A quick follow up note - one of the items we're having a very hard time with is being too open concept. Because of how we are adding on relocating the kitchen is enough more expensive that reconfiguring it would save us some money. BUT I don't love the idea of the dining room in the middle between the kitchen/living. We had this in an older apartment and I felt like we were constantly walking around it and it collected junk. Is it worth paying more to have in its own room?

Why aren't you talking to your architect?

Hi Virgil! This is an excellent point. We are talking to our architect and expressed these concerns yesterday and he is working on suggestions. We are very excited to see what he comes up with, but are also curious about others experiences with this kind of large addition.

Did they think they were going to love open concept and ended up hating it? (I've seen some of the forums discussing this)

Did they debate an aspect of their addition that they ended up loving/regretting?

Been there, done that. I'm not sure which we ran out of first; money or energy. But you are saying that you are over-building your house/neighborhood. Is this really a good idea? Any realtor would tell someone to not over-build the house or the neighborhood. That is what we were told and I think we've done a good job not doing either.

Now, if I'd one that 1.6 billion dollar lottery, I might just have gone ahead and spent money not this house that I'd never get back, but alas I did not win so that's a problem that won't be.

Sometimes, one must compromise. If the compromise becomes a problem years down the road, then change it. We ended up with a fiberglass shower stall in the Master Bath. I hated it from the day it went in until the day it was finally torn out 28 years later. But it could be used and I didn't replace it until I could afford to do so. I can't say it exactly "ruined my life", no matter how much I disliked it! I still don't like the hollow doors on my late husband's closet in the MBR. I would have replace them if I'd won that lottery but I won't a it would be a ridiculous expense for something that a future buyer most likely won't notice. If they do, they can replace them.

Get what you must have now - what would be VERY difficult to change later. Wait on the other things. Or even better, do some house hunting and decide if you really want to over-build your house/neighborhood

If you didn't like open concept before, you probably won't like it now. I'm not a fan of open concept (like at all), so that's definitely not a compromise I would even consider making. I'd cut back on/postpone standalone fixes like the driveway in order to do the kitchen and the layout in a way that works best for your needs.

We have open concept, with the dining room between the kitchen and the family room. I like this configuration. I can watch tv while I am cooking and eating my lunch (tv is off during dinner). It is great for entertaining (which sounds so HGTV.) I also think it affords more room for the dining table, which is important because my dining room table is huge. I often see open concept with dining behind the kitchen and those spaces are usually so much smaller and would not accommodate our table.

Sometimes noises from the kitchen can interfere with television watching.

A friend sourced his upgrades on Craigs List. He bought vessel sinks, brand new appliances, lighting, etc.

We saved money by doing some of the work ourselves.

My husband installed the kitchen cabinets, which paid for the granite countertops.

He also purchased 3/4" solid hardwood for most of the house; laid out chalk lines. We paid about $7K for prefinished walnut hardwood and I installed about 2000 sq feet. The install took a while (quite a while), but the savings paid for two bathroom tiling jobs, a whirlpool tub and ceiling to floor glass shower enclosures.

I also did the interior and exterior painting. The exterior was new stucco, requiring a base coat before the paint; the interior required a primer and then paint. My biggest and most unusual cost was a $500/day rental on an articulating boom to reach the upper peaks of the house.

Anyone can do this if they have perseverance. The real heavy stuff, leave to someone else. But if you can move a paint brush, do so. Save yourself a ton of money

It sounds like you've found an amazing team of professionals. Congratulations!

You say your architect gave you an under 200k plan. I'm not sure why you're in a dilemma; do you not like the plan?

I would say if your appliances work, don't replace yet. Do as much finishing work as possible yourselves. Maybe you buy second hand furniture. Buy the cheapest light fixtures you can find (but do wire for all the lighting you'll want, now.) I would also suggest not skimping on the little extra touches that elevate the space. I'm thinking things like soft close hinges and drawers, transitionless flooring, good quality door knobs. Those things really affect livability for me. Buy good quality windows.

if i was doing an addition, I would hire & invest in a good floor plan, windows, lighting. floors. If the price was too high going through builder for the interior renovation. I would get bids from general contractors & interior designers.

Builders are great at building additions, walls, roofs, etc. I then hire pros that specialize in interiors to complete the interiors.

Each Pro has their specialty. Hire accordingly.

Can you share more about the scope of the proposed work or the differences in the plans? Or are you just interested in general ideas?

You’ve probably already done this, but evaluate what you really need v. what trends say you need. For ex, I used to want a tiled shower with glass doors. But I hate to clean and I know I won’t even squeegee after each shower. So I cleaned up the fiberglass shower that my house came with and put new vinyl on the bathroom floor. It’s nice for me for 5-10 years. Who’s going to see my master bath anyway?

Also, when finishing attic space to a playroom, I was advised to match hardwood in rest of home. But it would be more expensive, colder in a room over garage, and ultimately not what I would have liked for that room. So carpet it is. And I’ll replace the carpet when it gates nasty. But I spent the money now on new windows and a few small built-ins.

Living room furniture- I have babies, I snack and drink in the living room, and I already want to change room colors after 8 years. I’ll replace with inexpensive furniture.

Buy cheap things where nobody will notice the difference- light fixtures, hardware, anything you’ll want to or have to replace shortly, such as area rugs, curtains, cars, appliances.

We've done MANY renovations and builds in the past 20-30 years. And we will ALWAYS found that the initial plan costs more than we thought. Congratulations to you that you are planning ahead enough to make changes before you start the work. So many homeowners plunge right in without a plan and then run out of money in the middle of a project.

