When you decide to custom-build a home, as opposed to buying a pre-existing property, it’s a big undertaking. Choosing a high-quality, experienced custom home builder is critical.
With that in mind, the following is a guide to what you should consider and remember as you’re choosing someone to work with and ultimately build the home you’re dreaming of.
Ask Around
One of the first things to do as you begin your search for a home builder is to ask people you know and potentially trust if they know anyone. You can ask family, friends, or coworkers who might have worked with a local builder at some point, and you can learn more about not only who they recommend but who they might warn you against as well.
If you’re talking to people you know, and they have recommendations, questions to ask them include whether their builder helped them stay on budget, what the level of communication was like, and how the builder dealt with issues that came up during the project.
If you don’t have anyone who can give you recommendations, you can start by simply doing an online search of builders in your area. You can contact local homebuilders’ associations as well.
Real estate agents who work locally can help too.
Know What You Want
While you can create a shortlist of possible builders beforehand, you want to make sure that before you actually start reaching out to them and interviewing them that you have a pretty good idea of what you want and need. This is important because not every builder is going to offer what you’re looking for.
Some builders specialize in very particular things, so you don’t want to waste their time or yours by not understanding what you’re looking for in your project.
Set some goals for your project overall, such as your general budget and timeline. You might have a location or school district you’re interested in, and you could, at least in a very general sense, know how big you want the house to be and the style you like.
Interview Candidates
By this time, you should have a list of possible builders that you could work with, in which case it’s time to start interviewing.
You should have a list of questions prepared that you ask all of the candidates. You want the same questions so that you get a true comparison based on their answers.
Once you’ve started the interview process, ask for a list of completed, recently built homes so that you can drive by them. You should also ask for a list of client references that you can actually contact. You want to get an impression not only of the quality of work but what it’s like to work with the builder and what their personality is like.
When you talk to clients, ask them about how committed the contractor was to a quality finished product and whether there were delays. If there were delays, how did the builder handle them and communicate them? Were there any mistakes along the way that needed to be corrected? How hard was it to get the builder to offer solutions if there were issues?
Questions to Ask
Some of the questions you should add to your list for the interview process include:
- How closely do you work with architects? If you’re using an architect, which most people building custom homes do, you want to make sure you find a builder who collaborates well and values the partnership they have with this person. You might also be working with an interior designer, so you’ll need to talk about this element of the collaborative process as well.
- Do you have experience building the particular tyle of home I want? You don’t want your builder to be jumping into completely new territory with your home.
- What’s your estimating process like? Typically, a builder will do a preliminary estimate, which is based on hard costs and current market prices. Then, after your plans and specs are completed and finalized, they can give you a detailed estimate for your budget. This is based on hard bids from subcontractors and vendors. You do want to ensure a builder is going to get multiple bids from subcontractors and that they’re going to carefully go over these bids. You want a builder who works with subcontractors who prioritize a balance between cost and quality.
- How long will it take you to get an estimate? Preliminary estimates can be done pretty quickly most of the time—usually, they might take around a week to complete. Your detailed budget estimate can take several weeks, so ask what you should expect.
- How are you paid? A custom builder who focuses on high-quality homes will let you know early on how time-consuming they think the project will be. Good builders should carefully go over your plans, and identify any issues they spot, offer ideas for changes in design that could improve your home, and find opportunities to save money. Then, from there, they should use this information to create an accurate budget. Because of how much time is invested even early on, most builders will charge for the services they complete before construction, and then they’ll discuss the rest of their compensation.
- How do you vet subcontractors? Ideally, your builder will have a pool of subcontractors they work with consistently because even with the best builder, if the subcontractors drop the ball, it can create significant hurdles in a home-building project.
- What happens if there are changes or conditions that weren’t anticipated? For a custom home, you are very likely going to see a change order, so ask ahead of time how changes are dealt with, how the builder will present you the costs and options, and what they’ll do to get your approval so they can move forward efficiently.
Finally, ask contenders how long they see the project taking overall. A custom home, depending on its size and the complexity of the design, can take anywhere from eight months to two years or more.