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Basic:
Cost:
Process:
Models and Floor Plans:
Quality and Safety:
Joshua Tree:
Company:
Basic:
In our first year, we're working with local clients on semi-custom projects of various sizes with different building constraints (see Cost, Process below). It's a bit expensive to transport our modules, so the further the distance from our Southern California factory, the more price becomes an issue. As we complete more projects, refine our systems, and secure additional production capabilities in other parts of the country, we'll expand our distribution.
At the moment the first LivingHome is shown by appointment to people who own land and want to build a custom LivingHome within the next year. The home is also included on several local-area tours conducted by architectural groups and if you're on our mailing list, we'll let you know about these tours as they're organized. We also have ongoing scheduled open houses. To find out about these and other tours, please join our mailing list.
Cost:
We have both standard and semi-custom LivingHomes. As with other custom home builders, we can't give you an exact price for a home until we actually complete construction documents for a specific plan. There are many variables in the design, materials, and foundation requirements - and only when the details are complete, can we clarify the costs. Our various lines of homes range from $180 - $250/square foot. That number does not include design costs (10-15% of your budget), permit fees, engineering, transport, install or foundation. Excluding the design costs, these other costs can add another $70-90/square foot for flat lots,
Included in the cost of our homes:
We're currently at the higher end of the range of modern, prefab homes - and certainly those of us at this range are expensive vis-à-vis typical construction in many parts of the country - but it's important to do a fair comparison. We believe our homes represent a 20-40% reduction in the cost of similarly constructed, stick-built home. By "similarly constructed," we mean a steel-framed home, designed by a world-class architect, that features substantial amounts of floor-to-ceiling glass, decking, and environmental finishes and energy systems.
We will introduce homes in the future that have lower per square foot costs.
Your foundation requirements will vary according to your site. Until you have completed soil studies and received topographic and geological reports, a contractor cannot give you an estimate on the foundation cost. Also, you might have an existing structure on the lot, so you will need to calculate demolition costs. If you want a custom design there will be design and engineering fees.
The project management fee ranges from 10-15% of your total budget, depending on what you're doing, and the engineering costs will be
additional.
Project management fees exist for both custom and standard homes, but vary depending on the type and complexity of the project. This fee covers the cost of preparing structural and engineering documents for submission for building permits (needed to build a home), the time involved in securing those permits, and the time involved in managing the contractors involved in constructing the home on site.
Transportation and installation fees will also vary according to the location of your site and size of your home, or number of modules it requires. The cost covers moving the modules to the building site (by truck) and placing the modules correctly (by crane). In Los Angeles, transport/install averages about $20/square foot.
Our semi-custom homes feature a building envelope and floor plan that meets our clients' specific site and lifestyle needs. The idea here is to accommodate client specific needs, but in a way that logically and cost-effectively leverages our modular system and environmental focus, so there are some limitations. (For example, there will be no curves in the structure, and we'll only use specific materials.) That's why we call our homes "semi-custom." The specifics of all this get worked out in the schematic phase.
Prefabricated homes define a broad range of products and styles. In general, "prefab" means that some or all of a house is factory built and assembled. As a group, prefab homes include everything from mobile homes to log cabins, panelized houses to custom-designed architectural showpieces. In addition to homes, prefabrication has been used to create office and industrial buildings, banks, and schools.
We use prefab production for several reasons:
Quality. By code, modular homes have to be built to a higher quality level than stick-built homes because they must endure stresses of being transported (wind shear, vibration, etc.)
Saving Time and Money. When you can start building your home at the same time as your foundation is being developed, you save time and money. Typically, a stick-built, custom home will take 12 to 18 months. LivingHomes can complete homes in 5-6 months. Additionally, the prefab process can be 20-40% less than a similarly equipped and constructed, stick-built home.
Sustainable Building Practices. 30-40% of the material used to construct a typical stick-built home ends up in landfills versus 2%, on average, for prefab.
If you would like to learn more about the history of prefab homes, a good resource is Prefab by Allison Arieff and Bryan Burkhart.
Process:
As previously noted, currently we're only doing semi-custom LivingHomes projects. The project management fee is 10-15% of your total budget (it varies depending on the complexity of your project) and the fee does not include engineering, permitting and other fees.
