Three Mistakes to Avoid While Designing Your House with Custom Home Builders

When it finally comes time to build your dream home, there are a LOT of things to consider, but it's so much more fun to just jump right in and start adding everything you've ever even thought about into your home’s design. But it's definitely worth investing some time into making sure you're avoiding the most common mistakes in home design. People have been there before, so let's learn from the experiences of a custom home builder in Spicewood, TX and skip the future headaches!

Skipping Measurements & Details

Many people start daydreaming about their perfect home when they're young, and it's tough to separate those dreams from our real plans, but they rarely take into account locations and lot sizes. For the purposes of this example, let's say we are working with a custom home builder in Spicewood, TX. Your planning should begin once you know the space you are working with!

• Going too big may leave you with very little yard left on your plot, limiting family activities or future additions. Spicewood has a variety of options for your custom home builder and designer to work with, but your home's plan should start with your lot in mind!

• Taking the time to plan out the dimensions on important rooms and spaces pays off big later! Nobody wants to cook in a kitchen that is all angles and tough to navigate. You won't want to spend time in your dream rooms if they can't fit all of that perfect furniture that you've been envisioning. And no kid will want to play in a playroom that's just four boring walls!

• Windows for natural light make for a brighter, happier home! Neglecting windows may make you feel closed-in in your own home! But also keep in mind which direction those windows face. Spicewood has a typically warm climate, so be careful of too many large south and west facing windows for heat control, or of bedroom windows facing east if you don't like waking up to a sunrise in the window!

Neglecting Storage

Your perfect home often comes with a vision of a perfectly uncluttered life! But life is messy sometimes, and that creates clutter. Make sure you have somewhere to put yours! For continuity, let's imagine we are designing our home with a custom home builder in Spicewood, TX:

• Spicewood is a great location for folks who enjoy the outdoors, with many camping and boating opportunities. You probably don't want to leave your camp gear and your kayak oars just laying around in the garage, so enlist your custom home builder to create spaces to hold everything you need for your planned activities!

• Homes need maintenance, and that includes cleaning. Where are you keeping your broom that's both out of the way and in easy reach when you need to sweep up a mess? Where do you keep excess toilet paper, paper towels, household cleaners?

• While master bedrooms are often meticulously designed, we tend not to spend as much time on kids rooms. Take advantage of your custom home builder in Spicewood, TX to create a space uniquely for them and their interests. Create unique storage options to accommodate their favorite activities or to put away their books after studying will be invaluable.

The “Flow”

This last point is a bit harder to define, but “flow” is a design concept that refers to how things move through your home. This includes people, pets, light, and even sight lines. We're going to keep working with the scenario of your custom home builder in Spicewood, TX here, too:

• Picture your typical day, your morning routine: how do you bring in the groceries from the store? How do you get ready for bed, or relax and unwind after a hard day? If you're building a home for you, optimize all of those experiences for yourself! Imagine how you want your day to go and set yourself up for that success.

• As a homeowner of a growing community like Spicewood, you'll probably have guests over at some point. Envision how they'll see your home and how they'll move through it from one room to the next. If you're entertaining, you may want the kitchen near the main living space and the bedrooms/bathrooms to be slightly further away.

• Many of us love to organize and have everything in its own place, but avoid over-compartmentalizing rooms and areas. Open-concept homes aren't for everyone, but a certain amount of open visibility through rooms and hallways and windows can help avoid feelings of being trapped that a box-like room might cause. People don't like feeling “contained”.

At the end of the day, it is your dream home, and you can design things however you like! But putting some trust with a custom home builder in Spicewood, TX and making some compromises based on their experience and knowledge of the community is much more likely to lead to a happy project—and to happy memories of your Spicewood (or elsewhere!) home in the future! Contact Riverbend Homes for more information.

What Are The Benefits of Using A Home Builder Instead of Being Your Own General Contractor?

You may consider yourself a handyman or even excel in renovations or the maintenance of your home, but are you qualified to build your own home? Maybe you think that you are saving money when you do the work yourself or act as your own general contractor, but regardless of the books or the YouTube channels you watch, hiring home builders in Spicewood has more advantages than doing it yourself.

Advantage #1

The first advantage for hiring a home builder in Spicewood, TX is the buying power that a general contractor has. Often, a contractor will build relationships with their suppliers, and they can get discounts due to the volume that they purchase compared to buying a single sink or the building materials for one home. The relationships between contractor and suppliers will save money, and you may even get better quality without the added expense.

Saving time and money

Most things today are measured in time as well as money. How much did it cost, and also how much time did it take? Time is something that all clients wish they had more of, and when building a home, time is something that can be mismanaged when doing it yourself. A home builder in Spicewood, TX has a history of building homes and knows the time that it takes to complete each task, as well as how long it will take to complete the entire job. A general contractor can dedicate all of his time to the project, whereas, if you are acting as your own general contractor, you have to divide your time between work, family, friends, and any other activities in your life. If your thought is that you will take the time needed to build your home, remember that, if the project takes longer, it could mean loss of your income or interference with other aspects of, or relationships in, your life.

Establishing good rapport with subcontractors

A home builder in Spicewood, TX will have good relationships not just with the suppliers, but also with sub-contractors. You can look through Craigslist and hope that you find a subcontractor with the skills that you require and can afford, but a general contractor will have all these people ready to go, from the electrician to the drywaller. Normally, high-quality sub-contractors work for general contractors and not for the general public. By hiring a home builder, you get access to these workers to ensure that your new home meets and exceeds the state and city standards. Timing when to bring subcontractors into the project is crucial to ensure that you are getting the most of your time and money. You do not want to be paying the drywallers to stand around waiting while the plumber and electricians are still working.

A home builder in Spicewood, TX has the experience and the relationships with suppliers and subcontractors to ensure that your new dream home is built on time and on budget. For more information on a home builder in Spicewood, TX, click here.