Perhaps he does not understand how to build a house tight and then ventilate it right.

He's probably not the only one. Here are the first two quotes from "old school" contractors who have seen my build since the ducting was in;

"I thought this wasn't supposed to have a furnace..."

"All that for just AIR??"

Fordracing, ICFs should add no more than 5% to the build cost.

Whatever the "ICF premium" is, I'm beginning to suspect that it could be much smaller with homes that are designed for ICF in the first place. Some of that extra cost we talk about now must certainly come from trying to make existing home plans fit ICF construction.

An architect or designer experienced in ICF could give you original designs that include amenities such as insulated walls or soundproofing or structural features that would squeeze down the cost gap between ICF and conventional construction.

I am of the opinion that one should not even go out for quotes until the home has been designed for the intended technology.   If the designer used a good software program, then it certainly does not take very long to alter a plan to fit the technology.  At least that has been my experience.

If the designer used a good software program, then it certainly does not take very long to alter a plan to fit the technology.

Alton, I think that CAN happen, but what I am talking about is archies and designers who design to fit the strengths of the product in the first place as opposed to porting something over. Designs made with ICF in mind will almost certainly be able to reduce that ICF premium.

Posted By Alton on 12 Jan 2012 10:06 AM
Perhaps he also does not understand that the air we breathe should be flitered first.  Perhaps he does not understand how to build a house tight and then ventilate it right.

I don't understand his logic. If a home is built non-tight, the home is constantly leaking in outside air, 24 hours a day, more so on windy days. So no mechanical air is required because the home is constantly leaking in air. If a home is built tight, then it does not leak outside air and needs mechanical ventilation to bring in fresh air. I would rather bring in mechanical fresh air for 5 minutes every hour and have a tight home vs. having a leaky home without mechanical air.

I guess he thinks that the building a tight home with mechanical air intake offsets building a very tight home because it's like opening a window to bring in fresh air. Plus the costs to run the fan 24 hours a day.

Posted By ICFconstruction on 12 Jan 2012 10:36 AM
Fordracing, ICFs should add no more than 5% to the build cost.

I have a hard time believeing that. Everyone I have talked to and from my own personal experience, it is more like 15% or even higher.

Nothing against you, but I believe the 5% is a sales technique to get a person "in the door". Like the car sales lot that displays an AD stating that you can buy a new car for $10,000. When you walk into the dealership looking for this $10k car, it's not available, BUT they can get you into a similar car for $15k.

Posted By ICFHybrid on 12 Jan 2012 10:58 AM
Whatever the "ICF premium" is, I'm beginning to suspect that it could be much smaller with homes that are designed for ICF in the first place. Some of that extra cost we talk about now must certainly come from trying to make existing home plans fit ICF construction.

An architect or designer experienced in ICF could give you original designs that include amenities such as insulated walls or soundproofing or structural features that would squeeze down the cost gap between ICF and conventional construction.

Herein lies the problem with aesthetics vs. cost. The lowest cost ICF home would be a rectangular box with a few holes in it for windows, throw in some decorative faux stuff on the outside and call it a day. Yet, people don't want to live in rectangular boxes. So homes are designed with angles and other features which then the builder tells you to get the check book ready.

Tract homes are designed for curb appeal and cheapest construction cost. Custom homes are a different animal. Depending on the architect, one can design for cost efficiency, energy savings, aesthetics, functionality, or a little of all of those.

Most people don't use an architect because of the costs involved. On a $300k home, you are looking at 10%-15% of the costs for an architect, so around $30k - $45k for their services. That is why most people will go with a pre-drawn plan from an on-line source that has thousands of designs to chose from. Or they might go with a draftsman who typically charges $1-$3 sq.ft. but let's not forget that a draftsman is not a licensed and schooled architect.

The icf guy was priced in line with a few of the stick builders. We signed our contract yesterday and I feel we are getting a great deal. Kitchen and baths will have granite, living is handscraped hardwood, and 2x6 construction for less than $80 sq ft living.

Posted By fordracing19 on 12 Jan 2012 07:16 PM
The icf guy was priced in line with a few of the stick builders. We signed our contract yesterday and I feel we are getting a great deal. Kitchen and baths will have granite, living is handscraped hardwood, and 2x6 construction for less than $80 sq ft living.

What was the cheapest ICF quote you got? $100 sqft?

$80 sqft is about the price out here in AZ for 2x6 construction with modest interior upgrades. Granite is pretty "standard" for homes today. Granite has become so inexpensive as it is barged over from China in huge quantities. One can get granite cheap if they CUT OUT the middle man (tile stores). They mark the stuff up SO MUCH that it is ridiculous.

For me, nice real wood touches inside really softens a home and gives it a cozy feeling.

Were you able to get them to install the duct work INSIDE the thermal envelope?

How comes out to $102 but didn't have granite with undermounts in the baths or the hand scraped floor.

Posted By fordracing19 on 12 Jan 2012 09:22 PM
How comes out to $102 but didn't have granite with undermounts in the baths or the hand scraped floor.

So ICF was basically 20%-25% more in costs than 2x6 wood. Sounds about right, maybe a little high, if there was a good ICF builder he might have been able to do it for 15% more instead of 20%+. Like I said before, all that I read and the quotes I got, it was around 15%+ more with ICF. That 5%-8% number is a pipe dream. Maybe if you are best friends or your brother-in-law runs an ICF company, you can see that 5% but otherwise it is more realistically at 15% more than wood.

