Is a small house cheaper to build?

Hi I hope you all are doing well. I looking here to need good suggestion from all of you. I think it is good platform to gain some knowledge about real estate. S
Look: I am very nervous and confuse how to choose the best construction building or house company ? I want to build a small in Nashville. Any one help in this regard someone know the company or agent mention here. Thanks

Welcome to the forum Alina.

You will have decide what "small" means to you, If not, an average construction company will want to build you a 3000 sq ft 10 bathroom house - this is how they make money.
In my opinion, small means 500-1000 sq ft. The best is to educate yourself and know exactly the goals and then manage entire building process - it's not easy, but brings so much satisfaction to the point that building a house is better than living in it. If you share more details, knowledgeable users will help.

Alina Rose wrote:Hi I hope you all are doing well. I looking here to need good suggestion from all of you. I think it is good platform to gain some knowledge about real estate. S
Look: I am very nervous and confuse how to choose the best construction building or house company ? I want to build a small in Nashville. Any one help in this regard someone know the company or agent mention here. Thanks

First of all, welcome to the forums, and I think as long as someone is open-minded, they will see there is a wealth of information here as many of us think quite differently regarding the building of homes in unique ways.

To answer your question though, a tiny house is not always cheaper than building a bigger one.

It sounds counterintuitive until you realize that when things get outside of normal; either bigger or smaller, they have a higher cost. As an example, tiny water heaters for a tiny house are incredibly expensive over that of normal sized water heaters because so few are sold. They might have a smaller amount of material to build them, but they still have all the same parts to make them work.

So it is with a tiny house. The material to build may be less, but you still need a kitchen, bathroom, sleeping and dining areas. To compress all this down in size just means a lot of labor fitting so few square feet into such a tight spot. What do I mean by that? Well consider a big house, to put down 100 feet of flooring means nailing down boards onto the floor in quick order. Lay them out and nail them down. To lay 100 feet of flooring in a tiny house means cutting around an incredible number of things and taking 20 times longer. That costs money if you are paying to have it done.

This is why a Tiny House might cost $80,000. It might not have a lot of material in it, but it has way more labor.

If a person wants to save money on house-building, my suggestion is to build a small place first, then add on as they go. This is what I did in 1994. I built a traditional 2 car garage that was 24 x 24 feet, for $5000 on 4 acres. I put in a septic system myself for $1500, and drilled a well for $4500. Inside I framed it for a 12 x 24 living room/kitchen, then a 12x16 bedroom, and a 12x8 bathroom with washer and dryer. It was tight, but it worked. Today it is MUCH bigger than that, but it was a $11,000 start.

Where I am at you have to find a custom home builder to get anything under 1,200 sqf unless your having a few houses / buildings done at the same time.  I'm sure their is an upcharge for going smaller.  

It depends on a lot of different aspects of the building.

So to answer the title are small houses cheaper to build one?


Different building materials could make building a small house more expensive that a larger house.

There is a mention of "construction building or house company" and you going that route might be cheaper because they buy material in bulk.

My suggestion would be to find one of the already-built storage buildings in the area and then find a handyman to finish putting the interior.

First of all I would not use "tiny" here. Tiny house in USA means ornamented trailer to evade tyrrany.
Alina is asking for a small house and it will be always cheaper than a big one, because it uses less of everything.

Areas of focus:
1. One Bathroom. Bathroom and kitchen are two most expensive rooms in the house. Family of two is buying a 4000 sq ft house with 3 bathrooms and they are crying that it was so expensive. Well...
2. Kitchen, bathroom, laundry should be in one corner of the building. I just can not understand what so called "builders" are thinking when running water and sewer pipes across living quarters to connect bathroom and kitchen on opposite sides of the building.
3. Simple shape - rectangle. All classic small homes are always rectangular (there is a tiny percentage for exceptions). Every bend in the structure creates structural problems, water expelling problems, heating problems.

The key thing is to manage everything yourself. Construction companies offer outrageous prices, because easy mortgage inflates everything, so basically you bid your money against the banks - you will always lose this way. You have to find a good craftsman that can do most. Companies have overheads - secretaries, offices, too big and expensive trucks - the customer will have to pay for all of this bloat.
It's not easy, but totally possible - I built a high end no compromise 1000 sq ft house in California where regulations, bureaucracy, labor and transportation costs are above Tennessee.

