 seems awful high for the prints and 3000 way to cheap to design a house. At the $12,700 doesn't even seem in total as enough. What does the contract state?

The original contract for the design process or the contract for the construction plans? I don't have the original contract in my possession, but I know it made no mention of the construction plans costing more than 3 times the design cost.

Right. Our contract had a "Construction Documents" section.

I agree with millworkman. Our contract was approx 11% of the cost of construction. 12k would have been a bargain...

They just received an email stating that the blueprints would cost $9700.

Best to give us the EXACT terms of the contract. A "blueprint" actually hasn't been made since the 1960's.

And I apologize if I sounded snippy, didn't mean to. After doing a little more research today, I agree the total sounds low. If they had been told upfront of the costs, I'd (and they'd) be OK with it because it would have been an informed decision. My m-i-l is very emotionally invested in this floor plan now and feels trapped and snookered.

Here is the relevant language from the contract proposal they just received:

I. Construction drawings

a. Floor Plan that is fully noted and dimensioned

b. Foundation Plan with foundation sections, details, and specs

c. First Floor Framing Plan with all structural members sizes,

d. Basement Plan

e. Roof Plan with gutters, downspouts, roof pitches, valleys, and

f. Roof Framing Plan with roof structural members, member sizes,

g. Building Section through Great Room

h. Reflected Ceiling Plan showing lighting, lighting locations,

i. Electrical Floor Plan showing electrical receptacle, heights,

engineering details, and specifications

attic venting

engineered details, and specifications

switch locations, ceiling heights, and materials

phones, computer, and cable locations

II. Construction Drawing Compensation

a. We will perform the scope of services noted above for a fixed

fee of $9,750.

They do sound a little shady. Rope you in, get you to spend 3k. Oh, you want to build it? That will be 9k more...

I will ask my f-i-l to email me a copy of the original contract. I am pretty sure it was just for the schematic design services. That's not the issue. I know it doesn't cost that much to print the plans. My in-laws were never informed of how much the "second phase" or whatever of drawing up the actual construction plans would cost. It just said there would be additional fees for copies of the construction plans (I think -- need to reread the original contract). My in-laws made an assumption that that would be a few hundred dollars (yes, assumptions get you in trouble). Just seems shady not to mention exactly, or at least ballpark, how much the construction plans would cost.

I know it doesn't cost that much to print the plans.

Looks like confusion over terms.

Looks like from the above "Construction Drawing Compensation" it's all about creating of the drawings, not the actual printing.

But if I'm wrong, as an example for me I just completed the construction/permit docs for a custom house, printed 3 sets so they could be originally stamped and signed by myself as the architect for permit. Cost of actual printing was $36 which I always treat as a direct reimbursable with no markup and I send the PDF's to the client for further printing for bid sets. Of course creating those construction/permit drawings to make ready for printing cost just a tad more than $36.

I honestly have not seen a true blueprint in 35 years.

OK, I have a copy of the original contract. It basically says they would have meetings (personal and virtual) to get the floor plan and elevation drawings to their satisfaction for $3000. No mention of how much actual construction drawings would cost. (I can't copy and paste the exact wording because it was scanned in as an image.)

What exactly did they provided you for $3000? Are there floorplans?

A little shady, but if you think about it it takes few days to enter all the information and create a construction drawing, systems: electrical, plumbing, hvac etc, create layouts, texts, elevations, nail down kitchen, etc. Plus they have to account for "followups, possible additional changes, GC time, approvals".

Sooo $9700 is not out of line.

"The architect will play no role in the building of the house."

Our architect is on site at least every other week and she comes from her home on a small island off Vancouver Island BC Canada. We are building in Washington State. In between there are phone calls, e mails, texts between her and the contractor, site manager, us, subs. Very much plays a role.

For this and the plans of course, we pay her what equals to 12% of the hard cost budget.

Yeah the price is not out of line but definitely shady. A lot of clients are first time/last time clients. I feel bad that your in laws had this happen to them.

You need construction drawings to get permits, and for builders to bid and build.

Do they like the house?

My concern would be what care was taken around the budget. Hate to pay 10k plus (charges might not stop here) and find out from a builder that it is way over budget.

If they like the house and don't want to start over, I guess pay.

One thing about being older, I've got some "screw you" money. I might be tempted to start over, and leave some pretty scathing reviews. If they start over, this time maybe have an attorney look over the architects contract or spend more time getting educated about the process.

It can happen to anyone. We had a 10k misunderstanding as well. Pretty sneaky, I thought.

Good luck to you all.

If your in-laws have a contract with an architect, and there is a question about the contract, they should bring up the issue with the architect or with someone that specializes in interpreting contracts. Attorneys specialize in contracts and if they engage one, your in-laws may very likely realize how inexpensive an architect is. In euchre there is a term, "Never send a boy"; along those same lines, ask an expert in the field in which your inquiry is related to.

None of us here were at the early meetings, or a party to any discussions or information exchanges, so we can only respond based on the normal and standard practices of the architectural profession and our experience therein.

"... My in-laws made an assumption that that would be a few hundred dollars (yes, assumptions get you in trouble). Just seems shady not to mention exactly, or at least ballpark, how much the construction plans would cost..."

I don't know why or how they could have made such an assumption, but given the amount of work actually required that sort of thinking is simply and completely unreasonable. Look at the itemized scope of services provided in your description above. How could that be provided for "a few hundred dollars"? That means someone at a $100/hr billing rate would spend up to three hours to complete your project! Does that sound reasonable? Or even remotely possible?

