I apologize for the novel and for the formatting. The app is not particularly easy to use when posting a lot of information, and I tried to include all lot of the things that might influence someone.

Anyone have any thoughts today? I know this is ultimately a very personal decision, but we've agonized over it for so long, I would love an outside perspective.

Are you thinking you'd split your lot and then sell the existing house so you'd be living next door to your former house? Just a detail I'm wondering about.

Building is always stressful but IMO, worth it if you have a good architect/designer/general contractor. I did a major remodeling about three years ago and it took almost a year. I was stressed beyond imagination with work, new boss, lots of business travel, a dog I took to day care everyday, etc. BUT, when I was stuck at home during 2020, I was so glad I had done it as everyday in my house was a pleasure, not an exercise in wishing it was different.

Plan now and hopefully once supply chain issues have resolved by the end of 2022, you can build at a decent price. It will take that long to subdivide your lot, get your plans together and get on a contractor's schedule, etc. At least in my area it would.

Set your budget and try to stick to it. Allow for overage of course, but stick to it as close as you can.

Building a house shouldn't blow your budget if you want to retire at 60. The big expense of early retirement is health care if you aren't covered by a plan that covers you early after retirement but before medicare kicks in at 65.

I'd look into building for sure.

If I were y'all, I'd probably... maybe... build a house. (Which *totally* helps, right?!?!)

Okay, so I think I'd plan like crazy *now*, but wait to actually break ground. Take your time with planning. Determine which house style(s) you like. Find an architect based on your favorite style(s). Talk with him/her and see what he/she says.

The major hesitation I have, about y'all's situation, is this little bit:

My husband's job is extremely stressful, and although I could handle most of the time, effort, communication, etc. of building, I don't want to delay his goal of retiring at 60 (in 15 or so years).

Building a custom home can be a fairly stressful project to take on, and y'all will have to hash out -- between the two of you -- whether the "retire at 60" priority is worth postponing, *just in case* building a house interferes with this objective. Especially in today's market, it very well might.

Seems the world turned upside down 18 months ago, adding quite a bit of uncertainty and volatility in both the building materials and labor markets. I am fairly risk-averse (financially speaking), and I lack impulsivity to a large extent, so I would be at peace waiting. Everything goes in cycles, and we are currently in a pretty unstable cycle. :-/

Like you said, it's a personal decision. We just finished a renovation & I hated having to make all the decisions (floors, tiles, layout, carpet, faucets, more tile, more faucets, counters, paint colors, more paint colors). And that was just for renovation. The thought of having to make EVERY decision for a new house gives me a headache... personally it's something I never want to do. But that's me. The limited inventory for buying is affecting EVERYONE. Building is at an all-time high, so I'm not sure it's the best time to take on such a project. That's just my 2 cents... good luck making a decision :-)

Building a home is an opportunity to do great things for many years.

Yes, unless we can work out a swap or something, we would be building next to our current house. Ironically, the former owners of this house already live next door, so it could be a cozy crew, or, if the new owners weren't so patient with the house's flaws, a little uncomfortable. (The previous owner is a dear and so helpful, and we don't hold the problems against her. It is what it is.)
Building is certainly in an unstable situation, but the labor market for us is much less so, so that's good.
I think what's driving our impatience with making the decision is 1. We've been hemming and hawing since shortly after we bought this house-6 years ago! And 2. Our desire to stay here is tied not only to the town, but my husband's job. When he retires (and our son is grown) we might not feel so tied to this place, and if we're going to the trouble of building, we want time to enjoy it, and get some of the satisfaction that is, we hope, the trade off for the expense and trouble.

