Q. What is a Custom Home?
A. A custom home is designed to specifically fit our customer’s wants and needs. From the layout to final finishes our customers are able to choose everything. Most builders have a handful of designs that they have you choose from; we literally start from a blank piece of paper and start designing your dream home with your input and involvement. If the thought of building a custom home sounds scary, rest assured that our experts will be holding your hand through the entire process.
Q. What is a Tear-Down or Offsite Build and what are the processes?
A. Most builders have vacant lots that they own as part of a specific neighborhood or community, you pick out a lot and then a house plan to build. However, sometimes a customer will already own a piece of land or vacant lot which would be considered an Offsite Build. If there is an existing structure or house on an off site lot, then it would be considered a teardown. We often look specifically for off site lots or tear-downs for a customer that wants to be outside of the normal tract neighborhoods. When building Offsite, things to consider are the cost of the teardown of the existing structure(s), well and septic costs or connecting to existing city lines, and tree removal. Soil tests are also a good idea to make sure the land is buildable. WE can assist in all of these areas.
Q. Financing- what is the difference between traditional financing and new construction financing.
A. Traditional financing is when a buyer has the builder finance the build and then they purchase the completed home from the builder using Conventional financing. This is typical of production builders and national builders. However, when building a Custom Home, Some Builders require the buyer to finance the building project with Construction Financing. The buyer obtains an initial Construction Loan and with that, they then purchase their lot and then the builder would then draw on the rest of those funds as needed while the house is being built. Depending on the cost of the total project the builder will typically do 4-5 draws over the course of the building drawing approx. 65-70% of the total package until the very end when the Final draw is made to complete the build. At that point the Construction Loan either automatically rolls over into a Conventional Fixed ” End Loan” or the buyer will refinance it with Conventional ” End Loan” Financing. During the draw period, the buyer is only paying Interest the funds that have been drawn bout by the builder, so they are not actually getting charged interest on the full package price during construction. We will put you in contact with a preferred lender to answer all of your questions regarding financing.
Q. Build Timeline
A. The design and bid phase are typically 3-4 months. Actual construction is normally about 6 1/2 – 7 months from the day they dig the foundation, barring any delays in materials, mother nature, pandemics, etc. So the total timeline from first design meeting to completion is 10-11 months.