The Complete Guide to Contracting Your Home is billed as “a step-by-step method for managing home construction”. This isn’t a “how to” manual for self building. Instead, these pages help the complete greenhorn avoid sounding clueless when hiring subcontractors. For instance, construction images of foundations and framing look technical. In reality they’re simplified for clarity and don’t explain construction’s true complexity. Still what information that exists is timely and relatively accurate.
The Good: In truth, the authors immediately stress that self contracting is hard work and not for everyone. A pro and con checklist of self contracting is provided in the first chapter, but feels like a formality. Since the text quickly shifts to topics including zoning, design, estimating, getting a loan and managing each phase of construction. Just reading the plethora of facts and figures provides a sober impression of what self contracting involves.
The Bad: One book simply can’t cover all relevant topics of self contracting in detail, no matter how hard the authors try. While this text provides a sober look, details are glossed over. Ultimately, construction is hard work. Let’s face it, even experienced builders have trouble meeting schedules, budgets and quality control. Think a tenderfoot can get it done, simply by following a “step by step method”?
Which leads to a deeper philosophical question. Can you really save money by self building? The authors think so. They claim self building saves up to 42%, while increasing quality. Never mind the book’s main strategy, build less and build simply, works just as well when hiring a builder. For a detailed discussion about the realistic savings achievable through self contracting, visit the Buildwise post – Is Self Contracting Reasonable.
The Bottom Line: Buildwise argues this book might help novice homeowners understand the enormous task of self contracting. But readers are likely to develop unrealistic expectations. Midway through the project they may wonder why the savings evaporated. And why they’re behind schedule, redoing half the work already completed.
Full Citation: Lester, Kent & McGuerty, Dave.
The Complete Guide to Contracting Your Home
Cincinnati OH: Betterway Home, 2009. Paperback
320 pages, 8.5×11 size, some relevant color photos and 3D technical images. Some checklists and tables.
The Complete Guide to Contracting Your Home
Pros
- Covers Many Subjects
- Up to Date Info
Cons
- Not Enough Detail
- Dubious Claims
Relevant Subject
10.00
For Pros
2.00
For Homeowners
8.00
Thoroughness
10.00
I built my first house in 1992, using this book almost exclusively as a guide. I had zero construction experience but a lot of drive and common sense. I thought of this book as more of a project management tool than a place to learn construction details. I followed the guides and timelines listed in the book and my project went off without a hitch. Building a home, especially when working a full time job, is very hard work. Being organized helps you get through it without regrets.