Answer: Generally, anyone is allowed to put the package together. Our expertise with the Owner-builder market is that most building departments allow a home owner the freedom to do it there self. The next question is should you? It is all individual and is your own choice. This system is the closest to “stick building” and you would think traditional stick builders would be agreeable to framing our packages. For some unknown reason, there is a resistance to framing panels.

In most situations we have been able to supply those who will professional assemble our packages.

Answer: With most builders price is based on “location pricing”, what they are saying is the land size, views, affluence’s of neighborhood like a gated community, and finally your ability to pay. Lots of traditional builder market there price on LOCATION, we do NOT.

Pricing is directly generated by the complexity of the plan. A four corner building with two truss designs is the lowest price building to build. More corners and truss designs can increase the price from the lowest -8% 4-corners & 2-trusses to +8% with 25 corners & 21 different truss. Thus a complex design could be +16% higher just with these two factors. Here are the typical items that increase price: wall thickness 2×6 instead of 2×4; tall walls 8 foot instead of 24 foot tall; up-graded windows; gable instead of hip roof; engineering features; large garages instated of no garage and up graded exterior doors,

Answer: There is almost nothing you cannot change on a standard plan or any plan you want us to design and then build. Let me point out that the more changes that you make, the odds are that it will no longer be a standard, but be called your custom plan. The moment a customer hears the words “CUSTOM” the dollar sign lights up. Generally, the worst that could happen is a moderate increase due to paper work, redesigning trusses and shopping the package.

If your custom plan has similar square footage, same basic features of a standard plan; like same number and size of windows, same number of lineal foot of both interior and exterior walls, same wall features like siding type, same roof system, same number of floors, same size garage, same porch areas and features combined with the same number of corners and truss designs, the price could be about 10% more. Not bad when you know you are getting what you want! We like to call our system the Burger King of building “having it your way”. Depending on the type of hamburger you like or dislike, this could be a wrong comparison.

Answer: Internet plans can be a good starting point if the layout is close to what you like. One of the greatest issues is that most them are from the east coast areas of the United States, thus the building requirements are VERY different from California. When building in California, you build per the requirements of California. Californian builds per the CBC (California Building Code) which requires some of the most stringent building code and design features. California is years ahead of most U.S. states in building requirements. Most other parts of the U.S. are governed by the UBC (Uniform Building Code).

Now back to internet plans, as a real of thumb there is a 75% likely hood that the best thing to do is to take the basic layout and start all over. It is not uncommon to see notes that indicate the designer has the capability of having plans changed to California requirements. It has been our experience that the delay and unknown local requirements will cost more than just starting over.

When in doubt, let us look over what you have and allow us to help.

Answer: Yes, and generally we use the Roseburg truss joist system. We have tried TJI and have been extremely impressed with their quality and timely supply for deliveries. One of the advantages of TJI over dimensional lumber is LONG STRAIGHT lengths. TJI are much lighter weight to move around when installing long in length, compared to dimensional lumber. TJI per-located holes for mechanical knock outs with little effort to knockout.

There are many different suppliers, but Roseburg has met our strong requirements of quality and delivery needs for our customer.

Answer: We can design and build on almost any hillside. It is fairly unlikely that you will use one of the standard plans, on a hillside lot. As a rule, if you find a standard CPH plan that looks like suites your needs, it can be modified sometime to fit your hillside design. The one feature that usually hinders this idea is the change the location of the attached garage.

When this happens the next step is just tell us what you like about an existing plan you have seen that you like. We do need you to supply the hillside contour mapping, known as topography map. We then implement the design to the contours of your topography map, now we are ready to design your dream home.

Answer: By all means, YES, you are allowed to do any or all the work that you feel capable of doing. You do have to get the work past the building inspector’s eyes and final inspection. In all the years we have been doing this, there are many customers who have had the self satisfaction of a job well done ALL by themselves. This is an awesome task and you may want to think twice before you take on more than you are capable of doing. This type of task and work is called “SWEAT EQUITY”. On the other side is the “MANAGEMENT EQUITY”. Over many years we have had the largest part of our buyers build this way.

This allows a single person or better yet a dual management team, the ability to share in the management. In the traditional arrangement, the man and woman team has worked well. In these change life styles we have had many combinations of relationships successfully accomplish the same task with the same sense of personal accomplishment.

