Are you about to embark upon the task of build a home? Building your dream home is an exciting time. It can also be a time of frustration, anxiety and many challenges. However, like anything else in life, if you do your homework and educate yourself on the topic, you’ll find that that you can avoid most of the problems and pitfalls of the process.
When considering the building of a home, there are three primary approaches to consider. There are:
1. Buy a home from a tract or production builder. These builders are the ones that feature a model home or homes as a way of showing you what the finished product will look like. Such homes allow for a lmited amount of customization.
2. The second possibility is to have a home built by a custom builders. Custom builders will build any home for you – therefore you can fully customize a home to your needs and liking. In adition, as businesses, custom builders are much smaller than the big house bulders referneced in #1 above – and are more flexible with regard to schedules, contracts and other issues.
3. The third approach is really a modification of number 2, the building of a custom home – with one very large difference – you don’t hire a bulder – you are the builder. Owner buider projects as they are called, do not reqiure you to do any building – unless you want to, what they do require is that you manage the process of building, just as a builder does. This means that you will need to find and hire all of the trades, the subcontractors, who will be responsible for building your home.
After you have decided which of these three approaches to building is the best one for you, then you can proceed to the next step. Quite often this next step is buying land or a lot. If you are buying a home from a big builder it is quite likely that you will be choosing from a group of lots in a development, so your work to locate and qualify a lot is largely curtailed.
If, on the other hand, you are building a custom house then you will have to locate your own land or lot. When buying land there is quite a lengthy list of factors that should be considered. Thre is an excellent lot/land checklist that can be purchased on this site, that will ensure that you don’t overlook these many important items. Don’t forget, the cardinal rule of real estate: Location, location location.
Aother very important factor is house design. This topic is beyond the scope of this brief introduction into house building, but it obviously is of utmost importance. Here again you have many options from designing a house yourself to buying stock house plans, to working with an architect.
Perhaps the single most important point to convey to you is the need to educate yourself. There are many people involved along the way but no one will look out for you, like you will. You don’t need to have the expertise of a builder to see that the job get’s done correctly, but you do need to be familiar with the process and the pitfalls.
Good Luck.