From the Ground Up: Home Building Tips for First-Timers

Building your home is an exciting process. Creating a home that caters to your design preferences is a fun, challenging prospect. But all of the choices involved in building a home can cause it to become an overwhelming process if you’re not careful. Here are some helpful home building tips for first timers.

Think Structural

Don’t blow your entire budget on aesthetic upgrades like backsplashes and carpet padding. Put your money into structural upgrades first. Whether it’s choosing a nicer elevation for the front of your home, adding or removing walls, adding additional windows, or adding additional bathrooms and bedrooms, the structural upgrades deserve your attention first and foremost. Aesthetic things like paint colors and kitchen hardware can all be changed out later without much additional effort or cost. But it would require a lot of effort, time, and money, to do a structural upgrade after your home is built. Save yourself some hassle by contacting a Utah home builder and getting the bones of your home perfect first, and then dress it up with finishes later.

Look to the Future

Don’t see your home only as it will be on closing day. Think about it five years from now, and consider what types of elements you’d like to see in your home then. If you can’t afford a finished basement now, but think you’d like to finish it in a few years, add in the rough-in plumbing for a future basement bathroom. Adding the required plumbing in the future will cost a lot more than if you add it during the construction phase. If you want to add a gas fireplace at a future date, bring in the gas line now. If surround sound is a must-have, but you can’t find room for it in the budget, do the wiring now before the drywall goes up and buy the system later. Changes are much easier before the walls are closed up, so carefully consider things you might want and add them in during the construction phase.

Put Your Money Where it Counts

Even though you might say this is your “forever home,” surprises still come up in life that may require you to sell your home. You always want to make sure the investment you’re making in your home will maximize your return, should you ever have to sell. Put your money in the areas of your home that bring the highest returns—kitchens and bathrooms. Instead of doing something extremely personal, like a recording studio in the basement, add in features that future buyers will also find value in, like having a kitchen hood that vents directly outside, or double showers in the master bathroom. Putting your money where it counts will help maximize your home’s value.

Be Firm with the Builder

It can be easy for the builder to sometimes run right over your concerns and minimize them until they seem insignificant. But if it’s important to you, stick to your guns. If you really don’t want them to cut down a specific tree, or put the ceiling fan in a certain spot, make sure they do what you ask. If they don’t, make them change it at their cost. The builder will be in and out and on to the next project, but you are the one who will be living in the home and paying for it, so make sure it’s built in line with your preferences.

Constructing a home from the ground up is not easy, but it can be a fun, exciting process. Following these tips will help first-timers build a beautiful home that they will enjoy for years to come.