Answer: There are several papers that make up the contract and we would be more than happy to fax or email them for your reading. We are very capable of having the whole paperwork process be done electronically. We now have complete email and internet capability of signing contract electronically. If you are on a deadline, like the end of a month and prices are rumored to go up, it is advisable to make sure you overnight FedEx or any service you feel will have the package to PMHI the day before the end of the month. If using an overnight service, you will need to use the factory’s street address Note this address will be supplied when the time is right.

The minimum deposit is 15%, payable to the factory. There are four other deposit options that allows the price guarantee to be held from 60 days, with 15% to 180 days with only 100% deposit. That’s SIX MONTHS, unheard of in the lumber industry. The price holding guarantee is also available on the web showing several examples of specific dates.

Answer: The time it takes to erect on package home is directly related to the abilities of the crew putting the package together. We have had some owner builders who have been as timely as professional general contractors. There is no special or technical knowledge needed to assemble our system. The key item is to keep working. The temptation with an owner builder is to assemble the package in one’s spare time. This approach tends to drag things out. It is hard to tell you what and when to do the work other than it is better to move along at a steady pace. In citing a couple examples, we have traditionally heard of a two car garage with four workers up in a weekend. Then, there is the GREAT story of a garage of over 1,700 square feet, that 12 fellow firefighters help a another fire fighter to assemble all the walls in one hour and forty five minutes and on the same day had all the trusses up by 4pm.

Examples:

Additions are a little more involved due to the tying together, of the new from CPH to the original older built building.

There were two very large custom homes both over 7,000 square foot. One a rambling rancher in Hawaii up in five weeks. The was a an owner builder of a two story in the East Bay hillside up in four weeks. “Up” means the exterior wall, note usually all exterior walls come completely sheeted with windows flashed in the wall, interior walls header for door openings and roof trusses, plus roof sheeting applied over trusses.

There was a very large 14 unit apartment building of three floors, with over 22,000 square foot in size, was a weather tight shell in under fifty-five days. Bear in mind that this last example was with one of our regular buyers who knows what to expect from us.

Answer: Yes, the fees are dramatized on the web under the drafting heading. We are more than happy to do drafting on new homes, cabins, chalets, barns and garages without any requirements for a job site visit, unless you feel there is a need for a visit. There is a travel time fee and a minimum two hour visit time provided if requested.

When dealing with an addition, there is considerable more time devoted to the existing building as there is the new addition. This statement is based on the assumption that the addition is 25 to 50% of what the original house was. Many times we have completely redesigned a new, and usually larger addition, complete remodel floor plan. It is always good to check directly with your local building department at what they will and will not allow you to do. It is not uncommon for us to provide drawings for over thirty to fifty different building departments in a busy year. Because of this, it is almost impossible to have a 100% professional handle on the individual county and city regulations. We leave it to for you to read up on the “in’s and out’s” of what they are going to require and us the drafting service. We are willing to read over their requirements.

In over thirty three years of providing plans, it is better that the customer to hear the requirements first. Then, it gives us an opportunity to read between the lines and share with you other successful approaches as to how to get the plans for the new project the way you want to have the project flow.

Answer: There is an extra step when providing plans for an addition called a site visit. This includes measuring the existing building. This step is very important and fairly time consuming.

The preliminary plans Addition generally will take 1 to 2 week to be drawn by computer. Next, is the final sign off set of one more week. After all have been approved, the next step of final plans takes another 2 weeks. After all plans have been drawn, they are to the engineer and that takes another 2 weeks. All totaled a minimum of one and half to two months is needed. Please keep in mind all these dates vary depending on holidays, how long you take to sign off and move to the next step.

Answer: No! We are quite different. We are not limited to style, size, height, width, weight, feature type of roof, flooring, appliances, paint, carpeting just to name a few differences. We let you get involved you can have it your way. Along with having it your way you can do as much or as little of the work you want to do your self and same more money. About the only thing a manufactured home has a over us is time.

The most important economic issues are how the public and banks look at this type of construction process. It is not uncommon to hear banks not wanting to loan at full value. For an unbiased testimonial, ask a listing real estate agent if they would rather sell a manufactured home or a “stick built or panelized home”? From a real estate appraises point of view the manufactured unit will appraise at a lower value when comparing like size, location and quality of our system.

Answer: Please present the question and we will personally answer this new concern. As new questions are asked, we will share with others the ones we feel are helpful in understanding our great product.

This is a new addition to our web site and, we hope that the in-depth wordy answers are informative when dealing with……… Frequently asked questions