DETAILED COMPARISON: PRE-MADE PLANS V/S CUSTOMIZED PLANS

You must be expecting this, no pre-made tiny house will satisfy your needs 100% because it is not supposed to do so. Pre-made plans are stock plans that are designed for an audience in general. One size cannot fit all and this stands true in the case of tiny house plans too.

You need a tiny house with a small porch, or maybe a rooftop garden, or a balcony, or a special workstation since your a work from home mother. These things are difficult to obtain in a tiny house plan that’s made for a general audience.

To get a customized plan designed for yourself you’ll be contacting a design firm that specializes in tiny house designs. When you have explained them all the necessary info on how you need your tiny house to be, the design firm is obliged to give you what you have demanded.

It may happen that you’re asking for something that’s downright dangerous or illegal, say, for instance, you demand you tiny house on wheels to have balcony that overhangs 6′ or say a 4 bedroom tiny house, these kinds of things are generally not possible given the limitations in structural design and codes.

Like I said pre-made plans are sold in stock and are generally designed for a general audience. Normally one single tiny house plan gets sold more than 30 times. This makes it profitable for the design firm to sell it in the price range of $100 – $300

Look at it as designer clothes, when you have something designed especially for you which none other than you has it, it is bound to be expensive. Also, to design a custom plan for a client it takes more than 50 hours of hard work. It is quite expecting of a client to shell out more than $2000 for a customized plan.

Not every pre-made plan will meet your definition of a perfect designed plan. Actually, you will only get a plan that is close to what you have been looking for.  Therefore, you should do some modifications to tweak it to be right for you. This will mean removing things you might not need and replacing them with important ones. Even though it might take some time, it is still worth the wait in the long run.

Now, in order to make modifications, you’ll either contact the Architect whose plans you purchased or you’ll get it modified some other Architect or DIY it. The fee you end up paying is about $100/hour.

The modifications alone would cost you about $700 – $1200 + The Sale Price of Tiny House Plan. Final cost comes to around $1000 – $1500

You know what’s better and cheaper? Get a customized tiny house plan. I myself charge only $1299 per tiny house design (all that you’ll need). This makes it way affordable than purchasing  a pre-made plan and then modifying it.

With custom plans, you will think about the needs of your family and future life. For instance, you can include a bedroom for your baby if you are planning to have a family. Unlike pre-made plans, you have the freedom of including anything you wish. You are thus sure of coming up with the perfect fit house that meets all your needs.

Custom tiny house plan will also need modifications, usually when you hire an Architectural firm, they soak your requirements and create a draft plan based on the info, you get to review the draft and suggest changes that you need. Again a revamped draft is produced which is again reviewed by you and then a final draft is produced which when passed by you is then finally produced into final construction document.

A customized tiny house plan is (in my opinion) an overall affordable option when it comes to tiny house plans. Sure the pre-made plans are on sale for $100 – $200 but the overall costs after modifications is equal to or slightly lesser than the cost of customized tiny house plan.

Pre-made plans are sold only over internet and internet is a vast place and you can’t be sure of every other website. Now, these tiny house plans could have been designed by interns, inexperienced Architects, or just any other random person.

A lot of my clients have first purchased pre-made plans and once they couldn’t make out any of it, they came to me to get corrections in those plans. It’s an unnecessary drama for both the client and agencies like us.

A tiny house design firm will ask a lot of questions to get a clear idea of how you picture the tiny house in your mind. That’s before they actually make their first draft. After having received all the desired info they’ll curate a plan for you. You can ask for modifications wherever you want (isn’t that the sole reason to hire them?) You practically get unlimited number of revisions (or at least that’s how I & my team work) till your satisfaction.

Since pre-made plans are designed for general audience, it is designed per IRC (International Residential Code). This code is general code for the whole Nation (applies to other countries as well) and will need some tweaking before it can suit your local code. To tweak it, you’ll need a local engineer or Architect to suit it to your needs (which costs another $800 – $1500).

Suppose you live in Florida, a pre-made plan is designed per IRC and won’t suit the needs and requirements of Florida (you know hurricanes. don’t you?) likewise for Alaska or New York.

A customized tiny house plan will be suited for your local code when you hire a local firm in your area. However if you wish to get your tiny house designed from somewhere else you can obtain a copy of your local code and send it to the design firm. They’ll then make sure that your house is designed exactly per your needs and county codes (that’s how we work)

To get a copy of your local code you gotta talk to your local zoning or building planning department, they are usually happy to comply.

Pre-made plans follow International Residential Code and don’t specifically cater to your local weather conditions.

Customized plans are drawn as per local zoning and building codes and therefore are compliant with local weather conditions and code.

Mostly pre-made plans don’t have any anti-theft measures designed to keep your house safe nor do they provide any helpful tips to keep your tiny house safe (not that I’ve heard of).

There are provisions which can be installed or designed in a tiny house which when installed can ensure safety of your tiny house. There have been quite a few cases that has shown us how vulnerable a tiny house can be.
I’ve written an article just about how to protect your tiny house from getting stolen and we incorporate the same ideas into our design even if the client doesn’t need it now, with the hope that they’ll need it later and will thank us for the smartness and farsightedness.

Pre-made plans are readily available and easy to purchase. However, there can be many hidden costs both in functionality and financially. Creating a custom design is time consuming because of the process. The good thing is that you will get what you need for your tiny living.

Whether you go custom or pre-designed, you can successfully build your dream home. It is simply a matter of your personal preference and what you want. Remember to learn the principals of house building regardless of the option you choose. When in doubt, feel free to seek help form a professional.