[Walkabout]

When building a new home, at what points does it make sense to visit to monitor construction progress? Our guess is we'd want to come down after the concrete slab is poured but have no idea how many weeks would normally go by after contract signing before this happens.

Between the pouring of concrete and final walk-through, we assume there would be other important checkpoints but have little idea of what these would be or when they would most likely happen.

We've been advised by several of our new neighbors of the importance of closely monitoring construction progress. This makes sense. The further along construction progresses, the more expensive catching and/or correcting problems could be.

Our best guess is everyone else having had a house built has thought about this. To those of you willing to share your experience, we have two questions. First, what are the checkpoints/milestones worth a visit? (When walls go up? When the house is under roof? When wiring is pulled for plugs? When interior walls are painted? Some other time?) Second, for the above checkpoints, when should we expect these to occur?

Thanks!

[raynan]

Building inspectors take care of checking the different construction stages. Our agent sent pix to us constantly so we could see in and out as it went up. The whole thing from sand lot to completion was 58 days. You could have neighbors (if you know them already) have send you extra pix and info as well. Good luck and welcome.

[DeanFL]

Our Holly in Gilchrist was built 3 1/2 years ago. I lived 25 min away, so came out every few days after groundbreaking - and took lots of pictures as well. So, thru the various stages we have pics of all areas of the house, especially handy to locate studs etc.
We also "met" a couple on ToTV back then, and their home was being built the same time as ours, 5 min away. I offered to take pics of their home building as they we in Salt Lake UT. They have found their pics very useful as well.
When we came for our visits, we never bothered the workers, but found a few items wrong and told our sales rep right away - ex, a hall sconce box put in the wrong area, and no second in-wall shelf in the master shower - small things - but better caught early than during walk-through..
Good luck and enjoy!

[graciegirl]

Originally Posted by Walkabout

When building a new home, at what points does it make sense to visit to monitor construction progress? Our guess is we'd want to come down after the concrete slab is poured but have no idea how many weeks would normally go by after contract signing before this happens.

Between the pouring of concrete and final walk-through, we assume there would be other important checkpoints but have little idea of what these would be or when they would most likely happen.

We've been advised by several of our new neighbors of the importance of closely monitoring construction progress. This makes sense. The further along construction progresses, the more expensive catching and/or correcting problems could be.

Our best guess is everyone else having had a house built has thought about this. To those of you willing to share your experience, we have two questions. First, what are the checkpoints/milestones worth a visit? (When walls go up? When the house is under roof? When wiring is pulled for plugs? When interior walls are painted? Some other time?) Second, for the above checkpoints, when should we expect these to occur?

Thanks!

Your building is carefully planned and orchestrated. They will give you the date of closing soon after you sign and it is possible it will be done ahead of that date by a week to ten days but they will keep the day and time of closing none the less.. Every day materials are delivered that will be ready for the specific team (There are different sub contractors) that will need them the next day. The builder will check in that morning and at least once during the day and in the evening to check what was worked on and clean up. Ours often left notes or rarely asked for something to be redone. He directed that the backsplash tile to be redone in the kitchen. We have owned ten new homes, several we had built, the process here was the most carefully orchestrated. We have had custom homes built and bigger homes but none as carefully built as our homes here.

I don't sell real estate. Don't know the developers but as you can see I am a huge fan. We were renting here while the last home was built (We had sold our first home here immediately and needed to rent while the second was being built) and we enjoyed coming over at least once a day to see what was happening, but we didn't need to worry that it had to be overseen my us.

[twoplanekid]

Originally Posted by DeanFL

Our Holly in Gilchrist was built 3 1/2 years ago. I lived 25 min away, so came out every few days after groundbreaking - and took lots of pictures as well. So, thru the various stages we have pics of all areas of the house, especially handy to locate studs etc.
We also "met" a couple on ToTV back then, and their home was being built the same time as ours, 5 min away. I offered to take pics of their home building as they we in Salt Lake UT. They have found their pics very useful as well.
When we came for our visits, we never bothered the workers, but found a few items wrong and told our sales rep right away - ex, a hall sconce box put in the wrong area, and no second in-wall shelf in the master shower - small things - but better caught early than during walk-through..
Good luck and enjoy!

As a part time business, I thought taking pictures of the construction of new homes to sell to the first time buyers would be fun. I would enjoy looking at pictures of our Holly being built.

Our house was built some three years ago. We purchased it new after it sat unloved for some 10 months. For whatever reason, they don’t seem to be building many Hollys. There is only one new Holly currently listed on the Villages sales site with none having been listed for the past several months. Would like to take pictures of a new Holly build.

[graciegirl]

One evening Henry and I were making our usual visit to our home under construction and ran into another couple there looking around that we didn't know. They explained it was their house. We didn't say a thing. It appeared that they liked "their house" and we did too.

