Working out who is right, for your home and project.
You will already have found the page saying building designers charge 40 to 60 per cent less than architects for comparable work. It was written by a building designer. Most of the pages answering this question were, and each of them concludes in favour of the person who wrote it. This one is written by an architect, so apply the same discount to it.
The one correction worth making to all of it is this. Building designers in Queensland are not unregulated. They hold a QBCC building design licence, issued in classes according to the scale of what they are permitted to design, with the QBCC as their regulator. Architects sit under the Architects Act and the Board of Architects Queensland instead. Those are two different accountability systems rather than a graded one, and neither is a verdict on ability.
So the useful question is not who is better qualified. It is where the risk actually sits in your particular project — and whether the cheaper set of drawings is still cheaper by the time a builder has priced from it.
If your block is plain and your brief is simple, hire a good building designer and keep the difference.
In Queensland 'architect' is a protected title: a five-year degree, logged practical experience, a registration exam, mandatory insurance, continuing education and a complaints process, all overseen by the Board of Architects Queensland. Building designers and draftspeople are not regulated the same way. That is a legal distinction about accountability, not a verdict on ability.
Wanting to be in good hands, and not being sure how to tell. Choosing wrongly here is the fear underneath every other fear in the process — because it is the one decision that determines all the others and the one you're least equipped to make.
Selection happens on price, proximity or whoever answered the phone. Nobody checks a registration number. The distinction between an architect, a building designer and a draftsperson is never explained, so it's read as snobbery rather than as a difference in what happens when something goes wrong.
My registration number is 4758, and you can check it on the Board of Architects Queensland public register in about a minute. Do that with anyone you are considering — ask for the number, and ask what happens if something goes wrong. There are excellent building designers in this city and I have worked alongside several of them. The distinction is about training, insurance and accountability. It is not a verdict on who draws a better plan.
Regulation, mostly. In Queensland only someone registered with the Board of Architects Queensland may use the title architect — five-year degree, logged experience under supervision, a registration exam, compulsory insurance, ongoing education, and a statutory complaints process. A building designer works under a QBCC building design licence, issued in classes according to the scale and height of what they are permitted to design, with the QBCC as regulator. A draftsperson prepares drawings, generally under someone else's licence. It is a difference in training and in where a complaint goes when something is wrong. It is not a ranking of talent, and there are excellent building designers in this city.
Legally, neither. Queensland does not require you to use an architect for a house. What you are required to have is a Building Approval from a certifier, a QBCC-licensed builder for most residential work, and drawings prepared by someone appropriately licensed for the job. So this is a value judgement rather than a compliance question. For a straightforward, code-compliant addition on an unencumbered block, a good building designer or a competent draftsperson working under licence will get you there for less money. That is a real answer rather than a modest one, and I would rather you had it up front.
It depends on where the risk sits. On a pre-1947 house inside a character overlay or a demolition control precinct, most of the difficulty is in the planning read — knowing what council will accept before you draw it, and framing an application that does not attract a request for information or a refusal. On a plain post-war block with a simple rear extension, that risk barely exists. Ask every candidate what they think the planning constraints on your block are, before you engage anyone. The answer sorts the field quickly, whatever the title on the letterhead.
Not on the fee. The fee is higher. Where it can be recovered is at tender. Builders price uncertainty as risk and they build that margin into the number they hand you. A thin drawing set does not remove the uncertainty — it moves it into the contract, where it comes back as provisional sums, prime cost items and variations, settled while the work is already under way and your negotiating position is at its weakest. On a large or unusual job, the gap between two tender prices for the same house is often documentation depth. On a small, simple job there is much less to recover.
Yes, and the published gap of 40 to 60 per cent is roughly the right order for comparable scopes. Two things worth checking before you use that number. First, whether the scopes really are comparable — compare stage by stage rather than total against total, because the cheapest proposal is very often the one that omitted the most. Second, whether involvement during construction is included at all. It is the stage people cut first, and it is the stage that most determines whether the finished house resembles the one you approved.
If you would rather start small, the First Sketch Session is two hours at your place. You keep the sketches, and there is no obligation afterwards.