joey_martin

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Posts posted by joey_martin

  1. Or as I said above...select the roof plane and lock the pitch. Then all you have to do is add the additional height you want. For instance 12", you would type +12 in the ridge height box, or baseline height box and move on.

  2. Make sure you have the box checked for a ceiling over that "room". Looks like no ceiling is present, unless you didn't want on, then you need to check the size of the framing members based on the size of the fascia you have spec'ed.

  3. I generally "market" the permitting side of things as a added bonus. Proper design and planning will eliminate most, if not all hold ups at the permit office. I have always sold myself as a designer that will more than pay for myself, if given the opportunity. Many times a client will come in with a sketch from their builder, or a floor plan printed off the internet with some notes they have talked over with their builder.

     

    In the past 20 years, there have been 5 specific occasions where I explained to the client, sometimes with the builder present, why their ideas wouldn't work as they had them sketched. On these occasions, the builder swayed and threw around phrases like "oh, I can overcome that", or "you are trying to scare them into buying plans." These 5 specific occasions, I had to be asked to come in and rescue the project, for the very reasons I pointed out. 

     

    My pitch has been that you can pay me $8K-$10K for proper design and planning, or you can pay $20K in change orders and re-ordering cabinets and doors, and structural headers, that I told you wouldn't work in the first place. The top home builders in my area will send clients my way, and those that I have had to rescue will send them now, but there's a whole directory full of "contractors" that have no use for design and planning, especially if the building department don't require it.

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  4. @DianneDSC you are preaching to the choir. After 20 years, 2 national awards, many great projects in my portfolio, there simply is zero interest or respect for the profession if the people that homeowners turn to don't show respect. Local builders and building officials will not "inconvenience" (their words not mine) prospective clients by needing to spend money for an architect or designer. I have set up booths in spring home and garden shows, been featured in magazines, heck, I even have some of my work used in a college of architecture text book!! All of this interests no one in my area. 

     

    I love teaching and working with kids. I also love(d) traveling for the NAHB and teaching classes for them, but I would much rather have a thriving design office. I simply could not afford to be ignored and still provide for my family. When the new local building official stopped requiring plans and State permits for commercial jobs, I was doomed. We could have moved down to Indianapolis, or up closer to Chicago and I would have had more opportunities, but we simply love the small, close knit community we live in.  

  5. Depends on where you are working in Indiana. I do more work from out of state than I do here to be honest. There are a great many local building department here in the great state of Indiana that do not require home plans in order to pull permits. Heck, my local building department has stopped even requiring commercial projects to get a State Design Release before allowing them to do work. In the past, the local building department required plans for commercial, but now...nope. New pet shop, 2 new pub/eateries, and an updated set of office suites have been completed in the downtown portion of where I live. No drawings, no permits = NO INCOME. 

     

    Residential, and especially remodeling, forget about it. Napkin sketches, or some scribbles on graph paper from a "contractor" and all 7 of the building departments within an hour of me will give you a permit. Indianapolis and Hamilton county are the only jurisdictions that require drawings to get permits.

     

    I now teach full time, but have my office open to do a project now and then when it comes along. I also do some teaching for the NAHB. Do I think you can make $80K? If you are in Marion County, Lake County, or Allen County maybe. Anywhere else, not without some connections from outside the state.

  6. In short, I believe the answer is no. Everything is programmed to the first floor. Chief tends to think in terms of the first floor line being the best place to measure from. While the majority of my builders also think that way, every now and then I get someone that wants the top of the stem wall to be zero, and I am left with doing a lot of math.

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