....any advice? What would you do different if you could change your current design/build? What are some things you would like to add or delete? What are some "must haves" that you would recommend?

Fire away, please, and don't hold back. Thank you in advance for your input.

I would determine how much of a budget you want to spend. What I mean by this is the size of the house and the amount per square inch you want to spend. This will get you started.

There are two approaches to starting this process. One is to hire the architect first. The other is to hire the builder first (and they will put you in contact with an architect). If you get an architect first, you may be able to bid it out and get a better price. In this case, you would make all the decisions to your house before bidding it out so you should know what you are getting. For architects, there are two types.

1) There are the ones that are really in control of the whole building process regardless if you have a builder or not. In this case, the architect may charge a percentage of the construction cost (say 11%). In this scenario, you may meet with the architect every week. They will visit the showrooms with you. They actually monitor the building process.
2) The other, builds blueprints and there is a lot more flexibility to change things (the architect may charge like $15k flat fee.

Also, what you spend is what you get. Don't just assume that getting a house at $190/sq ft will get you the same house at $300/sq ft. If you want LED lights in your house remember that they cost like $200/each. Also flooring can cost a lot depending on what you like. Wood floors between $7 sq ft to $20 sq ft. Lighting can be expensive and builders don't usually budget it correctly. It is not uncommon to spend roughly $40k for a 5000 sq foot house. Why.... because dimmers and LED lights can be expensive. Bathroom fixtures can be expensive. Place a budget and maybe get an interior designer that charges hourly help you with getting what you want at what you want to spend. The interior designer will be well worth it.

Nowadays, houses have SMART controls for them. You can have apps on your phone that controls the lighting and security for the house. Furthermore, all the audio video is controlled through apps. There are company like Control4 and Savant.

Let me know if you have any questions. We are building a house.

Where are you building?

I have a good thread bookmarked at the office that I'll link to on Monday. Similar title if you feel like searching before then.

This is my second custom home. We've got a great builder selected, and we will be building on 30 acres west of Wichita Falls. Construction won't start for another few weeks. I am trying to get some input on the "little" things that make a custom home unique. Energy efficiency is a priority, but wondering what others are thinking would be a "must have" if they were building a new home. All ideas are appreciated.

Little things are what make the difference!!!!

Things to think about:

Power outlets, especially in the garage, normal is 2!!! Put more in and up breaker amp so you can actually plug a power strip in and use it!

Where will water faucets outside be? Put one by curb if possible, wash cars and not need 150 feet of hose.

Put in new USB power recepticals in rooms and a couple in the kitchen for your phones.


If your doing wood floors call 4697672645 ask for David tell him the Aggie sent you!... Doors have to be cut, thresholds and trim changed.

Fans in all rooms.

Really think about no carpet!!! Wood and tile!!

30+ year roof...

We did all can lights no fixtures, much cleaner look!

Pre wire!!!!! Everything, media room, bed room, den, electrical, speakers, etc... Patio also, at a minimum leave pull strings, run at least 2 power runs for future use On patio if you don't build it out. Would recommend building patio into overall design from the start... Where will TV, grill, stereo, go, how does it get gas, power, cable, satellite...

Think about traffic flow!!! Where will mud enter the house? Where will kids books clothes dogs? enter the house. Don't skimp on laundry room! Momma spends at least an hour a day in there if you have kids...

Box in attic for storage... Make them put plywood down and add door so you can walk in easily...

Pick downstairs closet for tornado room. Have them reinforce the crap out of it... Preferably studs into the cement...

And finally you need a 7x10 attic room or something that's yours... And you can secure!!! Gun closet, fly fishing, bait, room where your stuff goes and that's it!!!!

That's a few ideas...

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we will be building on 30 acres west of Wichita Falls

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That cancels out my idea of a water closet in the garage as you have 30 acres to take a leak on.

Things for the garage

• A bunch of outlets (already mentioned)
• 220V outlet (welder,compressor, etc.)
• Utility sink with hot and cold water lines
• Water line/outlet for fridge in the garage with ice-maker
• Storage room

If you're going to have a barn or outbuilding then put those in there.

If you want to make me jealous, build with insulated concrete forms (ICF). Sounds like it's too late though.

All luxuries here but some of my ideas if budget is not an issue

Master Bath - XL Shower, Sauna, Heated Floors, Custom Storage in master closet

Mud Room / utility room - room for W/D, Large Sink, Extra freezer/fridge, room for dog kennel(s), custom storage for jackets, shoes, etc; I would have a workout room attached to either the mud room or master bath with water fountain for drinking

Deck the attic for storage capabilities

Urinal in garage

Over sized two car tandem garage with door and/or single garage door access to backyard

Wiring for exterior lighting, Christmas lights, etc.

