Estimate Building Costs - New Home in Southern California

Summary: Estimate construction costs for building a new home with a great room and vaulted ceilings in Southern California.

This is an attractive 4 bedroom, 2 bath ranch style house plan with a lot of nice features, yet it is only 1,412 sq. ft.
The front porch measures Approx. 27’ x 6’.

This plan as shown is with a full basement, but it can be easily modified for slab construction to save money or to accommodate a high water table.

I estimated the cost to build with a concrete slab foundation, as that is the typical foundation in San Bernardino, California.

Lifestyle Features: great room, suited for view lot, covered rear porch, vaulted ceiling, eating bar, covered front porch, unfinished/future space, split bedrooms & walk-in closet


HOUSEPLANS.COM - PLAN 18-1036

To estimate cost, I'll use my resource #5 , “Building Costs by City & State”, on "Getting Started" using average quality and a concrete slab foundation.

Using this shape for the foundation on the cost estimating software for the San Bernardino, CA area, I came up with $109,685, including a general contractor, or home builder, markup of $12,336.

For a new house of 1,412 square feet of living space, that is an approximate cost of $77.68 per sq. ft.

This even included allowances for homeowners insurance or builders risk insurance.

You should keep in mind that the cost to build for this example, or any house plan, can vary considerably depending quality of materials selected, and on actual bids for labor and material.

The estimate for this house is an approximate one based on average quality materials and a slab foundation.

Until you actually start getting your own bids and entering them into your own spreadsheet (see my spreadsheet page for FREE spreadsheets), it will remain approximate.

Carl Heldmann