Building a dream home is many people’s ultimate wish. It’s a way to have endless possibilities and design a home that’s perfect in every way for your family and your lifestyle.

It all begins with a plan. When you decide to build a custom home, the first step is for your architect to take into consideration the size, location, style of home, and your budget. Because you’re starting from scratch, already at this stage the choices can be overwhelming. It’s time-consuming and every detail from the floor plan to plumbing to electrical needs to be decided on from the start.

It comes as no surprise that the costs for an architect, surveying the land, and utilities planning will be taking away from your overall budget leaving you with less for your home build. Plus, a truly custom-designed home can take up to three times longer compared with other builds.

Getting more for less

The real value is buying a pre-construction home from a home builder. Nearly one in three homes purchased in Canada are bought directly from a builder. The benefits of buying from a home builder range from saving money, the convenience of having a new home, buying in a beautiful community, and the possibilities for customization.

The advantage over a truly custom home starts with choosing a model home. Many home buyers think that choosing from a selection of home plans means that they’ll end up with the same home as everyone else.
While it’s true that some builders don’t allow customizations, if you choose one that does, then suddenly your perfect dream home becomes a possibility.

How to get exactly what you want

The flexibility of starting with a pre-drawn model as opposed to starting from scratch can lead to exciting possibilities. The same quality and style can be expected–but with utmost convenience. Pre-drawn house plans are more worry-free, less time-consuming, and less expensive, which will help you stay within your budget.

The first step is to choose a plan that’s close to what you want. It may sound easy, but it can be really hard. You’re often choosing from award-winning plans. Plus, the most popular ones are popular for a reason and will already incorporate lifestyle features into the design meaning there’s often less than you think that needs to change.

Next, speak to your builder about what’s missing or what changes you want to make to the floor plan. If you’ve chosen the right builder, they’ll be open and willing to working with you. There are even a handful of exceptional builders that will even move walls to make your vision a reality.

It will cost extra to make your customizations, but nothing like starting from scratch. And, the results will be worth it for you to incorporate everything you’ve dreamed of into your forever home.

What is a pre-plot?

Taking it one step further and have your home builder do a pre-plot, a pre-plot build shows you that the house you’ve chosen fits on the lot where you want to build. At this stage, you can decide if you want to make the home larger, or maybe even build a bigger deck. It gives home buyers total peace of mind when they can actually see how it is all coming together.