Outdoor shower head for you after working in yard, etc.

I'm big into home automation and efficiency so here is my list of things:

- Spray foam insulation
- Nest thermostats
- Keen air vents
- Rachiro sprinkler controller
- Ring.com doorbell camera
- Outdoor camera system
- Dedicated spots upstairs/downstairs for wireless router
- Couple of hard-wired Ethernet spots for Apple TV/Fire TV
- Button controlled light switch (not the flip switch, but a push button. Can put like 6 buttons on one spot, very clean looking)
- Hidden room with built-in gun safe
- Tornado room (use cinder blocks for walls)
- pre-wire for a projector
- Huge sliding glass wall onto back porch
- deck every inch of your attic that you can

Things my wife would want
- Bigger mud room/laundry room (include a sink)
- walk in closets in every room
- Bathrooms for every room
- Small desk in kitchen area to set purse/backpacks on instead of counters

Some things we are putting in our custom build right now (some already mentioned):

- Electrical outlets that have 2 plugs and two USB ports

- decked, walk-in attic area

- sliding barn door to downstairs office/nursery/guest room

- wood floors throughout

- can lighting throughout

- built in dresser/peninsula in master closet

- 30 sq ft walk-in shower

- marble slab over W/D workspace

- mud room off garage entry

- walk in pantry with Granite slab for Keurig, etc

- under cabinet lighting

- wine rack built in cabinets

- wine fridge built in cabinets

- trash pull-out built into cabinets

- cast iron farm sink

- big vent hood

- spray foam insullation

Here's the thread I had bookmarked:
http://texags.com/forums/61/topics/2547644/1

Thank you everyone for the feedback and the link! Lots of great ideas!

Good feedback all around.

A couple of things I would add from trial and error..


Pre wire all rooms and outdoor areas for surround sound or stereo music whether you ever use it or not, as well as cat5/6

Laundry chute from 1st to 2nd floor if applicable

1 3/4 thick interior solid core doors, it makes huge difference

smarthome.com - insteon

if you are going to have a media closet, run an ac vent into it

outlets and network connects in your home office closet for printers,routers, etc.

pre wired subwoofer locations in MB and living room

built in mini fridge in the MB cabinets/closet for H20 etc...

if you gave the builder a max on the SFootage and room count, make sure you map out the bedrooms as this is where they will make up space for other areas and an extra foot one way or the other can make a huge difference.

Edit:

Work sink in garage ..

no bottom cabinets in the kitchen only big, deep drawer bases...no one wants to get on knees and crawl into the cabinet!

when you think you have enough outlets, add some more

when you think you have enough closets, add a couple or more

urinal in garage, sink in garage

OUTSTANDING lists above....
Ditto on damn near everything.

One thing we have in our old 70's weekend home we are remodeling.....
- Trash Compactor ! If you are in the country and have only weekly trash pickup or problems with critters you will find that having a GOOD compactor allows you to put a LOT more trash in your secured trash can. I never thought I would want one but I love my old worn out 70's model and am adding one to our remodeled kitchen.

- Have your gas line ( If you have nat gas) run with a pool heater, outdoor kitchen and aux power in mind. If you have a detached garage add or at least pre plumb for a separate FULL "outdoor" bath to be incorporated into possible pool room or as part of your outdoor kitchen.

- Put security lights on every corner or your home and garage. Prewire around the property for security cams

- IF you think you have enough outlets ..you are WRONG. Double it !!!No man ever born has ever had enough power outlets in his home/workshop/garage...its NOT humanly possible !!

One thing I forgot to mention we're doing that was #1 on my wife's list was having the utility room connected to the master closet, rather than being the first thing you walk in out of the garage.

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One thing I forgot to mention we're doing that was #1 on my wife's list was having the utility room connected to the master closet, rather than being the first thing you walk in out of the garage.

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We are also putting in a door directly from the master closet to the utility/laundry room.

1. Safe room. Leave enough room for a heavy duty file cabinet and perhaps a locked area for a gun safe. Put valuable documents in plastic bags. Room needs to be metal or concrete and going lower than foundation level will certainly help.

2. Tile underpayment for ALL tile. Something like Kerdi or Ditra.

3. Quality windows.

4. Think about a gas powered battery backup system.

5. Finish the garage floor prior to moving in.

6. I would spray foam or heavily insulate one of your interior rooms, or the room you think might be the media room. Not only for media room purposes but you or a future owner may want a home studio.

7. Build the biggest garage and driveway you can. Put a shower in the garage.

8. Wet/mud room.

9. Check with your framer about going 12" or less on center rather than 16" for sturdier hanging.

10. Not so much planning, but pay particular attention to and document the framing in the closets. Future owners will appreciate knowing where the studs are PRIOR to tearing down the closet fixtures (don't ask me how I know this).

