36. Building for your budget with self-builder Jenny Balfe

In this episode of The Interiors Podcast, host and interior designer Tanya Neufeld Flanagan interviews Jenny Balfe, social worker, mother of three and self-builder behind the @building_willow_cottage Instagram account.

Jenny and her husband have successfully self-built their dream family home in Wexford, 3km from Rosslare aided by their contractors, Next Level Construction.

In this episode, Jenny dives into how and why they opted to build and their journey to finding their site, including working with local planning authorities, evaluating county development plans and testing a site's drainage quality.

She worked closely with an architect technician to help identify the kind of home they could afford, and walks us through the revisions to the plans and sacrifices made along the way.

One of the key takeaways in the conversation centres on how the reduction in their bungalow's footprint allowed for the house to meet their brief while still ensuring they could have the finishes they wanted - a mistake many make when stretching themselves perhaps to have a larger house for the sake of it.

Jenny and her husband were able to design a home that suited their family's needs after renting for a long time and ideating on what their ideal home would look like, especially as their children ranged from 5 to 13 years old while they lived on-site in a mobile while building.

In the redesign process, Jenny talks about reducing bedroom size and number of bathrooms they actually needed, and how to ensure you have separate spaces for your family, plus some of the downfalls of open plan living.

We walk through some of the grants and the build process itself, why Jenny opted for a contractor versus the direct labour route which can offer savings but requires a lot more hands-on work and knowledge, as well as limited access to trades during times in which labour can be hard to find.

All this journey is amidst the backdrop of Ireland's housing crisis, and Jenny's self-build experience shows how buying a site and building a house from scratch can be done really effectively, achieving great value, and a home that fits your needs perfectly. It requires a lot of research and in-depth work on floorplans, and a lot of gumption.

Follow Jenny @building_willow_cottage to learn more about all her self-build and get helpful tips on everything from self-build mortgages to help with refining layouts.

Follow interior designer and host Tanya @tanyaneufeldflanagan and at the podcast's Instagram @theinteriorspodcast.