Architect fees, is this reasonable?

Nstutt

Also being an architect myself I have to say I find this post rather interesting. The fact is you dont 'need' an architect to do anything same way as you dont 'need' a brain surgeon either. There are many unqualified designers out there, many of whom will be failed architects, and they do a quite good job of designing garage extensions, loft conversions and the like. But if you want something a bit more special - that is when you pay for an architect. Same way as you can do interior design yourself with a bit of web study, but a qualified interior designer will blow your socks off, an architect will give you new ideas and will generally create a far more pleasing result than any drafting engineer ever will.

For most run of the mill extensions architects are not entirely necessary and most will not be interested in doing the work anyway. But you will still pay fees for the work and if anything goes wrong on site you have only yourself to blame of you employ a non-professional.

If you are building you own house or want an exciting extension along the lines of Grand Designs, then you need an architect and have to be willing to pay the 10% fee or whatever. You will get what you pay for, and lets face it there are more than enough boring, unimaginative buildings around these days. I wish more people were willing to pay for a bit of creativity, even on the smallest of jobs. An architect designed exntension will greatly improve the saleability and sale price of your property apart from anything else.

eamondobongo

I'm a qualified architect based in London, RIBA member an ARB. I could beat those fees.
But seeing as you have so many bitter and twisted correspondents on here, unqualified plan drawers presumably, I think I shall give it a miss.

Alarash wrote: »

Hello everybody,

I would really appreciate your help with this and please forgive me if its a slightly long post but I just want to give as much detail as I can.

I've bought a 2 bed Victorian semi detatched house that I need to do work to. It needs a top to bottom renovation and replacing a rear (falling apart) conservatory with a new single storey extension 20sqm to make an open plan kitchen/dining/living area.

In addition if I can raise the money, to the side of the property I would like to replace the freestanding garage with a 2 storey extension to have main entrance and integral garage on the ground floor and 3rd bedroom with ensuite upstairs (approx 50sqm).

The builder I have thought to go with recommended me his man for drawings. The chap in question is not a qualified architect, he describes himself as a draftsmen and surveyor, his actual degree is Building Studies. The fees breakdown is as follows:

Drawings (planning and building regs approval) £2300
Building regs £250 (not sure what this is meant to be)
Drawing management fee £400 (not sure what this is meant to be, i think for changes, amendments)
Local Authority fees £500 (planning application and building control(?) fees)
Structural engineer £400-600 (estimate)

This is meant to be a lump sum fee, it will include submitting and checking in on the application with planning dept, making any amendments required by them, by me, or by builders later on; being on the end of the phone to the builder and making site visits if necessary.

The chap is pretty upfront about himself and proposes on doing the survey and initial sketches before taking any payments. He has also offered to show me previous drawings he has made.

Can I ask if this is a reasonable fee? It sounds like a lot but then the first ARB architect I had over was quoting more than double this.

Many thanks,

Rashed

docmatt

eamondobongo wrote: »

I'm a qualified architect based in London, RIBA member an ARB.
I could beat those fees.
see my website eamonosullivan.co.uk

Pi$$ off with your !!!!!!

darich

docmatt wrote: »

Pi$$ off with your !!!!!!

Yeah....he's doing so well he's advetising on a website where people look to pay the minimum for services and after a post where a fellow architect admits that
"There are many unqualified designers out there, many of whom will be failed architects, and they do a quite good job of designing garage extensions, loft conversions and the like"

and

"For most run of the mill extensions architects are not entirely necessary and most will not be interested in doing the work anyway"

He's been reported as a spammer

phill99

docmatt wrote: »

Pi$$ off with your !!!!!!

Well said, sir!!

eamondobongo

This person is clearly bitter and twisted. !
I wonder what his problem is...............I hope he sees a shrink soon

docmatt wrote: »

Pi$$ off with your !!!!!!

eamondobongo

Who are you people and what is your problem ?

Have I stumbled upon some kind of bitter and twisted club for the cynical and mentally challenged?

darich wrote: »

He's been reported as a spammer

darich

eamondobongo wrote: »

Who are you people and what is your problem ?

Have I stumbled upon some kind of bitter and twisted club for the cynical and mentally challenged?

I see you edited your first post...which was advertising and against the rules.
Then in your two subsequent posts dished out insults.

We won't miss you.
Goodbye
:wave:

JJ001

Hi,

We have secured full planning permission for a 235sq m home and have now also decided to add a basement.
We have had the below quote and I just want to understand if this is competititve?:

Building Regs Application:-
foundation plan
ground floor plan
first floor plan
section aa
section bb
roof plan
elevations
building regulation notes
Total fee £1,584

Construction details:-
foot of wall detail
window cill / head detail
valley detail
ridge detail
verge detail
roof window detail
feature glazing details
Total fee £572

Basement package
total fee £600

Combined fee for all: £2,756
This price would give us the comfort of full Professional Indemnity cover.