So far as I can see from this thread, there was nothing shady, unethical or unusual about the contract arrangements or sums.

There was an initial phase to create a design, "to the owner's satisfaction", for a modest sum of $3,000. As a retired architect, I would have never used the term "to the owner's satisfaction" (since I well know how often consumers can change their minds over the smallest, often inconsequential, issue), and I would not have used a fixed sum, but an hourly rate, so that the owners had a share in the responsibility for how long the design phase took. So in this phase, the owners really got a bargain, and to their advantage. The fact that your MIL is "hooked" on the design suggests your family got their money's worth and what they were hoping for.

Having a separate, fixed fee for the necessary detailed construction drawings and specifications is a good (and normal) practice. The list of items covered in the description above is very thorough and complete; it's far more than many residential architects, designers and drafters ever provide! The fee for these services is reasonable and may actually be low, if separate engineering design, drawings and calculations, or other services, are required by the local jurisdiction.

As proposed, your family will receive a much more thorough and complete set of documents for bidding and construction than is the norm. As a result, the quality of construction and lasting value should be significantly higher than normal.

You are concerned about why the costs for services weren't itemized up front. It's a reasonable concern. As you describe, the architect said there would be an initial charge for the first phase (design) and a subsequent charge for services to complete the project.

Until the schematic design of the house was complete and approved, the architect had no way of knowing the scope and extent of time and services required to prepare and complete the construction drawings and specifications. It would be like trying to determine if something was bigger than a bread basket and/or flatter than a pancake. How would anyone know the scope and complexity of the house (and the amount of time to prepare and complete the required construction drawing and specifications) until the owners had first approved a design?

If you buy a ready-made plan from one of the Internet plan factories, you will thereafter have to spend money to have the plan adapted to your family's needs; you will have to have pay for a foundation design to fit your specific site; you will have to pay for the necessary engineering structural services; for the creation of systems plans--HVAC; electrical, lighting, signal and controls; plumbing, etc. Your local jurisdiction may have other special requirements to be addressed, i.e., seismic or hurricane forces, etc.

All of these are included in the services the architect has proposed.

I'm very sorry that this situation has occurred and that your family feels wronged or misled. But, as far as I can tell, the total costs are reasonable, and actually less than normal in many areas, for the extent of services provided.

I know this is likely not what you want to hear at this point, but it is a fair and reasonable response to the situation which has been described.

I sincerely wish you and your family good luck with your project.

Thank you for the replies. I (they) realize the total is not out of line, it was just the way it was handled. A little money upfront and then the whopper after you're emotionally invested in the project. My in-laws have been pleased with the architect's availability, attention, and turn-around time on needed changes. They just had no idea what was coming and feel/wish he had been more upfront about what happens after the initial design phase. For $3K they have a floor plan they like very much, but they can't do anything with it without spending almost $10K more.

At this point, do they NEED the architect to make the construction documents? I don't know copyright laws, local laws, etc, but we were able to take our architect's schematic drawings (cost was comparable to your in-laws' initial $3000) to our builder who had his draftsman create the necessary documents (approx $1500). The roof design was done between our builder and the lumber company that actually built the roof trusses ("free" to us -- and were able to save a $100k in trusses, roofing materials, and insulation by adjusting the roof/ceiling pitch, instead of going with the architect's original plan).

We had the architect's and builder's blessings from the very beginning though, so your situation may vary.

From the wording of the original contract, I would say no, they can't do that. It says the drawings belong to the architect and are under copyright protection and are not to be used for anything other than their intended purpose. Which seems kinda vague. :)

My m-i-l asked me to send the floorplans to my builder friend (whom they might use as the GC) to see if he could build from what they have. If he says no, I guess they could always ask the architect if they could take it somewhere else for the detailed construction drawings.

"Blueprint" is archaic contractor jargon for contract documents and shouldn't be used to describe design services of any kind.

I don't believe we have seen the wording of the original contract to determine if it was made clear that the $3,000 was only for schematic design and did not include the production of contract documents.

I can't tell you precisely why but I have a feeling these guys are not "architects" and are using that term generically similar to their use of "blueprints" only one is archaic and the other is illegal. The contract wording seems amateurish with typos and redundant phrases. If they teach you anything in architecture school its how to write a professional Owner-Architect agreement.

As for the use of the drawings, the ownership clause is intended to prohibit the client from using the drawings for anything other than building one building. I don't know why you couldn't hire other architects to so the contract documents but I suspect it would cost more money especially if the architects were actually licensed.

Interesting point JDS makes. Maybe do yourself a favor and double check that they are licensed architects and not just glorified draftsman.

I think JDS said it best. And there's an inside joke among us architects about people coming to us asking "Do you do blueprints?". Aside from the fact that an actual blueprint hasn't been made since the '60's, there's likely a misunderstanding of what is meant by the different parties when that term is used. I can't imagine an up to date agreement for professional services even incorporating the term. Todays agreements use terms like "printing", "copies", "digital copies", "PDF's", etc.

And there's nothing wrong with a client taking whatever drawings one architect has provided and taking them to another architect. People come to me all the time with drawings from other architects/designers that have been terminated for whatever reason. As JDS noted, there shouldn't be a problem if we're still talking about one building by the original client. And in 36 years of practice, I've never experienced one.