2.7m or 3m high ceilings??

I'm with Scott and Brian.

Standard doors are fine, I'm I'm a unit with 3m ceilings in living areas 2.7 bedrooms. happy medium to keep costs under control, 2.7 upstairs, 3m down stairs.
Also check the figures because 3m vs 2.4m is a25% increase but isn't quite as proportional as that.

Also go raked if the design allows, but also look into cornice and bulk heads. Find a good plasterer and get some options! Cornice is a great way to add wow! I often shed a tear for old mate cornice, it's always the standard stuff, there's so many options out there. I put the 4 step in our IP, most will say looking at $$ that's crazy but it lifts the place and everyone comments on it. In our extension i used a new one called linear, from memory, it's a90 degree cornice but adds nice shadows slightly different to square set. Bulk heads to separate open plan areas looks great to.
 
To give you a bit of an idea, that first pic if of my upstairs entrance room, it's actually 2.7m going up to 3.1m

Downstairs is 3 m. The rest of upstairs is also 3m.

Extra cost over 2.7m? Minimal as I did it myself. But don't know what others would charge.
 

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good for hot climates but heating this will be difficult. heating a raked ceiling... you won't be able to rely on the air being heated, will need a radiating heat source
 
It's about somewhere half way between 10-40k.

Carpenters will charge you a bit more for knocking together, it will cost about 15% more in material as they are cutting 3m/6m studs, main cost is probably plastering, it's an extra ripped sheet and an extra sheet join to stop up., so you are doubling up their wall joins.

Extra paint etc, extra labour for painters etc.

It all add's up, I'd say on a standard house it would amount to about 15-20k.
 
We have just taken over our house from the builder - 3m ceiling with standard doors (I didn't upgrade to taller doors). Went 3m ceiling due to council requirements.

Cost extra $8k from 2.7m to 3.0m ceiling (timber). Another builder (steel frame) wanted 18k from 2.7m to 3.0m ceiling and when I queried, they stated OHS W requirements.
 
... if I rake the ceilings in the bedrooms on the FF, that'll save me some costs by not building a ceiling.

Any opinions?

Andini, how do you propose to frame the roof? A trussed roof uses smaller timbers than a flat roof as the truss provides a different distribution of the roof load. Timber size will increase and not necessarily save $. You may also need to provide greater thermal resistance/bulk as there is no ceiling space to reduce the transfer of heat/cold.
 
Scott, I ended up sticking with 2.7 on both floors.
The roof is a flat roof, so if I used rafters that could span across bedrooms and take the weight of the gyprock, then it'd be easy to do a raked ceiling. I would need larger rafters for a raked ceiling in comparison to just a flat ceiling.
After thinking about heating/cooling larger spaces and the simplicity of building the flat roof and flat ceilings, I went with 2.7 ceilings on both floors.
 
Scott, I ended up sticking with 2.7 on both floors.
The roof is a flat roof, so if I used rafters that could span across bedrooms and take the weight of the gyprock, then it'd be easy to do a raked ceiling. I would need larger rafters for a raked ceiling in comparison to just a flat ceiling.

As well as the live load required for walking/working on the roof. Are you going to have a raked ceiling or are they building structure below the roof to keep the ceiling flat? (remember that the roof needs a 3-5 degree pitch to stop water).


After thinking about heating/cooling larger spaces and the simplicity of building the flat roof and flat ceilings, I went with 2.7 ceilings on both floors.

Don't forget the importance of sarking and insulation between the roof sheeting & the ceiling.
 
1 lot will have a 5 deg pitch and the other a 7 deg pitch, with Anticon below the roof sheets and probably insulation between ceiling joists too.
I've scrapped the raked ceiling idea, it'd only add more costs and complexity when it comes to building, not to mention difficulty in installing and maintaining services.
Scott, you seem well informed. What's your perspective on Colourbond, custom orb or kliplok?

Sorry if I'm hijacking the thread!
 
OP we built our house with 2.7m ceilings throughout with a 170mm step down into an open plan living and kitchen area to make that space 2.87m (although the kitchen has a bulkhead to give it some definition from the rest of the living), and we love how it turned out.

Went with square set cornices in the main hallway and living which kind of gives the illusion of more height as well as a more modern clean look, and also went with the taller doors both internal and external which to us felt "right" compared with shorter doors.

Would definitely recommend 3m in the living areas but also highly rate the raked ceiling look mentioned earlier if funds allow.

I think for us the raised ceilings came to about $9k (3 years ago), and the square set cornices and raised doors maybe another couple of grand all up.
 
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