If you are going to be in this home for a long time, windows are one of those areas you dont want to skimp on.

Even in the short haul they are good for re-sale.

You got to look at the big picture....window that is!

Your contractor owes you an explanation for low-balling the allowance.

ditto what mightanvil says. There is no way it should be 3 x the amount alloted.

Amy

Doesn't sound off to me b/c I was just talking to my builder about how much they cost. I am dreading getting the number on that for our house. We have some palladian, arched windows. We wanted the grilles to be curved (not sunburst). He said those would be around $4,000 instead of around $1200 for the sunburst. We have decided on the sunburst!

Wow, 3x's as much? Are you sure your builder didn't think you were using Vinyl?

We were told that Wood/Clad windows would be 2.5-3 times as much as vinyl.

Builders typically quote aluminum windows and they are cheap. DO NOT USE AL. True, they are dbl pane and low E (for the glass) but aluminum conducts heat thru it like crazy. Just find some on a hot day and touch the glass, cool. frame. Hot. For a major brand like BiltBest 3x is about right. We installed Pella Proline double hung for about 17k. WE HAVE A TOTAL OF 49 WINDOWS.

emily....that price seems very high! I just finished building a house with 33 windows, house was 4000 sf,(double hung, two pane) wood interior and vinyl ext. Cost $16,000. Would have been alot less for all vinyl and single hung. Why alum.? What part of the country are you in?

New home has 38 windows, many are small, but there are 3 with round tops and 6 quarter rounds, plus 7 glass doors.

Andersen 400 series, pvc outside, wood inside, 'self cleaning', prarie style grids, great energy numbers-- total under 35,000.

robin0919,

Her windows are aluminum clad, not aluminum. Big difference.

klabio

Hi,

Windows are expensive. I think that $US 10,000 was too low at the get go. Your architect should have pointed this out.

As far as actual windows go there can be a large price difference. The best windows I think are Duratherm http://www.durathermwindow.com/ but these are real expensive. They will make a large double pane window. This is difficult because under wind loading the seals can break, causing a misted up window. These guys have the largest windows.

Of the "Normal" window people, I would rate in this order:

1) Marvin -- most expensive but the nicest. more solid, more features. I could not afford these guys.
2) Anderson
3) Pella
4) I actually use some other guy's windows. They were quite nice, cannot remember their name. Sligtly cheaper than Andersson. Recommended by my architect. They were Vinl clad.

5) Others?

Best, Mike.

We have 32 Eagle aluminum clad windows (a mix of casement and fixed pane) and we paid $33K, which averages about $1K per window. We also had sticker shock, but at least our builder figured $25K so we weren't too blown away. The windows were the very first thing we got a price on after our architect gave us the plans. We got a real lesson in how over budget this build was going to be.

In looking at the breakdown of our window invoice, the cost of our 6'2" tall x 5' wide windows were $999/each. It seems your windows might be a little on the high side given their size. Our french doors with two fixed windows on either side was $3,351. We also have 3 rooms in our house with tall cathedral ceilings and windows two stories high. That's where our money went but I wouldn't trade the view for anything.

I would seriously question your builder as to what he had planned for $10K. This may be an omen as to a big difference of opinion on what you want your end result to be versus what has budgeted for. If you are planning this to be a very custom home, his numbers sound like "builder special" to me and you could be in for most serious sticker shock.

Our window quotes run spectrum. White, vinyl, double hung for around $11K. Vinyl clad wood casement, sand color for $22K. (both MW Windows) Aluminum clad wood casement in bronze for $23K from Lincoln and $25K from Hurd.

Vinyl isn't offered in a dark color that we wanted. Hurd offers a tougher painted finish than Lincoln, and can even do an anodized finish that's very durable but can turn chalky over time.

We had budgeted $30K because I didn't want to skimp on windows.

Aluminum clad doors were $2,500 for each french door pair. Waaaay more than what we budgeted because our plan has 8 of them. (We like outdoor connectivity here in the south.) For only $1,200 each, we're getting Mahogany French doors instead. $1,300 savings on each can pay for one Saturday each year where I re-seal the finish. As long as I'm not sealing or painting windows, I'm good.

emily

take your window specs to other vendors and get some more bids. you won't know how unreasonable the bid is until you compare it to some others. get bids for the exact same quality but from different manufacturers so you can do an apples to apples compare. also get bids for vinyl clad windows and doors as well. i have the anderson a400 series windows and doors and would recommend you get a bid on those.

does your contract allow you to use your own vendors for allowance items? Or, are you stuck with whoever the builder uses? does your builder make a fee on the allowance items?

given this early surprise, now you have to be suspect of all of his allowances estimates. start working the budget hard and get multiple estimates on everything or else you could be in for a large cost overrun on the entire project.

