Ever asked a builder “how much per square metre?” and copped a long pause? There’s a reason for that. In this episode, Dean and Shannon from DJH Builders, Hugh from New Realm Homes, and Matt from Warrnambool sit down to unpack why square metre rates have quietly disappeared from builder advertising, and why relying on them to budget your new home or reno will lead you down the garden path.
They talk through how the building game has changed since the 80s, why volume builders have backed away from the old “X dollars per square” marketing hook, and the surprising reason a smaller house often costs more per square metre than a bigger one. They also get into how new building code changes, thermal ratings, and the sheer amount of choice in finishes today have blown the old metric out of the water.
If you’re thinking about building or renovating and trying to make sense of quotes, this one’s worth a listen before you go any further.
In This Episode, You’ll Learn:
– Why square metre rates worked decades ago but can’t be relied on for today’s builds
– How volume builders used per-square-metre pricing as a marketing hook, and why they’ve quietly dropped it
– Why a smaller house often costs more per square metre than a bigger one
– How design choices, finishes, and site conditions blow square metre estimates out of the water
– Why you can’t compare a volume builder’s price to a custom build using square metres
– How upcoming building code changes, thermal ratings, and passive home standards are pushing build costs up
– Why renovations and bathrooms can’t be reliably costed by square metre
– What actually drives the real cost of your build, and why every job is genuinely one of a kind
– What to ask your builder instead of “how much per square metre?”
Key Timestamps:
01:19 Why square metre rates can’t be relied on for accurate estimates
02:23 How fixed price contracts and volume builders created the square metre myth
04:07 Why volume builders have stopped advertising per-square-metre pricing
06:45 How design choices and finishes blow square metre rates out of the water
09:25 Thermal ratings, building code changes, and the rising cost of compliance
12:42 How average home sizes have grown while blocks of land have shrunk
17:09 Volume builder marketing tricks and the inclusions homeowners miss
19:19 Why cutting items from your quote rarely cuts the total cost
Listen on
Spotify// https://open.spotify.com/show/0eGpiuFZidHdOcFunXPo4q
Apple Podcast// https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/builders-beyond-borders/id1841312899
Youtube// https://www.youtube.com/@BuildersBeyondBordersPodcast
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