Research

When we started talking to the agent about constructing the lot next door, there were some initial hiccups on both sides. We were very interested in building the same floor plan, but we didn't want to pay a penny more than the other house sold for. To complicate matters, the builder only had license to build that floor plan one time and was unsure that he could procure the rights to build it again. Initially the process moved very slowly, which was fine for us because we wanted to do a lot more research before we made a final decision.

One of the major research tools for us was touring model homes. We walked through every new construction model we could find getting a sense of features, floor plans and layouts. We found a lot of little features we liked, but we didn't find a single floorplan that we liked better overall than the house we tried to buy.

Model homes also helped us get a sense of what a new construction home should cost. We found quite a few homes that were cheaper, but without a doubt they were slightly smaller homes in tract developments in more suburban communities where land is readily available. Because of the location of my job, moving that far away was not an option. Besides, neither Theresa or myself wanted to live in a tract home community with small yards, close neighbors, no trees and that classic "cookie cutter" sense that sub divisions built by the same collection of builders always get.

We did manage to find a builder who was building the exact same floor plan in a few tract communities around the area. The prices on that model were 10k-40k higher than the house we tried to buy for the base model (depending on community) and the house we looked at had quite a few upgrades, such as granite countertops, etc.... The clincher for us was when we walked through a model home literally right around the corner from the house we tried to buy. The house was very similar in size layout and finish, however it had a few things we didn't like as much (notably the kitchen size and layout) This house was selling for 75k more than the house we tried to buy. At that point our minds were made up. If the contract looked good, we would sign and build a house.