Our first step was always to rethink the scope of the project, and analyze our wants/needs. Do you really need to add space? Adding on is usually more expensive than renovating existing space. Sometimes you can identify a room that you don't really use and reconfigure it for a new purpose. Do you really need a space that big? More square footage = more $$. Can you complete the project in steps, that is do it partially and add the rest at a later date? We planned on renovating a kitchen and adding on a hall/powder room and family room. After getting the prices, we added the kitchen and hall/powder room and did the family room a few years later.

The option that we never considered was to compromise on infrastructure and quality of materials. I always maintained that I'd rather not attempt a project than do it in a subpar way.

You're ready to make cuts. Cuts to what? Where is the plan. Where is the original? One hundred percent over the budget of 200k. As in a 400k addition/remodel? On what price point neighborhood?

Turn a 300 k home into a 700k and send 300 k down a loo?

Few homes are "forever" in real life . Upload the plans, Provide some detail as to this "dream" and the features. I say that as while their talent is MUCH respected, architects can be notrorious for lowball numbers on actual construction. Show the goods.

you talked about not wanting to build elsewhere... no empty lots.... and not scrape and rebuild... but you havent talked about moving to another already existing house. it has the benefit of taking advantage of someone else's decreased ROI. no construction dust. you can see what it will look like... right away!

Ninigret - unfortunately our current/desired neighborhood is all nearly identical cookie cutter cape cods built in the 80s. Many still the original owners. Fortunately for us we were able to get a house as we waited almost a year for one to come up for sale, and since purchasing only one other was listed (and immediately sold). The houses are being slowly altered as people move in, but the ones that have been renovated people are staying in. We could wait years for one of the renovated home to come up for sale (and discussed doing this). Plus side is we are getting to know our neighbors well as people move here and stay, and have walked through some of the renovated homes for ideas.

Another thought, Erika, is that if this is your forever home, there's no need to make drastic changes right away. Unless the home is in really bad shape (which if it was built in the 1980s, it's not very old), I'm sure it's livable even if not your dream. Prioritize your projects. Needs come before wants--a new roof, HVAC system, insulation, exterior painting, waterproofing, replacing appliances that don't work, etc.--all come before more decorative projects like new wallpaper, carpeting, window treatments, and furniture. When we moved into our 1924 home in 1983, we had three ORIGINAL bathrooms (yes, they were almost 60 years old at the time!) The boiler broke down right after we moved, in March, so guess what the first project was??? We used those bathrooms for many years before we "updated" them. We mowed and watered our own lawn for a few years before we could install an irrigation system and hire a landscaper.

I think with the proliferation of renovation shows on TV everyone thinks that the whole house has to be redone to perfection before it's deemed livable. The most ridiculous comments on these shows is that the house has to be ready and updated before a baby is born! Most babies couldn't care less if the kitchen needs a new backsplash or the paint color isn't au courant.

Taking your time and really analyzing your needs and wants allows you to save up for your projects, change your mind, and limit your choices. Huge projects require making so many decisions at one time that you can become overwhelmed. And going slowly allows you to keep things in perspective and not sweat the small stuff!

Hello all, for some reason not all of the comments seemed to load before? Some other potentially helpful info.

I have not asked our architect how he felt about sharing his work online so would like to refrain from doing so without asking. I work in a creative field and understand while we didn't sign anything that we couldn't, we also didn't ask and I feel that would be inappropriate.

The overview of our thoughts are as follows: we have a 1200sqft cape on .4 acres. It is currently 3 bed (one small master) and 2.5 baths. There is no full bath on the second floor with two of the bedrooms, and the master is on the first floor. The living room and kitchen are both about 12 x 14' so small and a bit cramped for us. There is no dining room/other living spaces. We have had issues with the water table rising that we need to run our sump pump in the basement a few times and don't think finishing it would be the best idea. We have no access to the outside except from our front door. We're dog parents and thinking about having kids, but not there quite yet. We're lived a few places in the country and see this as our forever home.

We have a 170k house looking to do a 200k renovation. Houses in our neighborhood typically sell for 190-250, BUT most houses in our neighborhood have zero updates and are being sold by original owners. One house in a near but different neighborhood that was flipped just sold for 425, so it's a bit difficult to tell if our neighborhood could go the same way as owners change or not. We're talked a lot and are comfortable with this budget and the potential for that loss. Our realtor that helped us purchase the house thinks with the renovations we're talking about would sell in the 320-350k range.

I'm mostly interested in general ideas as we have the wants/needs list and are working to refine it but are struggling in a few areas to come up with that final determination. Are we okay without a master bath? Can we live with just a one car garage? For both of these we think so and are ready to go without. How we feel about open concept, and is it worth moving the laundry out of the basement we feel more conflicted on.

Diana - we totally understand and were hoping to do this! However, the smoke damage in our home from the previous owners was worse then we were expecting and after some attempts to resolve it found that we needed to rip out all of the flooring and still need to replace all of the drywall on the second floor as well as are partical board kitchen cabinets which are failing. Fortunately the first floor and basement have been successfully mitigated by us, but we're still living with subfloors and a mess of a kitchen until we decide. We're having trouble justifying the 20-40k we think doing all of this now would be to just rip it out later. Or does it make sense to try that route?

We have a 170k house looking to do a 200k renovation. Houses in our neighborhood typically sell for 190-250

Perhaps you should have a discussion with few Realtors about what happens in the future when you try to sell a $370K house in a neighborhood typically selling for 190-250K. I strongly recommend you to reconsider spending that kind of money in your current neighborhood.

Well, Erika, that's a totally different scenario. Having to replace smoke-damaged flooring and cabinets that are falling apart is serious and high priority. I suggest you speak to your architect and local realtors to determine the amount of money to put into the house to get it into decent shape without overspending for the neighborhood. And then see if your budget will support it.