Building a House Interview.......

[substanger]

Hey all!! I know there is ALOT of "LIFE" experience on this website just due to the number of members and people who frequent this website.

My wife and I are meeting with a home builder this afternoon to talk with him about building a house using one of his floorplans. We saw one of his houses and met with him briefly that day, and liked what we saw.

Anyway, just wondering what are some good things to ask him during the next few weeks before he actually begins construction. We're not planning on signing anything today, just meeting with him to narrow down cost and how close he can get to our max price on the house we like. I've searched the net a little on what to ask a builder and have come up with some pretty good basic questions like:

1. Interest rate increase during build/contract and earnest fees.
2. Where and when we choose cabinets/tiles/fixtures/carpets/ and how we establish how much we can spend according to the price of the home.
3. Warranty
4. Termite treatment (we're getting a VA loan)
5. Appliances
6. Heating and cooling systems efficiency/heat pump.
7. What landscaping is including.
8. References in the neighborhood we're building in and can we speak/see their homes as well?
9. Service after construction. (What if settlement cracks develope on drywall after construction, how fast will you come out to repair??

Did I miss anything? My wife and I built before, but the first time, we REALLY didn't know what to ask and didn't really do our homework, so the experience was rather bad, to the point where we're really leery about building again, but here we are 10 years later, considering building again, except this time, it's for real. The other house we built was only an $80,000 house. This house is over $200,000, so you can imagine our uneasyness.

I APPRECIATE ANY AND ALL COMMENTS OR SUGGESTIONS!!
Craig

[C-dub]

1st is he a custom builder or a cookie cutter? find out what is included in the contract assume nothing get it all in writting (for you and your builders sake) plan every thing well in advance, making changes during the build is going to cost more in time and money. look at his past projects, you could talk to people, just keep in mind there are always issues that come up and some people get upset about it. ask how he would handle those issues. check on the crews doing the work. framers, plumbers, roofers, electricians, the trim guys, painters, hvac crews... the list is long, but they should all hold there owne insurance unless the work for the builder (not as subs) and they should all be "legal". find out how his jobs are run, are they clean and safe? do things walk away from time to time? do his projects sit for any long length of time without progress? how long is the avrage build... take this last one with a grain of salt, projects always run over. find out what insurances you need to have on the home while its being built. theres alot to think about and alot that can go wrong. just throwing some things out there for you

c-dub

[C-dub]

find out what type of payment schedule there is. how much to begin and than at what interval the next payment would be required. usually this revolves around the work so much for when it passes the framing inspection, again for when the dry wall goes up and again at closing.

[devous1]

We just built about 4 yrs ago. We looked for several months for a lot and found a 2 acre lot in a small development in the middle of nowhere. Approximately a year later we decided to build. I bought plans for a 4200ft house then I was layed off so we downsized to about 3200.

The financing we used was through our local bank, they give you a construction loan for the lot and then grant draws on the construction. At the end of construction the loan is converted to a mortgage. There are quite a few fees involved.

I acted as my own general contractor, the hardest part was to find a builder that would construct the shell of the house. Which is also where we had all of our problems. We chose a large local builder which represented themselves well. However after the paper work was signed the nightmares began. I would also find other build sites, don't ask but secretly find the owners and talk to them. Also do some work and talk to thier current and past contractors. Our builder only sent us to people that he was on good terms with. Once we were in the neighborhood other home owners told us of thier nightmares with the same builder.

Acting as my own general contractor was more work but affored us alot more home with some very expensive extras. We also purchased alot of items for our home off ebay. Things like ceiling fans, Baldwin door handles, faucets, etc. Just as two examples we purchased one gold plated Kohler faucet list $900 for around $200, I also snagged a $1200 Casablanca ceiling fan for about the same.

Good luck, and don't get too stressed.

[Hammer]

I'm in the HVAC biz and we don't do any new home construction beyond occasional room additions and other types of remodeling with custon builders. But we do a lot of service work on newer homes and find too often that the HVAC systems are always the area that is used to cut corners to allow for other upgraded cosmetics to keep overall cost down.
The problems we see are in 2 story housing is that the second floor areas are not adequatly (sp) feed with air flow, and therefore, they are sometimes 8 to 10 degrees warmer in the summer than the first floor. That is something I could'nt stand at night.
Don't let them skimp on the system and it's design. Zoning the first and second floor is an option with seperate temp control.
Bryant/Carrier have a very nice zoning setup with the Evolution control, but this is usually the higher end system and would need seperate duct systems for the 2 seperate zones.

Good luck

[substanger]

Originally Posted by Hammer

Don't let them skimp on the system and it's design. Zoning the first and second floor is an option with seperate temp control.
Bryant/Carrier have a very nice zoning setup with the Evolution control, but this is usually the higher end system and would need seperate duct systems for the 2 seperate zones.

Good luck

Yeah, this was an important question for me, and the builder said the system we're getting is a 95% efficiency system. We talked to one of his customers tonight and their highest electric bill has been $95. Not bad. They haven't even had to turn the heat on yet, been running on the heat pump only, and it's been cold here (down to 10 degrees).

[Sledgehammer]

Originally Posted by Hammer

I'm in the HVAC biz and we don't do any new home construction beyond occasional room additions and other types of remodeling with custon builders. But we do a lot of service work on newer homes and find too often that the HVAC systems are always the area that is used to cut corners to allow for other upgraded cosmetics to keep overall cost down.
The problems we see are in 2 story housing is that the second floor areas are not adequatly (sp) feed with air flow, and therefore, they are sometimes 8 to 10 degrees warmer in the summer than the first floor. That is something I could'nt stand at night.
Don't let them skimp on the system and it's design. Zoning the first and second floor is an option with seperate temp control.
Bryant/Carrier have a very nice zoning setup with the Evolution control, but this is usually the higher end system and would need seperate duct systems for the 2 seperate zones.

Good luck

I agree, my wife and I had our house built spring of 2004 and it's a two story and we had the problem of trying to keep the upstairs and downstairs the same temperature.

When we built our house we paid for a lock and key job. My parents built a 3500 sqft. home in 1998 and subcontracted it out. The built it for less money and is better quality. They found a floor plan they liked, took it to an architect and had the changes made they wanted and bought some land to build on. By sub-contracting their house out it appraised for $75K more than it cost to build it the day after it was completed. 8 years later if they were to sell it today they would profit $200K from it. My wife and I sold our house last month and made $11K on it in 2 1/2 years. Just something to consider, hope you get the home you want.

One question about the VA loan, do you have to pay PMI on a VA loan if you don't have 20% to put down?

[C-dub]

Originally Posted by devous1

We also purchased alot of items for our home off ebay. Things like ceiling fans, Baldwin door handles, faucets, etc. Just as two examples we purchased one gold plated Kohler faucet list $900 for around $200, I also snagged a $1200 Casablanca ceiling fan for about the same.

Good luck, and don't get too stressed.

fyi, if you do supply your owne light fixtures make sure they have the UL stickers on them. nothing worse than a home owner showing up with antique lights at the end of a project, just to tell them they need to have them re-wired.

[devous1]

If referring to the ceiling fan Casablanca is a brand. Ours is hard wired but the controls are wireless. It has all different programs you can run in the summer for and automatically speeds up with the heat. It also has a winter setting to reverse the direction and send heat back down. I put fans in just about all my rooms. For some reason I like a little air movement all the time.

[Fastbandit99]

Congrats...I would ask for a reasonable construction time guarantee. Good thing 200k will build you a nice house there. It sure won't where I live..