Everything ok, but what did it cost?

One of the difficulties when planning to build a house is knowing what is it going to cost. Can you afford it?

I remember when I was looking for information about costs, it was not easy. There is quite a bit of information in Finnish but almost none in English. That is actually one of the main reasons I wanted to start this blog, to give more information in English about what it takes to build your bad/good dream home in Finland.

But you know what, building a house is good for learning Finnish too, because many of the building contractors don't speak English :).

Even with packages "ready to move in" the price is not telling the whole story.
These package prices do not include:
- concrete foundations or pillars if needed,
- potential design of foundations
- land work preparations (gravel, stone, road),
- sewage and electricity connections
- rental cost of hiring a lift truck to lift the tiles/ house elements into place.
- fees of the foreman, HVAC foreman
- garden lights
- removal of construction waste
I would say that these extra costs can range between 50 000 - 80 000.

In the link below I prepared a breakdown of the actual costs for our house and land, hope you find it useful and looking forward to your comments!
http://project-eco-house-finland.blogspot.fi/p/breakdown-of-costs.html

Meeting on the plot and hunting fireplaces

We met this morning at the plot all the key-people of the project. Head designer, Lapponia house representative and landwork contractor. At -13degrees it was rather chilly meeting... but got valuable second opinion for the landwork (maatyöt) and making the roads last. The landbase is soft clay (old bottom of Baltic sea) and needs to be made strong enough for big machinery of 40 000kg to delivery elements. Since we have about 1meters of snowbed at this very moment, there is no deep frost in the ground but when the snow melts... we will propably come across with some flodding issues. So planning of the roads was rather interesting because of the deep snow... Let's see how it will all go.

Last weekend we were totally scared off by some contractor candidate with the mount of work in order to make the bottom strong enough. Estimate given was about 30 000 eur but today it wasn't that bad at all. So always ask for second opinion or even third. We will go for some contractor known and recommended by Lapponia house.

We also went again to see some fireplaces. This time we entered a company called Tulikivi and there we found some charming old fashioned, traditional fireplaces. Somehow I have been thinking of a modern style so far but Tulikivi made me seriously dream of having proper all-around-tiled fireplace (kaakeliuuni). Tiles are handmade in Finland and this gives some idea of the price too... Roughly 10 000 eur for a fireplace with oven and tandem-chimney incl. installation and delivery. Tandem-chimney we need because we will have wood-heated sauna on the other side of the fireplace wall. So one chimney goes for two "stoves". 

So at the moment we have 3 candidates we are looking at:
One model from Tulikivi

http://www.tulikivi.com/mallisto/ksuunit06/juhani_e_06.JPG 

Another model from Uunisepat:

http://www.uunisepat.fi/WebRoot/521328/10Tuotteet.aspx?id=1142354&Product=Katrilli&Model=Klassikko

and a cheaper version from Suomen Takkateollisuus:
http://www.ultimatemarket.com/PublishedService?file=page&pageID=9&itemcode=10710