I did this when we found out that the excavation allowance that our builder came up with was pulled out of his rear end. We were overrunning like crazy and I had enough. I started getting bids on the remaining excavation work from competitors and a funny thing happened - the price started coming down from the guy my builder was using.

The same tthing happened on the electrical allowance and for that, I did a lot of the wiring to offset the overrun.

i think a 10 grand allowance for that many windows plus doors is a joke. even at 300 dollars a window (which won't buy much if you are looking for a good quality window), you have 9 grand right there with 30 windows, let alone the doors.

Take charge!

Thank you all for your input and advice. I will be speaking with the builder today as we don't know what some of the other allowances are, insulation or painting.
DH and I have spoken with former customers, they are satisfied and speak highly of him.
We are in SW Louisiana having recently moved here last year from CA. Most homes in this area are custom, a few builder's spec homes.
Our house is just under 3000 sq ft, The builder's estimate is $419,000 and his allowances are;
windows $10,000
exterior doors $7,000
cabinets $25,000
flooring and counters $26,000
lighting $4,500
plumbing $5,500
for a total of $78,000.

Emily never stated the grade or details in options for bestbilt as they have several grades and upgrades. If she chose higher end windows from bestbilt, the price does not sound out of line. A 10 k allowance from the builder w/ the amounts she has,(again no details) sounds like big box store or builder grade windows that im sure she would have regrets in the long run.

I forgot to add to the above post, it is a cost plus 11% contract.

sierraeast, thanks for responding! The window bid says: Eclad Spirit. Some are casements most are doublehung,
5 1/4" jambs, fiberglass mesh screens, wood grilles, natural interiors, lowE-366(ultrabilt6), no tint, standard hardware. Applied rigid aluminum nail fin on the larger windows.

Sorry emily, guess i was responding the same time you listed your allowances. We considered biltbest and were very impressed with them, but didn't go so far as to get estimates, so i cant help there.

I feel that going higher end will be worth it in the long run w/ better efficiency and relaible mechanics that should perfom better for the long haul. You might get estimates from other mfgr's that are similar quality such as marvin, weathersheild, eagle, etc, to compare, but i think for the quality line from biltbest you are getting, the price is there,imo.

emily

i see you allowances but without knowing the expectations you have for quality, it is hard to tell if they are too low. but given that you are just starting out and you got your first surpise - and it is 20 GRAND over! - that should send off some loud alarm bells.

we found that our builder used his standard when estimating all allowances. we quickly discovered that his standard and our expectation were way out of sync. if we had built what our builder assumed, the house would have been a huge disappointment and not worth all the effort.

we actually increased many of our allownaces before signing the contract using actual quotes from vendors for the quality and styles we wanted. when it was time to place the orders, we stayed within those budget wedges. i think our total overrun on all of these items was less than 1 or 2% and most of that were due to price increases that were beyond our control (note that if you get a quote now it may only be good for 30 days or so. if you order 3 months from now - the prices may be higher. you might want to factor some inflation into your budget as well).

Unfortunately, there were a few large allownace items where we had to trust his judgement and that was where we got burned. Excavaation, well, septic, and electrical. And we were disgusted by it all - especially since we told the builder that we were on a tight budget and we were counting on him to stay within the numbers he gave us. He assured us there was enough pad to cover any issues - and he was wrong by a long shot.

you have to address the window issue now since that is a near term decision. the only way to do this is get more bids and look at other options. i second the advise to not go cheap on windows and doors, but there are wide ranges of pricing and quality - you just need to find the right balance.

once you get that settled, I suggest looking closely at the other allowance areas. go out and get bids and start working the numbers - so that you are not shocked again (and again) when it is time to order the other items. you must get a very detailed list of exactly what is embedded in each allowances and then get bids or pricing on all of those items. tally it up (don't forget tax and his fee) and see where you are at.

I worry that your builder did exactly what ours did to us on the allowance items.

We just put biltbest aluminum clad casement windows into our house, we had a ton of huge windows most about six feet tall with 8 that were 7 feet tall, plus we put in five set of aluminum clad french doors and ours were about $41,000. So your price seems a bit high, did they give you the builder's discount? In four windows that we never planned to open we put in fixed windows and that reduced the cost. Our builder told us that vinyl would have been about $16,000. for just windows (not including french doors) so your allowance of $10,000. seems a bit low.