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The Crazy Girl’s Guide to Home Building Survival

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Last year my husband and I embarked upon an incredible (and terrifying) adventure of building our new home. When I say building, I can’t take any credit for it. I did no manual labor. What I really mean is that we worked with an amazing real estate agent, Scott Anderson, and an awesome builder, Moore-O’Connor Construction and my husband, my dad, our bestie, Casey, and several other friends and family members contributed hours of sweat equity. In the end, we have been thrilled with the outcome and continue with our work in progress. It’s an amazing feeling because the house is ours and we were able to make it the home we’d always worked for. This experience wasn’t without some lessons along the way. Remember I said incredible / terrifying? Here’s a few pointers for remaining sane during the home building process. This list of ideas and suggestions will help you and your spouse achieve the home you envision and survive the process with each other too!

Be Realistic. Having a significant dialog with your spouse about your goals for your future home. Also, have a significant conversation with your bank and real estate agent. Having a realistic understanding of what you can afford to build versus what you need for your family is vitally important before proceeding down the home-building path. If all things don’t quite align, it may be best to wait and create a financial plan to achieve your home goals. Patience is key….we’ll talk more about patience later. 

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Be Educated. Tour a lot of homes, read a lot of sites online, and a lot of magazines. Collect ideas for floor plans, colors, carpeting, etc. Learn what floor plans are realistic in your budget and what are appropriate for your neighborhood. While your intent may be to stay in the home you’ve built, it’s important to think about what would be best for resale value. It is also vitally important you and your spouse have a conversation about features that are really important to each of you. My husband’s priorities were: 1. Tallest shower head placement possible, 2. Amazing stamped patio, 3. Mud room. I knew this because we talked about it several, several times. My priorities were: 1. Storm room, 2. Effective closet space, 3. Useful laundry room. Together we were able to make adjustments to our house plans to achieve all our goals. Side note: I was obsessive during the research phase! Also, my husband and I talked about the house constantly! 

folderBe Organized. Don’t lose all the info you’ve researched! Create a binder or folder to collect all your ideas in one place. When you move into the decision-making and building phase, you’ll want a separate finder or folder to keep your decisions together. This will ensure you have all your information collected in one place as you meet with your builder, your real estate agent, and other contractors. Having your ducks in a row ensures you are prepared to communicate your expectations very specifically. Not only did I have a folder, I also had an excel spreadsheet detailing out the model number, quantity, finish, etc of all selections in our home. By compiling this document, I was able to provide that information directly to my builder and feel confident we’d have all the little details we wanted. 

Be Prepared.  You will need to make A LOT of decisions. The more you him-haw around making a decision, the longer it will take for your home to be completed. Keep in mind that builders will generally have multiple projects going on so the faster you’re able to provide them the information they need, the better opportunity you have to keep your project, your future home, moving forward!

1006364_10201770017161804_1016294255_nBe Classic. Decorate with trend but build with classic design. Again, consider what impact your decisions would have on the value of your home. If you create a space that is more universal but decorate with trendy items, you can achieve a contemporary style in a space that won’t ever go out of style.

Be Involved. Trust your builder, your real estate agent, your contractors and understand that whatever you communicate will be completed. If you assume your builder will know what you want, you will be disappointed. We were very fortunate to partner with an incredible builder who asked us a lot of questions and shared his opinion and feedback on our decisions effectively. We also made a trip to the house every chance we got. This was not easy since we were living in Seward and building in Kearney but we knew we had to split our lives between two communities while we needed to oversee progress on our house. Building a home will be time-consuming and is a significant investment so you should be as involved as possible. 

Be Open. If you have a question or concern about your house, be open and ask. Waiting or complaining about it to someone else will not help you achieve the best result. Also, remember that your builder and your real estate agent are professionals for a reason! They have incredible knowledge and perspective that you as a non-professional do not. Utilize their knowledge to achieve the best result. After all, you are paying for it!

Be Patient. There are so many variables that can influence the completion of your home. By doing what is in your control to help move the process along, like making timely decisions and communicating them in detail to your builder, your real estate agent and your bank, progress will be made. Understand that sometimes shipments are late, people get sick, paperwork takes a while, and the weather gets bad. I’m not totally in agreement with the saying, “Good things come to those who wait.” but in the case of home-building, patience, after you’ve provided all the appropriate information, can lead to the best result. For us, it was a beautiful home just outside town down a dirt road, in the middle of some acres. Not too close, but not too far away. It’s just right!

Whether you buy or build, the journey toward home-ownership will be far more enjoyable by partnering with your spouse and having lots of communication. If you create a clear plan through open honest goal setting, organized plans, and educated decisions, this can be a great bonding experience while you work to build your dream home. Enjoy!

 

 

 


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