Anyone purchase a Smiling Woods Yurt?

[Barb]

If anyone in this forum has purchased a Smiling Woods Yurt, will you please share your experience with this company? How much support did you get with this company? Any issues? Thank you!

[HawaiiYurts]

We had clients that started to work with them. I found that Smiling Woods was easy enough to work with ourselves, as we were working with them for the client. However, after clients had invested over 5k in drafting and fees, they were hit with the realization that $60,000 for the kit didn't include a lot of mandatory components - ceiling for instance (their kit only came with the roofing and beams, nothing to dampen sound from rain or insulate from heat or cold), or gutters (there were no options they offered for that a year ago), or foundations/flooring (it is typical for most kit homes not to include foundations and floors), interior walls even if they were in the drafted kit, porch components that were drafted in, etc. By the time we got done really dissecting it, there were $60,000 more in materials that would be needed and easily $200k in labor.

It isn't what I'd call an affordable housing alternative. But they are well done and beautiful. Just be very aware of costs going in. Preferably before you pay $5k in drafting/engineering.

[Barb]

THANK YOU Hawaii Yurts!! This was extremely helpful! I suspected the prices I was seeing were more reflective of a 'shell'. The labor cost, though, was a shock. Defintely has given us reason to look at all building options for our new home.

[HawaiiYurts]

No problem, check out the Yurt Foundation in your search! That's Bill Coperthwaite's amazing legacy and I do believe they turn out a bit more affordably.

[Paul_Liebeck]

My wife and I are putting the roof on a Ponderosa 35 this weekend. Very well put together kit, quality lumber.

[Indra100]

I am looking into a 30' cedar. How has your experience of Smiling Wood Yurts progressed?

[Paul_Liebeck]

Originally Posted by Indra100

I am looking into a 30' cedar. How has your experience of Smiling Wood Yurts progressed?

No complaints. Between the selection of quality lumber, milling for all the angles and layout so the parts go together right, SWY has a lot invested in their kits. Our 35' went up and weather tight in 7 days with two people. I still need to do the trim work and put in the French door.


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[Dharmajan]

In reading the price that the Hawaii folks quoted for a yurt package and looking at the Smiling Woods website there is nothing there that compares to a $60,000 price tag. I believe that at the time of this post the most expensive package they sold was around between $40- $45,000. I suspect there were significant changes to the package and shipping was included in that price which to Hawaii would be quite a bit.

Giving the $200,000 labor price tag I hope that the design of their yurt was a lot more than just a simple yurt - including room additions, loft, possibly a basement and porches. If that is true $300,000 for a custom home is not that much. If not can the people ever putting it together for them or charging a whole lot of money!

[HawaiiYurts]

We did the legwork to calculate the true costs for a potential client. There were added costs for shipping, but that cost wasn't included in the base cost of construction. Hawaii construction labor costs may be more than some areas of mainland, but on Big Island they are pretty comparable to most mainland areas.

My comment is a caution to others to do the calculation work ahead of time so you don't find out thousands of dollars in that your 80k budget won't even pay for half. I think Smiling Woods is a good product and a good value, but I think it's a bit misleading (like many other package home companies) when it comes to True Cost to the client after the package is in their hands.

Over and out! I've got yurts to build!

Melissa

[amaralice]

Originally Posted by HawaiiYurts

We did the legwork to calculate the true costs for a potential client. There were added costs for shipping, but that cost wasn't included in the base cost of construction. Hawaii construction labor costs may be more than some areas of mainland, but on Big Island they are pretty comparable to most mainland areas.

My comment is a caution to others to do the calculation work ahead of time so you don't find out thousands of dollars in that your 80k budget won't even pay for half. I think Smiling Woods is a good product and a good value, but I think it's a bit misleading (like many other package home companies) when it comes to True Cost to the client after the package is in their hands.

Over and out! I've got yurts to build!

Melissa

I signed an agreement with them this month and the cost of the shell including NY Sales Tax ($5K) and Shipping ($8K) was roughly a total of $64K. This includes 2 upgrades - taller walls and panel ceilings (a total of $10K).

Now the costs of interior framing (incl. a robust loft level), foundation work, plumbing, electrical, bathroom and kitchen components (excl. appliances),

insulation

, utility connections etc - that's another estimated $70K.