11. For that matter, document EVERYTHING for future owners. Anyone that has a book of everything about their house will likely get a higher initial offer from me than those that don't know.

12. To me, the floor tubs with a shower are obsolete. If you put a bathtub in, put a higher standing one with a separate shower. Parents can still bathe their kids and those that want to take a bath won't have to clean the tub/shower first.

Can lighting every where especially bedrooms. Cieling lights in fans are not enough.

Electronics change to fast to keep up but consider a central closet for everything to come together including wifi. We put ours in media room.
Security cameras ! Cheap these days.
Consider a metal front door. Nice touch and never goes bad.
All doors over sized 36 x 8 foot.
Central vac
Many other great ideas already posted.
Make everything rooms etc 10 percent bigger than your first thoughts.

Oops. We spent extra on windows larger Ac units and foam insulation.

Have someone design your HVAC. But for real design it. Run a load calc, take into account exposure, orientation, etc. Have it tested and balanced once installed. You'd be amazed at the difference

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1 3/4 thick interior solid core doors, it makes huge difference

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This. The cost when we built to switch to solid core interior doors was minuscule compared to the cost to replace them now. Every time I shut a door and hear the hollow thwack when it echoes off the solid floors pisses me off.

And when I'm pissed off I can't slam a door because the damn hollow core doors aren't heavy enough to not be a sail, so I have to keep my hand on the door to push it shut!

We wanted the solid core doors as well, but were convince we needed to stay with hollow core. We are starting a family soon, and it was explained to us that if our baby somehow were to close its fingers/hand in the door, the solid core doors are going to do a much larger amount of damage than the hollow core.

That makes absolute sense. We don't have children so that thought hadn't occurred to us.

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We wanted the solid core doors as well, but were convince we needed to stay with hollow core. We are starting a family soon, and it was explained to us that if our baby somehow were to close its fingers/hand in the door, the solid core doors are going to do a much larger amount of damage than the hollow core.

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Well I hope you don't live a 2 story house because a fall down a flight of stairs is much worse than a fall to the floor staning up.

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We wanted the solid core doors as well, but were convince we needed to stay with hollow core. We are starting a family soon, and it was explained to us that if our baby somehow were to close its fingers/hand in the door, the solid core doors are going to do a much larger amount of damage than the hollow core.

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Well I hope you don't live a 2 story house because a fall down a flight of stairs is much worse than a fall to the floor staning up.

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It is two story, with wood stairs. Luckily we can control infants going up/down stairs better than we can them closing an open door on their hand.

Thanks for your smart ass input though. Have a great day!!!

My biggest regret is not adding a stairway to the attic. I live in a large one story home and there is a ton of space for storage in the attic, but it is such a pin in the butt going up and down the pull down ladder to the attic. I wish I would have just added a staircase behind a regular interior door so it looks like a closet or something.

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My biggest regret is not adding a stairway to the attic. I live in a large one story home and there is a ton of space for storage in the attic, but it is such a pin in the butt going up and down the pull down ladder to the attic. I wish I would have just added a staircase behind a regular interior door so it looks like a closet or something.

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Ships ladder.

If you're going to actively store stuff in the attic, take a few minutes the first time to go through and cover or bang over any nails sticking thru the decking. Hell, stick some split open pipe insulation on the joists. The top of your head will thank you.

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My biggest regret is not adding a stairway to the attic. I live in a large one story home and there is a ton of space for storage in the attic, but it is such a pin in the butt going up and down the pull down ladder to the attic. I wish I would have just added a staircase behind a regular interior door so it looks like a closet or something.

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Ships ladder.

If you're going to actively store stuff in the attic, take a few minutes the first time to go through and cover or bang over any nails sticking thru the decking. Hell, stick some split open pipe insulation on the joists. The top of your head will thank you.

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And your shoulders
And your back

Ask me how I know ...

I put an elevator/dumbwaiter in my garage attic access point. I basically cut out a hole in my ceiling, built a metal frame, and bought a harbor freight hoist. Very handy when putting up Christmas stuff.

French or double doors!!!! At front.

You can bolt other door with screws if you want. But no bigger pain in the world trying to get furniture thru a single freaking door!!!!!!!!

Most new homes around here are going w oversized front door instead of french for some reason

42-48 inches wide seems to be the average but some going up to 60 inches based on the width and height ratio.

Ours is normal door height but 42 inches wide.

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My biggest regret is not adding a stairway to the attic. I live in a large one story home and there is a ton of space for storage in the attic, but it is such a pin in the butt going up and down the pull down ladder to the attic. I wish I would have just added a staircase behind a regular interior door so it looks like a closet or something.

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Agree 100%, current house and new one under construction both have full stairs up to attic. I will never use attic stairs again.