Product Description

Hundreds of thousands of us renovate, convert, extend and improve our homes each year, and one-third of all new detached homes are self-built. If you're looking to build your own property from scratch, or work on your existing home, this is the one and the only book that you really need. "Building Your Own Home" has now been fully updated and expanded by David Snell, acknowledged expert and guru in the field of self-build, and it remains the best book on the subject. Packed with authoritative advice, charts, diagrams and photographs, this fully illustrated bible contains everything you need to know, from finding and buying a plot of land to explaining planning and building regulations, financing the project, buying materials and choosing the design. In addition, it also gives an insight into the costs and problems encountered by recent self-builders in a varied collection of new case histories.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #71285 in Books
• Published on: 2006-03-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 448 pages

Evening Standard
[This] informative book manages to combine masses of information with a light touch...Hugely helpful and intelligent.

Grand Designs Magazine
"Covers every subject a self-builder needs to be aware of...for practical advice I can't recommend this book enough"

Homebuilding and Renovating magazine
"this is a book for the bedside table as well as the building site"

Customer Reviews

The definitive manual for the aspirant self-builder
Certain fields of endeavour seem to have a book that is "the definitive guide." This appears to be the one for self-building in the UK. Now in the sixteenth edition, the book covers everything from finding, evaluating and buying a site through all the aspects of designing a house, dealing with planning and building regulations and managing the project. It is written in a wonderfully clear style and is larded with real case studies illustrated with diagrams and colour photographs. It is also full of useful contacts and references to other sources of information. I would also recommend this book to anyone who is building a large extension.

A must for any first time self builder
Anybody who is contemplating building their own house should read this first, there is a broad overview of the whole process and advise on many difficult decisions, it also answers many of the questions that whose (me) with no knowledge need answered. The book is easy to read and flows well from section to section, an index makes referring back simple, something you will want to do both as you read the book the first time and as reference afterwards. Probably the best book you can buy on the subject

Basic background (non-practical) book on building.
...It gives almost no practical advice on how to build your own home, which is in direct contradiction of the title.

It gives case studies and details of how to organise and manage, but on a very superficial level .... a bit like the Blue Peter approach. i.e. here is one I did earlier .... tempting you with the finished product but giving no real help or ideas in how to achieve it.
On almost every page Murray mentions how much was saved by a particular self build, or cost per sq. ft ...... but if you think this book will help you achieve this you'll be disappointed.
There are some sample plans which give ideas, and sample specifications and costings that helped bring out the details a bit.
Maybe worth considering if you want a background book to see if you want to dip your toe into the self build game.
It is also now out of date with modern energy conscious design requirements.