[John_W]

You didn't say if your home is masonry or stick built. In 2011 and 2012 I used to walk everyday around our sub-division and saw about 60 designer homes go up on Southern Star Golf Course. Back in my first life in the 70's I bought and sold five new homes in five years in Pensacola. After watching the first three being built, I was able to work as my own general contractor on the last two homes.

The masonry block home's walls are built in 1-1/2 days. You'll see about a dozen cars parked along the street and about 20 workers laying block. It's amazing what they can do in such a short time. Then a crane will come in and set the trusses. A stick built home will have a framing crew of about 6 to 8 workers and they usually take about 10 days. Now is the time to make sure of the walls are where they should be, and a window is where it should or shouldn't be. After the trusses are set, plywood, and then felt paper are put on the top and windows are set in place. This is called being dried in, now the inside work can start. The inside wall framing, electricians wiring, overhead lights, can lights, make sure you have lights where you want. Many times they will center the dining room light with the walls and not where you really want to put the table. Drywood will start to happen after the electrician is done. All together most designer homes take about 55 days from start to finish in TV.

Of course right before all that, the slab is poured, so being there before when the plumbing is roughed in, you want to make sure the shower, the tub, the island sink are where they are suppose to be located. Have a floorplan with you as you walk around the outside.

If you're building a standard floorplan without any modifications I don't see any problems. So if you made changes, bumped out a wall, added a window, etc., these are the items you want to watch.

[Walkabout]

Thank you very much for the information! Getting an initial handle on the process makes a huge difference. Our new house will be masonry Laurel Oak with garage and laundry room stretches. We also intend to ask the builder to replace the normal diagonal and small island with a single, larger island containing the dishwasher and kitchen sink.

Based on all the above responses, it seems the construction process is very well managed and our home inspector should be able to check on some items. Still, it sounds as if carefully timed visits are a good idea to avoid surprises.

When would you recommend scheduling key visits? Our guess is there is probably some initial delay between the time we sign the contract and pouring the foundation; staging building materials and assigning work crews seem likely to take at least a couple of weeks. Should we plan our first visit a week or two after contract signing or would it be more reasonable to visit a month after contract signing?

Assuming builders would need to wait a few days for the concrete to set and erection of masonry walls take less than 2 days, it sounds as if our second visit should take place about a week later.

The next visit time seems to be at the completion of drying in. How long do you think that would take after walls are up?

Another good time to visit seems to be sometime after drywalling and the completion of electrical work. Again, we have no idea when we could expect this after drying in.

After these 4 preliminary visits to monitor construction, our best guess is we wouldn’t need to make any other visits before walk-through.

Does the above approach for 4 preliminary visits make sense or are there other key milestones worth a visit? Also, do you have a rough idea about the timing of these visits (that is, how many weeks after contract signing for each inspection)?

Thanks again!

[villagetinker]

When we built, 4 years ago, The Villages had a photographer that stopped by the house every week and sent 6 to 10 pictures back to show progress. We saw the empty lot, and the completed house, and we were very happy with the result. We had a home inspection just prior to 1 year, (Frank DeAngelo) and he found only 1 major item (insulation in the Lanai area), and several minor items. Over 3 years later, all is still well, except of the cracking in the ceiling of the lanai (over 600 homes affected so far).
If you are friends with your neighbors, ask them to take photos, I did this on the house next door, and gave the current owners a CD as part of a house warming gift. Also did this for a neighbor when they were having a very large addition installed.

[champion6]

Originally Posted by Walkabout

<snip> We also intend to ask the builder to replace the normal diagonal and small island with a single, larger island containing the dishwasher and kitchen sink. <snip>

I might be wrong, but if this isn't specified at the time you sign the sales agreement, it ain't gonna happen. You're not buying from the builder, you're buying from TV. I suggest that you work with your sales rep on this - before the contract is signed.

[Shimpy]

Originally Posted by villagetinker

When we built, 4 years ago, The Villages had a photographer that stopped by the house every week and sent 6 to 10 pictures back to show progress. We saw the empty lot, and the completed house, and we were very happy with the result. We had a home inspection just prior to 1 year, (Frank DeAngelo) and he found only 1 major item (insulation in the Lanai area), and several minor items. Over 3 years later, all is still well, except of the cracking in the ceiling of the lanai (over 600 homes affected so far).
If you are friends with your neighbors, ask them to take photos, I did this on the house next door, and gave the current owners a CD as part of a house warming gift. Also did this for a neighbor when they were having a very large addition installed.

I've had 3 homes built in Florida and in each of them took pictures of the progress. This can be very helpful later when wondering what's inside a wall, such as electrical or plumbing, when going to install something.
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