Picture this. You’ve found the perfect block of land to build your brand-new dream home. It has incredible views, with plenty of natural light and elevation. You’ve already started daydreaming about your ideal home design when suddenly, reality hits: the gradient of this block means it could cost a fortune to excavate. Do you turn down the opportunity to build?
Often, building a home on a sloping block of land can mean compromise. You could end up spending a lot on a retaining wall, or making do with an adaptation of a new home design that doesn’t really meet your requirements.
Fortunately, there is a third solution to the sloping site dilemma. There are now plenty of new home designs that are purpose-built for blocks with varying levels of elevation, even those with a rise or fall greater than 3 metres. These designs are also great for those with unusually-shaped pockets of land.
The benefits of split-level home designs
The one key advantage that exploring split-level home designs will give you is more choice.
A split-level home allows you to consider blocks beyond flat, rectangular parcels of land. With split-level, you’ll be able to highlight beautiful views or take advantage of interesting blocks.
By spending less time and money excavating your block, your resources could be repurposed to spend on the features or floorplan of your new home. And as far as your features and floorplan go, a split-level homes doesn’t mean compromising on design. Adding layers to your floorplan can give it greater dimension and increased functionality, particularly for those looking at flexible living arrangements.
As Metricon’s Design Manager, Ricky D’Alesio, puts it, “Once you start introducing changes of levels, it feels completely different and adds a layer of interest and detail that you don’t often get with standard single-storey homes.”
To do it well, Ricky says the shifts need to be subtle.
“A lot of homes you walk in and go straight down,” he says. “But what we’ve done is gradually stepped the home down to suit the fall of the land. This means staging the pouring of concrete to create splits at different levels.”
Though this building process can mean additional costs, the final result is worth it for the added interest and impact it delivers to the overall aesthetic of your new home. “Once you’re in the home – it’s incredible,” Ricky says.
Adelaide case study: split level home designs
One of the reasons Metricon has expanded its split-level offering was in response to growing demand from South Australian home-buyers.
Where other states may have required more subtle 1-1.5m falls across sites, SA’s undulating topography meant that an increasing number of people were looking for home designs that would work on sloping blocks.
So, we set our designers the challenge of building a display home on a block of land with a 6-metre decline. The team thought carefully about how to take an existing design, the Botanica 36, and adapt it in a way that would still create plenty of wow-factor.
“We had to redesign the home to accommodate the split levels,” Ricky explains. “Instead of stepping into the home and having a series of steps down right after the entry – as is the case in many sloping block designs – the aim with the Botanica was to bring it down in levels across the living areas gently.”
Ricky says it was also crucial to create a home that would be adaptable to various blocks of land, providing a more customisable design rather than a cookie-cutter solution. As a result, you can alter the home design to vary the floorplan and accommodate different levels of elevation.
Building on a sloping block
There are now several homes in Metricon’s range that suit sloping blocks. Other homes include the Metro, Vantage and the stately Whiteley. These innovative home designs are a testament to the fact that you needn’t compromise on style or functionality when building your brand-new home, just because you have a block of land that isn’t flat.
So, when considering your next build, don’t rule out land with a gradient or unusual shape. Split-level home designs empower you to make the best use of the available space and build a beautiful and striking home that’s right for your location and your family.
To find out more about building new homes on sloping blocks of land, book a consultation with one of our experts here.
