Building Our First Dream House Part 1: The Planning Phase

Living without many resources or much support can be challenging, but I have always believed in making no excuses and focusing on execution.

As a software engineer who enjoys project management, I decided to build something that would become a life asset for my family—our first dream house. During my time at Capgemini, I learned valuable lessons about planning, execution, and management. Those experiences inspired me to document this entire journey—from planning and budgeting to the successes, failures, and lessons learned—through this blog.

I started planning my first house when I was 24 (Oct 2021) with my friend Simranjeet Singh, but the actual execution, especially the financial planning, began when I turned 25 (Nov 2022). I approached it like a real project, dividing it into phases. The first step was estimating the finances, materials, and overall costs before starting any work.

A significant part of my planning approach came from working on the N2K project at Capgemini and learning from my senior manager, Anand UV. He always supported and guided me without making me feel like just another junior team member. Beyond work, he taught me valuable lessons about financial planning, project execution, and thinking long term.

Once the financial planning was complete, I documented everything in an Excel sheet to track expenses, estimates, and progress. The first phase focused on building the foundation (Neev) of the house. Although I exceeded my planned budget by ₹35,550, it became one of the biggest learning experiences of the entire project.

The costs shown here reflect the prices at that time and may vary in the future due to inflation. My goal is simply to share my planning process and real-world experience in the hope that it helps or inspires someone else planning a similar journey.

Below is the high-level budget, forecast, and the final outcome after completing the first phase of the project.

Below is the detailed payment plan for the foundation, including dates, amounts, and notes.

I’ve broken down the payments into materials and labor. The section below provides a detailed plan, separating the material costs from the labor charges.

After planning the finances at a high level, I used Excel sheets to track the actual costs, as they often differed from the estimated budget for both materials and labor.

That covers the financial planning. Now, let's move on to the exciting part—building the foundation. In this section, I'll share how the foundation was constructed on a 150 Gaj plot, where my dream house will stand, along with the progress and pictures from the journey.

The first and most important step was to thank the supreme powers for their help and ask for continued support in building the foundation of the house. We performed a worship (Pooja) for this purpose.

After the Pooja, Day 1 was focused on digging and marking the areas where cleaning would begin.

After marking the areas, we cleaned and dug out the foundation spots to prepare for the work.

The next step involved setting up the bricks for the foundation and all the work done by the engineers. I’m not skilled in that area, but they did a great job.

During this time, nature helped us with rain, which made the foundation stronger. Thanks to the supreme powers for their continued support. Once the concrete structure was complete, it looked like this.

The final step is shown below. This image shows the completed foundation.

I learned a lot about managing finances and working with a civil engineering team to complete the project. Once the first phase was done, I felt very happy and satisfied. It took about 30 to 50 days, which were quite hectic and stressful.

The next phase involves filling the foundation with sand and other materials. I’ll share the details of the finances, management, and planning for that in the next blog. If you found this blog inspirational, please share your house plans and progress with us at info@wakeupcoders.com.

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