Building a new house is a very rewarding undertaking but without a competent builder your dream can easily turn into a nightmare.
Here are a few tips to help you avoid costly mistakes during the construction process.
For a start, before signing a contract with your builder you must ensure it contains detailed specifications for your new home.
Adding, say a few pages, of detailed home specifications to your contract will increase the probability of your builder meeting your expectations for the desired features and level of quality of your house.
It is important to thoroughly describe your project, when inviting bids from multiple builders. This will increase the chances that their bids will be more accurate and comparable to one another.
Before construction gets under way, you should discuss your specifications with your contractor. These discussions may bring to surface other important issues that may prompt you to adjust some of the limits of the allowances in the contract.
It is advisable to work with your builder to establish your new home specifications. You suggest the specifications to your builder, discuss them, reach agreement on them, and then append them to the contract. This way, you minimise misunderstandings between you and your builder while the project is under way.
Having thorough specifications included in your contract ensures that your builder commits to meeting your exceptions and deliver on them.
Although it is the responsibility of the builder to meet the requirements of the applicable building code, every builder uses construction methods and selects building materials that meet his own quality standards. If you wish to make different choices than the builder, you should state these in specifications appended to the contract.
Detailed new home specifications helps your builder to improve cost predictability. The more detailed your specifications are, the more accurate your builder’s cost determination will be. They also help reduce instances of unplanned upgrades and changes.