I haven’t built from scratch but have done remodels, updates, flips, etc. I love this stuff and am not a newbie but despite that my last project (a $300k to the studs gut remodel…nearly double original budget because of scope creep) almost sent me to the loony bin. I was officially the GC (while working full time) and did a bit of the work though a GC friend helped….but there are so many decisions and challenges. It is hard and not to be taken lightly. Now that it’s over I’m thrilled. Reminds me of childbirth! As an aside, though I live in CA we have a summer place in a little town in W MI (Charlevoix) and recently priced out some work and it was more pricey than CA. Our MI neighbor has literally not been able to find a contractor. It’s a tough market right now for finding people to do work- lots of very high end construction keeping them busy. If you do it go into it with eyes (and wallet) wide open!

I'm not surprised that Charlevoix is expensive, but the thought that it was more expensive than California is certainly sobering! We're further south, so I hope that supply and labor aren't quite as tight here.
As far as decisions to be made once we decide to build, that is a bit scary, but as I said, the master bath went well, so maybe....and this may be where our lack of pickiness will be helpful. If the house works well, the finishes are important, but not the be all and end all-they can be changed. I've never really cursed our honey oak (would it be nice to update, sure, but I don't think about it daily) our west facing windows, those kill me every day.

We're further south, so I hope that supply and labor aren't quite as tight here.

This is what I posted earlier... We're seeing building supply and building labor volatility in many (most? all?) parts of the country right now. :-(

If the house works well, the finishes are important, but not the be all and end all-they can be changed.

This will serve you well, for sure!!! Having that flexibility is soooo good. :-D

[...] our west facing windows, those kill me every day.

:-( OhmyGOSH, yes. :-(

We are in the last 2 months of a new build in Tennessee. The process has encountered supply (material and labor) hiccups at nearly every stage. I can tell you that our builder has said that he would not recommend building from scratch right now…no end in site for mundane material bottlenecks.

GW, your flexibility will come in handy. You seem to have what it takes to make it through the process, but as others have said better to take your time and wait for prices to improve.

The more you know and have control over, the less you'll stress.. If you break the build into segments and research each area that'll help. We prepped for 2 years, formed a company for a sales tax license and built from scratch. Not that much stress because of the prep and a simple design. We knew to scrap and replace a rough crew right before the start when we talked the the crew chief. We stopped the work of the first drywallers immediately after they began. Poor quality. Same with some roofers. We did this because of our research. All the know-how we gained has been a continuing benefit many times over.

Thanks so much for your thoughts everyone, I appreciate them and any others you might have to offer. I feel I might not have been clear that I don't believe that we will GC this ourselves.
The process of splitting our property will take some time anyway, so we have lots of time to keep thinking and preparing. We've just spoken to a few septic folks about moving the drainfield, we still have to get the county out to perc the new spot, and start talking to the township about splitting. In the meantime we can chip away at getting this house ready to sell, and keep our eye on existing home listings.

Here's another question, though, if you were building, what would be the minimum amount of time you knew you were going to stay in the home? For example, if you knew you would probably only have five years in the house, would you build? 10?...

You don't seem to have the fire in you belly that it takes to undertake a custom build. I suggest you hire an architect and figure out a way to make that west facing window more amenable. That's a much smaller scope project and would give you a lot of satisfaction. Seventy percent of the time, it's best stay and renovate.

Home chef, thanks for the thought, and normally, I would agree with you. That's kind of the why I'm asking, but....I may have downplayed a the number of things that give us headache and heartache in this house. I will give just a few more examples...the 2 foot wide and four foot deep pantry. The angled walls that make half the living room unusable, the duct work running up the western wall with minimal insulation which means the heated or cold air gets pretty darn close to the outside temp by the time it gets to the upstairs registers, the septic tanks on the west side of the house making it impossible to plant shade trees, the non-standard window shapes that are so hard to cover, repair and replace.....

So, I guess if I could be more succinct and straight forward, is hating your house with a passion passion enough to build, instead of the passion for perfection that usually feeds a custom build?

I hate to say all these things, because we will have to sell this house someday, and I feel bad about that, but at least the buyers will have a new roof, water softener, water heater, furnace, air conditioner, master bath, siding......etc., etc.