All the above responses have merit.
But, at the end of the day a small house will normally cost less, whilst the $ per sq foot may actually be higher.
Total price is the important issue.
My first home in Australia was built in 1928 and was about 1200 sq ft and that was considered normal for a family!!
Today its madness.
How are you seeing a 'small house'?

Assuming you’re talking about a small house, say 1,200 square feet and not a tiny house, something well under 1,000 square feet, then a smaller house costs less to build, period. Less materials to build it, fewer man hours, it will cost less than a 2,400 sq. ft. house.

You need to know the zoning and building regulations for your specific building site before you begin the process. Unless you’re willing to accept a design the builder already has, something they build fairly often and have all the plans and approvals for, you may need to begin with an architect or engineer and that adds unpredictable costs. We designed our own home and then had an engineering firm draw up plans and certify them. That was a few thousand dollars.

We’re actually building our home, not hiring a builder. That saves money but costs time. I’m retired, so we’re not losing my working income for me to build the house. We’re using timber from our land, which saves materials costs, but adds costs related to tools and equipment.

As for recommending contractors in a particular area - you have to talk to people that live there and work in the housing industry for guidance. It’s not possible to offer recommendations of any value without intimate local knowledge.

Building a small, space efficient house is similar to boat or campervan building. It costs significantly more per sq ft because the number of angles, corners, and joinery involved.

Building a small (single or 2 room) house using standard dimensions is of course much cheaper than building a large one.

My father was an architect, and a trick he used when estimating a job was to count the number of corners inside a dwelling, and multiply it by a price per corner. A curve is equal to 2 corners.

I used to build both custom and spec houses up to the start of Covid. The “sweet spot” for building was about 2000 sq ft. Any bigger and the rooms get too big and the lumber for the ceiling and floor need to get bigger to support the span. Any smaller and the amount of waste becomes significant.

There were efficient and wasteful designs, too. One builder had great designs that fit standard lumber sizes so there was almost no waste. Key is to have OUTSIDE dimensions be multiples of four feet so you don’t waste floor sheeting. We could build the whole house and only have one pickup load of scrap. Another builder had a similar plan but it had a full dumpster of waste because it didn’t consider those things.

Today’s market in Nashville it is probably really difficult to find anyone willing to do a small house. They are so busy they can choose the big easy jobs.  

All else being equal it is cheaper to build a small house than a big one. And it is also cheaper to maintain it too.

1 bedroom = 12ft x 12ft = 144sqft
3 bedroom = 450sqft
livingRM + Kitchen/Dinning RM = 300sqft
LaundryRM + BathRM + Hallway = 144sqft

So it possible to build a 3bedrom house that is only 1,000sqft.
And Assuming that you are just going with regular/cheap fixtures, flooring and roof, then it can be build for $100 per sqft for a total of $100,000 for a 1,000sqft house.

If I had to get a 2,000sqft house over a 1,000sqft house I would get a duplex so that I can rent it out, AirBnB, or some family member/child can live in it in the future. Basically I would rather have 12room that are each 12ft x 12ft over only having 6rooms that are 17ft x 17ft

There are many 24ft x 24ft designs from the 1920s.   2 bedroom, living room, eat in kitchen and bath.  

S Bengi wrote:All else being equal it is cheaper to build a small house than a big one. And it is also cheaper to maintain it too.

1 bedroom = 12ft x 12ft = 144sqft
3 bedroom = 450sqft
livingRM + Kitchen/Dinning RM = 300sqft
LaundryRM + BathRM + Hallway = 144sqft

So it possible to build a 3bedrom house that is only 1,000sqft.
And Assuming that you are just going with regular/cheap fixtures, flooring and roof, then it can be build for $100 per sqft for a total of $100,000 for a 1,000sqft house.

If I had to get a 2,000sqft house over a 1,000sqft house I would get a duplex so that I can rent it out, AirBnB, or some family member/child can live in it in the future. Basically I would rather have 12room that are each 12ft x 12ft over only having 6rooms that are 17ft x 17ft

All the time is in the edges and corners. That is  where the cuts are. It takes seconds longer to build a 17 foot wall than a twelve. So your 12 room house would probably cost 30-50% more than the six even with the same exterior.