Well, define “Construction Cost”, do you have:site access, utilities, permits, specifications?

Start with your objective, I.e., what do you want, them write a story as if you built your home. Then price out each stage/room.

Or, Contact a local realtor. A contractor wouldn’t return your call.

Need more info. You own the land? Utilities to the site? City water and sewer? You have an architects program completed or you just want a ballpark?

Planning to buy a car outside of Nashville, how much will it cost? No one can answer unless you tell us if you are buying a Kia or a McLaren or any of the other brands/quality in between.

A house build has a similar range in pricing. Are you putting in $3 tile or $15 tile or even higher? Are you going with basic windows or top of the line? Basic ceramic for bathrooms or fancy/expensive marble? Appliance package from Lowes or the fancy showroom that sells Wolf/SubZero? You can play this game for every single thing you put in a house and every person will have different needs/wants and things that are important to them. Do you want to spend money on the structure or on the pretty/shiny things?

What is your budget? What size house would you like? What type of finishes?

Best bet is to go to many open houses for new construction and start to get an idea of what finishes are being used and what are the upgrades, and how much they are charging you for what you see in person.

Sorry everyone... preliminary plans. I will buy land in Williamson County 10 acres then plan to build simple modern farmhouse 3 bedroom 3 bath 2,000 sq ft. Lots of glass for our retirement home. Looking at plans . I’m asking questions.

You aren’t very nice. You have to start somewhere and if my ignorant questions bother you then don’t respond. Easy. Done. Now go away.

No one was not being nice. They were being honest. No one can give you a price because there are too many variables. I moved into my custom home 2 years ago. I could have built it for almost 1/2 of what we spent if we decided to go with basic molding, LVP instead of engineered wood floors, a stock kitchen instead of a custom kitchen, a 14 SEER single speed AC system instead of the variable speed 16 SEER unit, a simple rectangular shape instead of the U shaped house we designed, etc.

We still can't answer the question but if this is your retirement home, I HIGHLY recommend you work with someone talented to create a house for you as opposed to looking at generic plans that may not even work for the land you buy. Why? Because while you may now be quite physically able, as you age, things do come up and it's best to incorporate them into the house now. House plans are generic and are not what is best for most retirees. I know because I looked for a month before deciding to have our house designed for us.

Best to find your land and/or your person of design talent first.

I live in a very low cost to build rural area in Virginia and ours is around $110-120/sq ft. I suspect you’d be upwards of $160 in Nashville but I do not know that market at all.

IMO if you ask a question you will get answers and you may not like them Your question cannot be answered that is why you get the responses you don’t like. To begin get the piece of land since any architect needs to know where the house is going. Then you get a plan from him and go get pricing to build it from a bulider and who the heck knows how much that will cost that is your job.

Thank you

Thank you all for responding and I apologize for my response earlier. Your insights are very helpful. Sequencing in the buy and build is important and I am aware of that, but in the heat of the thinking moment I reached out with a question that was unanswerable without more details. I am now off to continue my research.

Once you have more info, you'll get some excellent advice here. Good luck. As I said, we built our retirement home a few years ago and moved in 2 1/2 years ago. I made it a point to post everything here and listened to all comments, even those that sounded snarky because there was some good advice hidden in them. My house lives very well.

Might I suggest you start by reading an excellent book? The Not So Big House by Sarah Susanka. An excellent and easy read that will truly have you thinking.

I also suggest you look into what some things might be needed for as you age. Just a few examples from my build to give you an example:

1. We are in a flood zone so had to raise the house 3' so that means steps. However I designed the house with the ability to put in a ramp in our garage, just in case one of us ever needs a wheelchair or walker.

2. All hallways were supposed to be 42" wide. As it turns out, the builder screwed up and the hallway to the master is only 39" wide with molding on.

3. We put our laundry right next to the bedroom since most laundry is generated from the bedroom. Makes it easy to carry back and forth.

4. While we did put our toilet in a "closet", I had it designed so if one of us ever needed more room to maneuver, those walls could easily come down.

5. There is blocking in the walls around all toilets and in the master shower in case we need grab bars.

6. My hand held shower is on a slide bar that is also a grab bar.

7. I have a free standing tub in the master across from the shower. If we ever need the extra space because of a handicap, it's easy to remove the tub to give easier access to the shower.

8. We are on a small infill city lot so had to go up. My studio is upstairs as is the guest bedroom/exercise room and the guest bathroom. Because of this, we put in an elevator. It's great for hauling boxes and suitcases up now, and it makes a great storage closet too for now.

9. All door knobs are not knobs but handles.

10. In the kitchen, all lower cabinets are drawers with the exception of my prep sink cabinet.

11. There are no floor transitions. While we do have tile in our mudroom/friends' entry and in the bathrooms, it's all on the same plane as our wood floors.

12. The shower is curbless in the master.

There's more but you can start to get the idea. I learned this lesson when I watched my very active Mom develop Parkinson's disease starting at age 72. This was a woman who went to the gym 5x a week and on the days she didn't, she walked on her treadmill or walked around her neighborhood. Near the end even the one step into the house was like climbing Mt. Everest. Luckily because she too had planned ahead, she was able to stay in her beloved house until the last 6 months of her life.

Thank you, Thank you for sharing. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your comments.

I answer the same questions for our market area weekly, but we're on opposite sides of the country.

The most expedient way to find your answer is to start looking at new speculative and/or custom construction and have conversations with those builders regarding duplicating the specific homes on your property this year. Note construction costs are up significantly over early 2020 and usually rise at a rate 1.3-1.7 x inflation (lumber, fuel, tax rates, metals, concrete, labor, code changes, etc).

Make sure you fully research the (future) parcel of land and determine if there are any unique features and/or restrictions.

There was another post on this forum where someone was building a house on a 5 acre parcel, but the county would only "let them build it" in a particular location on the land. Many comments were oriented on designing the house to work around the parcel restrictions. However, what surprised me is that you could have 5 acres of land and only one acceptable location for the house (based on county approval). This could be a deal breaker if you a looking for specific views, road access, utility connections, etc.

Bruce.

Good to know. Thank you’

Can anyone refer an architect for a single story Napa Style house on 3-5 acres in Williamson County Tennessee.