What does a custom home
really cost in Melbourne?
Builders are vague about this for a reason: the honest answer has variables in it. Here is the starting point, the six things that move it, and the costs most quotes leave out.
A custom home in Melbourne starts from about $500,000 for the build itself. The final figure depends on size, site conditions, specification level and council requirements, and most blocks add site costs before the first brick.
The short answer
From $500,000, and it climbs from there.
Custom home builds with Humble Abode start from $500,000. That is the build, not the land, and it is a genuine floor rather than a teaser. Below it you are not commissioning a custom home. You are buying a volume builder's floorplan with a changed facade, which is a reasonable thing to do, but it is a different product.
Where a project lands above that floor comes down to six things: size, site, structure, specification, services and approvals. None of them is a mystery. All can be estimated before you spend money on design, which is the reason we do it in that order.
A brochure price is set against a flat, regular block and a standard specification. Your block is not standard, and your specification is the one you want rather than the base list. That gap is where most Melbourne budgets come unstuck.
You will also see cost per square metre quoted everywhere. It is a useful sanity check and a terrible quoting tool. Two homes of the same floor area can differ by hundreds of thousands, depending on how many corners the roofline has and whether the slab sits on rock or reactive clay.
What the number is made of
Six variables that move your price.
Size and shape
Floor area sets the base, but the perimeter sets the cost. A long or articulated plan carries more external wall, roof junctions and flashing than a simple rectangle of the same area.
The block itself
Slope, access, soil classification, rock, trees and easements all change what footings and site works cost. A reactive soil class or a steep fall can move site works by tens of thousands.
Structure and span
Open-plan living with few internal walls needs steel, and double storey needs more. Long spans, cantilevers and big stacking doors are worth having, and all carry an engineering cost a brochure never shows.
Specification
The widest variable of the six. Tapware, stone, joinery, tiles, glazing and appliances can differ by a factor of three between identical plans. Specification is where a budget is held or quietly lost.
Services and connections
Power, water, sewer, stormwater and communications connections cost what the authorities charge. On an established block, the existing connections are rarely where the new home wants them.
Approvals
A building permit alone is one cost. A planning permit, an overlay, a bushfire rating or an estate design approval each add fees and, more expensively, time.
Beyond the build contract
The costs that sit outside the build.
A build contract covers the build. Several real costs sit outside it, and they land at the worst possible moment, after the deposit has gone. Budget for the whole project, not the contract sum.
- ✓Design, working drawings, engineering, soil report and energy rating
- ✓Planning permit, typically $200 to $1,500, and a building permit, typically $1,000 to $5,000
- ✓Demolition if you are rebuilding, typically $20,000 to $40,000 for an average Melbourne home
- ✓Service connections and authority charges
- ✓Landscaping, driveway, fencing and letterbox, unless the contract explicitly says otherwise
- ✓Somewhere to live if you are rebuilding on the block you currently occupy
- ✓Finance costs through the whole 9 to 12 months of a typical build
Ask every builder for that list in writing before you compare quotes. Two numbers that look tens of thousands apart are often the same project once you work out which one included the driveway.
How to read a quote
Brochure price or priced specification?
There are two ways to be handed a number. Only one still holds at handover.
A brochure price
- ✗A headline figure set against a standard block and a standard specification
- ✗Site costs added later, once the soil report comes back
- ✗Provisional sums and prime cost allowances you discover during selections
- ✗Upgrades priced against a list you only see after you sign
A priced specification
- ✓Site conditions assessed and costed before contract, not after slab
- ✓Every selection named in the contract documents, down to the tapware
- ✓Provisional sums kept to what genuinely cannot be known yet
- ✓A contract sum you can take to a lender and plan around
- ✓10-year structural guarantee, in writing
The unpopular part
When the honest answer is do not build yet.
Sometimes the right advice is to wait, and a builder who never says so is selling rather than advising. If your total funds, including contingency, only just reach the estimate, you are not ready. Builds uncover things, and a budget with no room turns every decision into an argument.
The same applies when the brief and the budget sit a long way apart. A very large home on a modest budget is an arithmetic problem, not a design problem, and clever planning does not fix it. Reduce the footprint, stage the project, or wait a year. All three beat starting and stopping.
And if the block is genuinely wrong for what you want, no budget rescues it. We would rather say so at the free site visit than three months into a design you have already paid for.
Where you build changes the number. Estates and established streets carry different site costs and approval paths, which is why our custom home builder Pakenham page treats the two halves of that suburb separately. The custom home builds page sets out what comes as standard, and renovate or rebuild covers the other decision.
Straight answers
Custom home cost questions.
What is the minimum budget for a custom home in Melbourne? +
Custom home builds with Humble Abode start from $500,000 for the build. Land, demolition, permits and design sit outside that figure. Below it, you are generally looking at a volume builder's floorplan rather than a custom design.
Does the starting figure include the land? +
No. It is the build only. Land, stamp duty on land, demolition if you are rebuilding, design fees and finance costs are all separate. We set out the full project picture at the site visit.
How much do permits cost? +
As a guide, a planning permit runs $200 to $1,500 and a building permit $1,000 to $5,000, with a demolition permit $100 to $500 where one is needed. Fees vary by council, and we confirm for your address.
How long does a custom home take to build? +
A typical custom build runs 9 to 12 months on site, with permits usually taking 6 to 12 weeks before that. A knockdown rebuild program from demolition to handover typically runs 12 to 16 months.
Why do two builders quote such different numbers? +
Usually because they are pricing different things. One includes site costs, driveway and landscaping; the other carries them as allowances or leaves them out. Compare the inclusions line by line before you compare totals.
What contingency should I hold? +
Hold funds beyond the contract sum for variations you choose, authority charges and the finishing items outside the contract. If your budget only just reaches the estimate, you do not have enough room to build comfortably yet.
Can you give me a price before I have plans? +
Yes. That is what the free site visit is for. You get a realistic estimate against your brief and your actual block before design money is spent, rather than after the drawings are paid for.
Want the number for your block?
An hour on site with Jarrod, covering orientation, slope, services and what your budget realistically buys.