For Custom Home – 54 weeks
For Standard Home – 46 weeks
Contact us and let's talk: newhome@livinghomes.us. We'll do our best to answer any remaining questions. If you decide to move forward, the first phase will be for us to complete a Feasibility Study.
The ground breaking date depends on a number of things, some of which rely on your input and availability.
On a custom project, we work in close collaboration with you on basic considerations such as total living space, elevations (one level or multiple levels), and number of bedrooms/bathrooms.
Obtaining permits in some cities is simply a matter of filling out the forms and paying the required fees. In other cities it is a more arduous process and every step of your building process may be reviewed.
Typically, you hire a general contractor to build a foundation to the specifications we provide. We can provide construction management services to identify and manage this general contractor.
Models and Floor Plans:
We have a variety of floor plans, and the smallest semi-custom project we have completed is a one-bedroom, detached home which is approximately 650 square feet.
We have a couple of homes that approach 6,000 square feet.
Visit our configurator tool to customize any of our current floor plans.
Quality and Safety:
No. LivingHomes are permanent structures. The modules are only moved once, from the factory to your site.
The frames of the homes designed by Ray Kappe are made of steel, which is extremely strong, durable -- and highly recycled. Because the modules are built off-site they must actually meet more stringent building codes than stick-built homes since they must withstand the stresses of vibration and wind sheer during transport.
No. The roof is pitched to provide appropriate drainage. The roof is engineered to withstand 100 pounds of pressure per square foot.
LivingHomes are built to comply with, or exceed, all the same standards that apply to site-built buildings. Steel is one of the strongest building materials and tends to perform well in earthquakes and hurricanes.
Snow loads are determined by local codes. In 2007, LivingHomes will design and engineer homes for regions with larger snow load concerns. Design variations, including pitched roofs, will be considered.
Sadly, no. The high quality of LivingHomes can only be guaranteed when we sell and build complete dwellings.
Joshua Tree:
We have a 20 acre property about five miles north of one of the entrances to the Joshua Tree park. It offers breathtaking views of the valley below and the mountains around. Ray Kappe has designed a special home for our community. The first four units of phase one are for pre-sale.
We will likely offer tours. But not in the summer. Again, it's helpful to sign up with our mailing list
Company:
We are or will be likely differentiated by three things:
Design. For better or worse, we are one of the only prefab housing companies not run by an architect. Therefore, we work with best-of-breed architects, like Ray Kappe and David Hertz, to design our homes. Both Ray and David are modernist architects who integrate craftsman-like attention to detail and warmth into their work.
Environmental program. We are very committed to creating homes that have some of the smallest ecological footprints of any production homes. The first LivingHome was one of two homes selected for the United States Green Building Program's LEED Home (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification program. LEED is the leading green certification program and we as a company are committed to only building homes that are at least Silver certified.
Price value. We are driving costs down by, a) standardizing our homes, and b) building in high volume, using prefab construction. To achieve higher volume, we're developing our own communities or are partnering with others on their communities so that we can manufacture in larger runs.
LivingHomes was founded by Steve Glenn, an experienced entrepreneur who has founded, co-founded or been on the founding teams of a number of technology companies including Clearview Software (sold to Apple), idealab (which incubated eToys, CitySearch, GoTo/Yahoo Search, etc.), and Peoplelink. The founding team of LivingHomes includes a mix of senior executives and advisors who bring a wealth of experience from the home building, green development, and architectural and technological industries.
We are currently outsourcing our manufacturing to a company that has a long history of steel fabrication and reputation for taking on challenging custom projects. They have built thousands of steel-framed schools, banks, industrial and commercial buildings.
Absolutely, we will. We're currently focused on our first two architects, Ray Kappe and David Hertz.
What's not to like? An almost perfect metaphor for what we aspire to do: make the creation of homes that feature modern form and functionality efficient and really cost effective. If only they were made of reclaimed, post consumer plastic or, better, something else that did not involve non-renewable resources in its production. Oh, and soy dyes. Then we'd love 'em even more, which, frankly, is hard to conceive.
Other Questions: