Some extra info from the architects, concerning private terrasses for the units on ground level:.
A statement from them:
’ Nous pensions ne pas prévoir de terrasses pour les lots OAK (sinon c’est un surcout pour eux), par contre pour les logements Reef au rez, ce serait bien qu’ils puissent avoir une terrasse. ’
First question from my part:
‘si j’ai bien compris ce sera un choix libre par les personnes du Reef qui prend un logement au rez (pas d’obligation par la région/commune)?’
Reaction from them: ’ Il faut prévoir un petit espace extérieur minimum pour les logements Reef. La taille par contre peut être au choix. ’
Second question from my part
je suppose que le coût d’une terrasse au rez aura un autre coût que les prix des terrasses au +1, +2, +3. Est-ce que vous pouvez donner une indication du prix (et indiquer si ça inclut le TVA, 15,1 % de frais (honoraires AR + études techniques)’
Reacton from them: ‘Pour le projet spiegel, on avait compté le même montant qu’aux étages. Même si elle sera moins chère à réaliser. Cela inclus un prix pour le terrain. Ça c’est si la terrasse n’est pas dans un jardin privatif bien entendu. Mais vous pouvez décider d’un autre montant si vous ne souhaitez.’
What is the point of having a ground floor balcony? It just reduces the common garden. It creates barriers where there is no need for any. I understand the logic in a non-cohousing apartment block, but in a cohousing it’s not justifiable.
OK, but here we should look for a workaround IMHO. Otherwise it looks like “we are a cohousing, but we actually do not want to hang out together, so each of us has their own little table with a fence around it, I hang out alone here in front of my unit and you’d better stay over there in front of yours”. It would be visually messy. It would be much nicer if we would have three beautiful sets of garden furniture, and that would be where people mostly hang out. We now even have the sunlit Reef Zone in Idefix, why would people not go hang out in front of that?
I don’t see a problem with ground floor units having a little terrace for themselves, just like the other units on the other floors have terraces that are private. If they want it, it would allow them to use some outside space (eg for putting a laundry rack, growing herbs, installing a telescope) without needing consensus from the group to do this (like the people living on other floors).
Met the architects tonight and some extra info about the options, their reasoning and what they advise:
Reasoning behind the price of 350 euro/m2 for the private gardens => they are rather big surfaces, the total price of the private garden would be too high if you apply the price of land + notary costs
Reasoning behind the ‘obligatory terraces’: they are cheaper to build than the non obligatory terraces, why is the selling price the same => because they are private outdoor spaces. Only in the case of the top unit in Idefix, where the surface is quite big, they would go for a lower price/m2. For this latter: same argument as for the private gardens: the total price of that obligatory terrace would be too high
Recommendations by the architects:
private gardens (behind Idefix): 350 euro/m2
private terrace on ground level (1 bedroom Obelix): obliged, same price as terraces on other levels, minimum size of 6 m2
private cellars: construction cost + VAT + fees
terraces (obligatory and non obligatory) except for the one on top floor idefix: building cost of ‘non-obligatory terrace’+ VAT + fees
parking: 20.000 (In Spiegel, where there were carports, they sold them at 17,000 euro. In Brutopia (underground protected parking) somebody recently sold one at 25,000)
I asked again if we cannot negociate about the obligatory private terrace for the ground level units (without private garden) , there is one unit, the 1 bedroom in obelix on the ground level. They said the commune/region won’t accept it, it’s clearly mentioned in the report of the last meeting with them (see post). They don’t think the argument of cohousin/big common garden will work. The minimal surface should be around 6m2.
Do ground level studios also have to have terraces?
What is the reasoning for pricing these terraces at the same price as those that are hanging from the building? Their building cost is near zero (put some planks on the ground); they have almost no advantage (they do not gain any extra access to inhabitants of those units); and they weigh on the cheaper (hence inclusive) units.
It seems more fair to price them at building cost.
I didn’t yet ask ‘how they look like/what the construction cost is’, but my understanding is the same reason as why they price the obligatory terraces/coursives at the same price as the non-obligatory terraces (where the first ones also have a lower building cost). The architects don’t seem to consider the building cost as a criteria in the price setting, but more the fact that you have a private outdoor space that they consider as valuable as the other two…
(i will ask the question how they see this/how they would look like. I had the impression that they did think of a certain cost, and not just ‘some planks on the ground’)
Here is a Q&A linked to it:
Q: Je suppose que le coût d’une terrasse au rez aura un autre coût que les prix des terrasses au +1, +2, +3. Est-ce que vous pouvez donner une indication du prix (et indiquer si ça inclut le TVA, 15,1 % de frais (honoraires AR + études techniques)
A: Pour le projet spiegel, on avait compté le même montant qu’aux étages. Même si elle sera moins chère à réaliser. Cela inclus un prix pour le terrain. Ça c’est si la terrasse n’est pas dans un jardin privatif bien entendu. Mais vous pouvez décider d’un autre montant si vous ne souhaitez.
Thanks Els. Could you explain this point? Why is this terrace different, and how much do the architects propose to price it?
And another question: in your document, you indicate the building costs for “fixed terraces” to be substantially lower than that of “flexible terraces”. How is that possible? The technology and materials are exactly the same.
And a third one: I don’t understand the concept of “selling price”. As far as I know, all prices are selling prices. And they can be based on one of two criteria: production cost (in our case, building costs) or market (re-sale) price. So I don’t understand the “selling price” table at the end of your document.
