People think there are 2 options when building a granny flat. But there are actually 3.

The two common options are:

1. Buy a granny flat kit and arrange trades (or DIY)
2. Hire a builder to do everything for you

However, we assist our clients to arrange plans and help with approvals then cost materials.

Many people have seen “kit” companies offer granny flat kits.

But what most people don’t understand is that many granny flat kit companies, they simply provide frames and trusses and then source cladding, roofing and windows from other suppliers and simply add additional profit margins that you have to pay.

By simply breaking down the materials needed for your custom plan.

Arranging those materials directly from suppliers and simply sorting out deliveries with the correct trades.

You stand to make significant savings, essentially cutting out a “middle-man”.

Before we get into this in more detail.

We are going to cover some essentials in this article:

• How you will know what materials you require.
• How you can arrange these materials instead of a kit home.
• Common inclusions on a granny flat kit home.
• Why a “kit” home is really just a succession of materials delivered at once.
• What a modular home is, and if that is an option for you, rather than individual materials. 

So, if you are considering building a granny flat, explore your third option in our article here.

How To Know What Materials I Need

This is exactly what we can do for you. We can start with just architectural plans for you, and submitting these to certifiers we can gain a checklist for approval.

We are designers and builders and engineers, so these plans include all the paperwork you need for approval at your Council.

Once these plans are done and once we get the engineering done, we combine these together and create construction-ready, or framing diagrams. From these diagrams, you will know exactly what materials you need, which I will explain in more detail in the next sub-heading below.

How to Arrange Materials Instead of a Kit

Once we have your diagrams, we can break down every metre, every square metre, every cubic metre, or every linear metre that is needed for every material, such as gyprock, lights, cornices, windows, and everything else that goes into a granny flat.

By breaking this all down this way, we can show you exactly what you need to order, as well as when in the build you need to order it, when it should be delivered, and what trade does what – so you will know what materials to order, who to order it from, and when you need to order it to be delivered to site.

Yes, we share all that information with you just from your diagrams. So essentially, we take what a kit company does, and break it down so you can save money on your build, and also show you how to put it all together.

I will also go over what will assist you in doing this below:

1. If You Are Building on Land with a Solid Foundation

Before you arrange the delivery of your materials, just consider if you want your kit home to be built on a concrete slab or on piers. You would want your foundation to replicate the type of kit home you are building.

2. If you have enough space to store your materials.

No, the materials will not arrive all at once – as I mentioned, we will let you know when to order them. However you still will want to make sure that you have enough storage room on your block to stockpile the material that does come before it gets used.

3. You can follow instructions, and do this well.

Your kit home can be built by yourself if you are good at reading the manual that you will be given. Or if not, maybe you just let someone else be in charge of this and follow these instructions. And of course, there are tradesman that you will need over time, with certain certificates, such as a plumber.

4. You have enough time.

Building your own kit home does take time, particularly if you are planning to do this yourself. With assistance from the right people I was able to build my own granny flat, but I do know many people that have taken a couple of months off of work to be able to do this themselves.

Common Granny Flat Kit Inclusions

Your common granny flat kit inclusions include those in the list below. I have broken down room by room for you.

Kitchen

• Cabinetry, both overhead and under-bench, which are often laminated from the outside.
• Soft-closing doors.
• Soft closing drawers.
• Handles to all of the above.
• Benchtop, which are often made from stone.
• Tiled splashback.
• Appliances, mainly your oven.
• Your tapware – a sink and spout.

Bathroom

• Your vanity
• Your sink.
• Your mirror.
• Floor and wall tiles, to tile bathroom as well as shower and floor.
• A shower screen – generally these are made from glass.
• A shower head.
• Control devices i.e. knobs.
• Either just a light, or a 3-in-1 Light, Exhaust Fan and Heater.
• Towel racks.
• Your toilet suite.
• Your toilet roil holder.
• Waterproofing membrane.

Laundry

• A laundry sink.
• Both hot and cold washing machine taps.
• Tiled splashback.