3,000 sqft home/ 2x6 wood = $240K
3,000 sqft home/ ICF = $285K

For me, the granite stuff is not as important. I know I can go to a granite yard and get it for cost and then just pay to have it finished. Probably save myself 50% vs. going through a 3rd middle-man granite distributor.

Herein lies the problem with aesthetics vs. cost. The lowest cost ICF home would be a rectangular box with a few holes in it for windows, throw in some decorative faux stuff on the outside and call it a day. Yet, people don't want to live in rectangular boxes. So homes are designed with angles and other features which then the builder tells you to get the check book ready.

I  don't necessarily agree with the above statement.  Designing a house for ICF is a great idea and here are a few reasons why:

Short walls with Corners (or small bump outs) are a pain in ICF.  Bumping a wall out for a foot might make for a nice  break in a long wall, but it's hard to configure blocks, there's waste, and there's likely a vertical seem that will need additional reinforcement.

If you know the length of the block you are working with, designing walls to make full use of the block makes it quicker to stack and obviously produces less waste.

Using windows that fall between the block dimensions so "notching" the block to accept window bucks isn't required or requires less work (ie cutting through webs).

Realizing a wall is going to be 11-1/4" or 13-1/4" thick ahead of time, so rooms that are marginally small don't get smaller.

Angles and corners are easy to do, so long is they aren't too short.

Window and door bucks take a ton of time, so using windows that make full use of the lumber would make sense.  Plus, getting rid of narrow windows that loose their effect with deep sills.  On the original plan, some of the windows look like they start at the bottom of the wall.  I've never quite understood the concept of that.  I would raise the sill so  you have at least one block height worth of sill.

Looking at the revised plan, a design like FordRacings is actually pretty simple (except for the small bumps that I mentioned).  I did notice that a few rooms would suffer from the thicker block.  I would also recommend that the Jack and Jill bathroom between the two rooms be moved to a single hall bath, then make a small closet for the top right bedroom in the space saved in the bathroom, then take that original bedroom closet and make it the pantry, and finally make the room labeled pantry a larger utility room.

Should be $225k vs $280k

The lowest cost ICF home would be a rectangular box with a few holes in it for windows,

Well, isn't that the same for just about any construction method? Minimal corners, 4 straight sides, etc? There are some things that are commonly done to jazz up stick construction, but they may not be the same things that are done with to jazz up ICF and vice-versa. Jeepster mentioned a few of the things, above, that should be considered in helping keep the cost down. I don't necessarily share his distaste for short corners, unless they are so short they start taking bites out of corner block......

In fact, I actually liked doing the corner work and putting jogs in the long walls help support them. In my case, so much so that we were able to build with 6" walls as opposed to 8" or 10".

A good ICF builder will be able to do it in the 5% range. Maybe not every plan that way, but certainly the ones that have considered ICF during design.

Granite has become so inexpensive as it is barged over from China in huge quantities.

I'll try to remember that when I close my countertop contract. :-)

  I don't necessarily share his distaste for short corners, unless they are so short they start taking bites out of corner block......

That's exactly what I'm talking about.  I agree with your comment on adding corners to strengthen the wall and break up the monotony, just at least make use of the full corner block.

Most people don't use an architect because of the costs involved. On a $300k home, you are looking at 10%-15% of the costs for an architect, so around $30k - $45k for their services.

My architect was much less than that. If you want to use one, talk with them about how to get the fee down. They really want to work. You just need to help make it possible.

I’ll be building within the next year and have done my leg work as well. A few of the costs that Lbear mentions are quite similar in our neck of the woods.

Architects are still in good demand in Ottawa (therefore having no real incentive to deal) and many want at least a 10% cut of the total build cost for their services (definitely the case for the 3 that we looked into before quickly being discouraged). We ended up going with an experienced architectural technician who is charging us in the ballpark of $1.50 a sq. ft.

ICF was a plan of ours, but after seeing the upcost in the range of 15-20% as well, it was unfortunately passed over for conventional framing. The full 15% is not entirely attributed to the blocks and the poured concrete, but also to extra cost for thicker/wider glazing, more detailing, stucco-based "parging", more work for electricians running wires on external walls, etc etc.

There is a big market between "at least a 10% cut of the total build cost" and $1.50 a sq. ft. My architect's fee was square in the middle at around $5/sf. You need to shop around some.

Same applies to ICF work. Here is the range of bids I had calculated by sf of total floor space.

$41
$32
$30
$22

See the range? What if I had stopped at the upper two bids?

Posted By MikeG on 13 Jan 2012 10:57 AM
I’ll be building within the next year and have done my leg work as well. A few of the costs that Lbear mentions are quite similar in our neck of the woods.

ICF was a plan of ours, but after seeing the upcost in the range of 15-20% as well, it was unfortunately passed over for conventional framing. The full 15% is not entirely attributed to the blocks and the poured concrete, but also to extra cost for thicker/wider glazing, more detailing, stucco-based "parging", more work for electricians running wires on external walls, etc etc.

And that is why ICF is not catching on as it should. When you have a 15%-20% upcost just for doing ICF over wood, most middle income people will pass it up and go with wood. For now, ICF mostly caters to commercial and upper income people.