Thanks

Bricks

I'm someone else with an architectural background who's just come across this thread, and I'm a little alarmed by some of the things written here.

Without having a go at anyone particular, and not necessarily defending everything the "architects" have said maybe I could try and clarify a few things.

People are talking about "plans" as if that word defines some kind of fixed portion of work as easily definable as building so many metres of a brick wall or laying so many square metres of tiles.

If someone gives you a quote to do "plans" for a house extension you need to be clear exactly how much they are producing.

If it's for planning permission or building regs, then it might be no more than a couple of basic floorplans showing the layout of the rooms and position of windows, drainage connections and so forth. And a couple of elevations showing principle heights, window positions, and a couple of labels saying "roof: slate" and "walls: brick to match existing" or whatever.

Those plans might take someone half a day to draw, and they might be enough to get you planning permission. Maybe also building regs approval if it's a very simple project although there will probably be some details to be thought about - to a certain extent it's true that some details can be "copy and pasted" if everything is using very standard products and you are doing nothing out of the ordinary whatsoever.

So, 4 hours work, 50 quid an hour for someone who can use CAD, couple of hundred quid, fine.

But that's it - that's all you're getting - someone drawing something for you. You say "i want the bathroom there, bedroom there, PVC windows here, etc" and they draw it. They don't put any time into thinking whether the layout is making the best use of the space or any details about how you might want to fit furniture in or how much storage you might need or all sorts of things that you might not have thought about yourself.

That's fine if that's all you want. But the fact is that designing (note - "designing", not drawing) efficiently and thoughtfully laid out living spaces is a skilled job and someone who does it all the time and has been trained is pretty likely to be better at it than you.

So, here's the important bit - thinking about all this stuff takes time. And that's not just time doing fancy sketches and pontificating - that's time thinking about stuff, trying out different options, looking stuff up, possibly making suggestions to you, listening to what you want, maybe redrawing stuff if you're not happy or change your mind. That's what you are paying for if you hire an architect or designer rather than a draughtsperson (aka CADmonkey).

There's no getting away from the fact that time costs money and you might be reluctant to shell it out. But bear in mind that it might save you money too. It's much easier to change a drawing than to change something that's already built. That's why it's worth investing in the design process. if someone can visualise something for you, you can spot the stuff you don't like or hadn't thought about before it's in the form of bricks and plasterboard that is going to be expensive and messy to take down and rebuild.

And that's just the start of the process.

Are the basic layout plans enough to then build the extension from? They might be, if you have a good builder, and you trust them to make decisions on your behalf and to take the time to ask you about what you want, rather than building stuff in the way that's easiest for them. There are hundreds of decisions that need to be made to turn a basic floorplan into a real building. Many of these might seem trivial but they are effectively design decisions. Where's the curtain rail going to go? is there enough space above the window? where do you want the electrical sockets? What type of lighting and which switches control what? where's the cooker extract going to go and where's it going to come out of the wall and what does it look like? Is there going to be enough headroom over the stairs where they are drawn where they pass under a beam that the engineer decided you needed when you got him involved after you got planning permission? Which windows do you want to open and which direction and can you reach the handle if it's up there and behind the kitchen counter? How are you going to change the lightbulb over the stairwell?

To make sure these things are thought through you need a set of construction drawings. These aren't just a few basic plans. Even for a simple extension there might be 20 sheets of them. They all have to be drawn, and because no two houses or sites are the same, you can't just copy and paste everything from your previous job.

This is not even getting into what happens once the job starts on site. Unexpected things will happen. There might be a drain somewhere unexpected and it might affect the foundations and maybe something will have to move a bit and someone will have to check through the implications of that change. And who's checking the builder is building what they are supposed to be building? Who's going to stand up for you if they are trying to charge more than they should for an extra? How can you make sure that all that insulation you paid for (but is invisible once the walls are closed up) is being installed correctly, or at all? If the insulation isn't performing as it should, it's you who is paying the heating bills.

Anyway, that's just a bit of an attempt to hint at some of the things that are involved in the job of being an architect, (or any kind of designer) even on the most basic of jobs. it's not even starting on what's involved if you want to create something that's really outstanding or special and all the though and bespoke detailing that has to go into that kind of job.

Also - contrary to popular belief, most architects don't make huge amounts of money. If they are charging you a couple of thousand pounds for their services, it's unlikely it's "daylight robbery". The reality is that they often earn less per hour than many of the skilled tradesmen on a building site.