Material Finishes

• Ceilings, which may require plasterboard to smoothly finish.
• Internal walls which may also need plasterboard for smoothness.
• Cornices for each room.
• Wardrobes, where you may want sliding doors with a mirror.
• Paint, in your colour of choice, to finish the walls.
• Door handles.
• Door locks.
• Door stops.
• Skirting and architrave.
• Tiling in common areas.
• Carpet in bedroom/s.
• An internal fuse box with a safety switch.
• A hardwired smoke detector with a battery for backing up.
• Internal power-points.
• LED downlights.
• Your telephone, TV, and internet points.
• An adjustable sensor light on the outside.
• An outdoor TV antenna, be this digital or regular, with all the mounting accessories required.
• An air conditioner.
• Your windows, which you may want normal aluminium framed sliding windows with keys, as well as fly screens for all of these.
• Blinds, be these vertical or roller, on each room except for wet rooms.
• Insulation on both your external walls and your ceiling.
• A verandah if you wish.
• Hardware, such as screws, bolts, sealers, and rivets.

Why a “Kit” is Just a Series of Materials Delivered Together

Most “kit companies” are just ‘frame and truss’ manufacturers.

So, what they do is source cladding, windows, eaves, and all of your other materials I just went over above from other suppliers. And then add a margin on top of this.

As such, there is more money to be saved when you break materials down and source these yourself instead of an entire “kit” – as we assist our clients to do.

What Is a Modular Home? Is That an Option Instead of Individual Materials?

As you have been looking over your choice of homes, you may have come across “modular granny flats”.

So, I will go over what a modular granny flat is – and you must know that is very different than a ‘kit home’.

As we have been discussing, a ‘kit home’ is where you just get all the materials you require to build your granny flat. And from there you either have to employ a builder or build it yourself.

A modular granny flat, on the other hand, is almost fully assembled when it comes out of the workshop. And from then it takes only about roughly 3 days to be built on-site.

So, the difference between a ‘kit’ granny flat and a modular granny flat is that:

• A modular granny flat is prefabricated off-site in advance. A kit home is all just materials.
• A modular granny flat will be delivered to you in one piece, as one modular unit. Whereas with a kit home you will have a series of materials delivered to you over time.
• A modular granny flat generally is assembled within only a few days, whereas a kit home can take a couple of months to build on-site.

I understand that a modular granny flat does sound like it could be the better, easier idea. But what it is not is the cheaper idea.

The only place you may save money on a modular granny flat is on labour, if you were not planning on building your kit home yourself. As they do not take as long to build.

If you choose to build a kit home as an owner-builder (that is, build it yourself), you straight away save money on ‘project management’ costs that each and every builder charges on top of every job they do, including just constructing modular granny flats. Because what you must remember on a modular granny flat is that you will be paying these builders costs – they are just being added on the time spent while these are being built in the workshop.

If you can also assist with the manual labour work that is required to be done, here is where you will save a lot of money on kit homes as well. As labour does cost a lot of money, particularly in Australia. Meaning, if you can hurry this along and make it finished, well, not quite as quick as a modular granny flat, but quicker just by assisting the builder or doing the entire thing yourself, you will save a lot.

And by us assisting you with sourcing the materials, you will not have a builder adding their margin on top of the building materials also. So yes, it might mean more work and more time and more trips back and forth to Bunnings, but it will save you money and be well worth it in the end.

You will also have to pay the transport costs for the modular granny flats, which can be quite expensive. Whereas with your kit home a lot of the material you can even pick up yourself if you wish.

So yes, to go over that again, with a kit home you will save money on:

• Materials.
• Labour.
• Delivery.

Conclusion

So yes, what we do like to do for our clients is give them a ‘third’ option – to arrange plans and help with approvals then cost materials.

This includes us providing you with:

• Pricing the materials for your build for free. This allows you to know the exact cost of every material required for your build. And unlike a builder, we do not put a margin on top of this – we know the exact price of the materials that you will require.
• Multiple quotes from multiple builders. This will allow you to decide if you want to build it yourself or hire a builder to do it all for you. And this is all done from the same set of plans that we provided you with initially.
• A personalised plan. We can easily discuss your plan with you, and every step that you will need to take as an “Owner-Builder”, again allowing you to decide whether you do want to build the entire thing yourself, or if you would like our assistance with tradesman, quotes from labourers, advice on building and more. Just this will allow you to save 25% on building.
• Plans that are yours from the start. Yes, that is correct, we do not hold any copyright or ownership to the plans. We allow you to do what you want with these plans. This means you can choose any builder or tradesman you would like to work with, and have no legal consequences if you do.

We are also more than happy to help you with every step of the way after the plans have been drawn up, such as assisting you to gain approval to build.

If you have any further questions about how we work and what we do, please just ask here.

Or if you just want more ideas on how to save money when building your granny flat, simply look at our blog about owner builder granny flats here.