Draft of a proposal is available here. I still need the answers to the questions in this post to finish the draft, but it’s mostly done. I asked TeamFin to review it.
I worry that putting this type of proposal on TeamFin requires direct access to the architects. We are doing Chinese Whispers here, with us trying to interpret what the architects mean by expressions like “selling prices”, and having to ask Els, who then asks them… not very efficient. Maybe let’s assess any upcoming decisions, and if we are to do this again let’s establish a direct line to S&F.
Reasoning: the total amount of m2 of this terrace is quite big so the total price of this terrace would be huge/unreasonable according to them and that’s why they propose a lower price/m2 so the total cost of this terrace would be reasonable : it’s 38 m2 so this would make it 79,420 euro terrace (based on 2090 euro/m2). I see in your proposal you go with the building cost (vat/fees included)(based on 1323 euro/m2), not with the architects proposal, so this would come 50.274, which already is a huge difference with the previous amount.
How much they propose: forgot to ask, they said a bit lower
I based myself on the building costs the architects mention in the file with the calculation and they mention a different building cost for those two… All the obligatory terraces (like the one on top of idefix) are partially constructed because of the units below them (its the roof of that apartment below it), so the construction cost is already partially financed by this other unit, so therefore lower in construction cost.
This term refers to the amounts that the architects use in their calculation file (and which eventually leads to a price per m2 ). How they come to the total price of the project and price/m2, is
they first calculate the total costs: buying of the site, notary costs, constructions cost of all items (units, commons, …), vat and fees based on the construction costs. This also includes the options.
than they calculate all the income you get from selling the options (parkings, terraces,…). In the excell they call this ‘ventes options’, i translated it as selling cost.
The selling price table at the end of my document is the figures the architects now use in the FS under the section ‘ventes options’. Meaning as well, adapting these prices to the prices you now put in your proposal will have an impact on the price/m2 and thus also on the price of each unit
than they deduct the selling cost from the total cost and they divide it by the m2 vendable, giving the price/m2.
PS i quickly read your proposal and saw the following sentence ‘All prices must be incremented by VAT 21% + fees’: the prices i mentioned as building cost, are the costs including VAT and fees, so all is included in the prices you mention (1741, 2090,…)
Ok, got it. So that is essentially arbitrary. What you are saying is that, if you decide to sell at a certain price (building cost, sales cost etc.) these amounts will need to enter the budget (once more, we do not need the average price). This makes total sense.
Also let’s note in passing that we are “selling” to ourselves, except for maybe some parking lots. This is the same thing that happens to the units themselves: the group sells to its own members. So I propose we drop this language of selling, and move to a unified vocabulary of pricing, like we did for the units. This way, we can re-use the criteria we already decided on for the units: inclusivity, simplicity, no cross-subsidization from the poorer to the richer units etc.
Noted and changed, with thanks. I was wrongfooted by the use of + in your document.
fyi chronological order of the questions asked/answers given…
‘Nous pensions ne pas prévoir de terrasses pour les lots OAK (sinon c’est un surcout pour eux), par contre pour les logements Reef au rez, ce serait bien qu’ils puissent avoir une terrasse’
Then the following question was asked, with their answer:
Concernant 'Nous pensions ne pas prévoir de terrasses pour les lots OAK (sinon c’est un surcout pour eux), par contre pour les logements Reef au rez, ce serait bien qu’ils puissent avoir une terrasse. * si j’ai bien compris ce sera un choix libre par les personnes du Reef qui prend un logement au rez (pas d’obligation par la région/commune)?
Il faut prévoir un petit espace extérieur minimum pour les logements Reef. La taille par contre peut être au choix.
I still came back to that in a meeting with them where I understood that they will foresee it on the plans as in the meeting with the commune/region they stressed the fact to have a private outdoor space for every unit. What came back in the meeting with the commune at several points is their ‘need to switch to a normal appartment block in case things don’t work out’. This is for the case of Oaktree, say one day, there is no more Oaktree, can they easily be converted into ‘normal’ units. And secondly also ‘what in the case the cohousing doesn’t work out’, than it needs to be possible to switch to a normal appartment block where everyone has his private unite with private terrace nicely isolated from the neighbour. (my interpretation of all of this is that we foresee it on the plans, but maybe we don’t need to actually execute this, no idea if they will check that at any point).
@alberto I see that you are deviating from the architects proposal on this one: you are proposing to adjust the price in function of the weighting, while the architects propose a flat fee. I would like to object to that on the grounds that I would like to keep following the architects advice (and also because I’m starting to stretch my limits).
More in general I would like to add some nuance to the proposal, by adding a definition of option as in “everything that is not in the casco”. This is because in the future there will be more options (example: light tunnel for those living under a roof), and I find it more fair to value these at cost price.
So to sum everything up: I object to weighting the options. The only thing we said we would adjust in solidarity was the price of the square meter casco. This is what the architects also propose (we already gave consensus to not weighting the coursives) and I would like to stick with that.
I am proposing to set the price to a weighted building cost, not a weighted flat fee. The issue of cross-subsidizing from the cheaper units to the more expensive ones is made more severe by the flat fees, because the building cost of a terrace for the ground floor units is a fraction of that of the balconies higher up.
Yes. What I’m saying is, what we are doing here is discussing the proposal before it’s finished and before the plenary where it is supposed to be discussed
