You’ve been dreaming of your perfect living space for years…and now the time has finally come for you to explore the process of building your custom home! While there is no one way to go about the process, there are some items that everyone will need to consider and steps that need to be taken to effectively plan your custom-built home.
1. Create your budget
Because the price of building a custom home can vary widely, it is important to know what kind of budget you’re working with. Your budget will affect everything from the size of the home you can build to the location and all the custom design features you would like to include.
2. Create a general timeline
While we would all like a new home as soon as possible, it’s good to come up with a general idea or date you want to make everything a reality. There are many things to consider that may be out of your hands including material shortages or unexpected weather conditions that can cause delays, but there are other things that you may want to ask yourself when coming up with a time frame such as:
- When do you plan to move out of your current situation or end a lease?
- Are there kids in the picture getting ready to go back to school and what is that start date?
- Is there a new baby on the way that you’re trying to plan around?
3. Get your expert team assembled
Now that you’ve set some type of budget and have a general idea of when you want to bring it all to life, it’s time to find your team. At this point, you have some great ideas and big plans for what you want in your home. Now you need someone to bring them to life!
A great place to start is by finding a good architect to work with that has similar experience designing homes like yours. It’s important to shop around a bit. Ask anyone and everyone you know for referrals. A good architect will not only help bring your design into reality but offer other helpful information such as helping you decide on what works with the land you have, and even refer you to some general contractors that they’ve worked with in the past.
Your other important team member, of course, will be your builder! They are the ones that will get the project off the ground once all the planning, paperwork, and permits are in place. They’ll be working with you every step of the way from the time the foundation is set, to the time you’re ready to move in. Some builders will even assist with the design process and provide architect services
When choosing a builder and general contractor, you want to gather references from past jobs, photos when available, and even ask them who will be working on your home and how they go about getting those workers.
You’ll be putting an enormous amount of time and effort into planning, and so you want to make sure the person heading the project has a great team of their own, good suppliers, and can handle any unexpected items that come up such as delays with permits. A good builder and general contractor will know all the ins and outs and have plenty of experience building homes like yours.
4. Time to clean up and wrap it up
The last piece to worry about will be who is responsible for cleaning everything up during and after the build. In most cases, the contractor is on top of this.
You may also want to consider a landscaper or interior designer as part of the process before moving in and wrapping things up. It can be helpful to get some professional opinions and advice before hiring a crew or doing this part yourself.
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Note that all the things mentioned above are necessary and important, but only give an overview of the many details required in the custom home building process.
The best thing you can do is contact a professional like Whicker Construction to start building your dream home. They not only care about the quality of your home, but the quality of the service you get from start to finish.
If you have any questions or are ready to start building your custom home, contact Whicker Construction today at 317.839.8353.