Reminds me of Love it or List it…you make renovations and are still not in love…I hear ya. We remodeled our entire house, to everything we wanted and more, and still decided to build a new house. It just doesn’t work for us anymore. So far I can honestly say the new building process (semi custom) has been much easier than remodeling a whole house. But we also wanted a new location, so that played a big part of moving for us.

Building a house is not for the faint of heart. It's a HUGE undertaking.

Added to the stress is having to decide everything from paint color to door knobs to windows, insulation, HVAC, etc. If you have design skills it's a bear to do. If you don't have design skills, it's even harder. I can tell you I do have design skills and picking everything was probably one of the hardest things I did.

Additionally even with the best contractor, there will still be mistakes. Some he/she catches and others you catch and then decisions on how to alleviate them.

Then there is how it will affect your relationship. If you're not both on the same page, it WILL create conflicts. When we built, we agreed anything having to do with design was my job (Of course I ran everything by DH just to be sure and I allowed him to question any decisions he wasn't sure of) and anything related to money, or systems was his job (and likewise he ran those things by me.) Because we had clear expectations of what we wanted plus knew our strengths, the process worked well for us. Well it did except when trying to deal with a less than forthright and honest GC.

Thanks for the further advice, Mary Jane. Our town has all the basics, GPs, dentists, grocery, etc., and we are within easy distance of everything else we could need. We don't have a detailed post-retirement plan. My parents are also in Michigan, so their needs will be a consideration, if they have the blessing of a long life, and if our son has settled somewhere, that will play a role too.

I think our plan is to proceed with getting this house in as good a shape as possible, keep an eye on the listings, and proceed with the property split- it will take a while to get that done, and if we finish the split and still decide not to build, it will be of more value as a separate lot anyway. We can keep or sell as we wish.

I've seen several posts where the OP asked something along the lines of "what do you wish you had done differently with your build" and more than one individual said something like "started years earlier and not poured money into the previous house we never liked anyway".
We certainly feel that way, but building is such a commitment and takes a lot of different skill sets, even if you have a great GC.

Have you considered buying a smaller house and adding on? That could offer the best of both worlds: smaller scope and the opportunity to get what you want.

I love a project and am very good at making decisions. But it's not for everybody.

You own the land, so that's a plus. Now, can you build on it? Has the land been subdivided? Have you had it engineered? Do you have plans to present? Have you chosen a builder and gotten quotes?

Got to have your ducks in a row before you make such a big decision.

If you truly love your town and houses are scarce it might be worth it. we buiilt to stay on our lot.

First question is, is housing really scarce, or is it just scarce now due to the pandemic? can you wait for the market to normalize? consider talking to some realtors.

second question is, what does it mean that you can afford it? those loan calculators tend to be ridiculous imo. assume the project goes 30% over budget - and get a realistic budget. are you still ok? we built pre covid and well under our financial pain thrreshold. i think that pushing financial boundaries here is unwise due to a very large amount of uncertainty!

if your husband doesnt want to be involved in the detsils, id say, find a friend or hire soneone to help you. sometimes having 2 sets of eyes helps and there are lots of decisions.

Thanks Roccouple,
I agree, the loan calculators are ridiculous! They usually predict about 50% more than we think we can afford- as I said, we are pretty conservative. So, although building would put us at the higher end of what we really like, it's far from the deep end.
As far as inventory, I've kept a close eye on listings since we moved- we knew when we moved in the house wasn't perfect, and we saved and looked and debated "do we make this house what we want or save for a down payment". As the years have passed, it has become clear that we really can't make this house what we want....so it's down to wait and buy or build. In six years, I've seen probably less than 10 homes we would even consider, and all of them seemed to come at a time when we were in a fix-it-up kick. 10 homes in six years seems pretty low to me...we could get lucky, but I just don't want to wait until it's too late to build and wind up just having been miserable for 15 years.