How Long Does It Take to Build a Santa Fe Custom Home from Start to Finish?
In Luxury Home Concept’s multiple years of building custom homes, we’ve answered almost every question that a potential homebuyer could conceive. If we had to pick one question, we’d been asked more than any other, this would be it: how long will it take to complete our custom home?
Right up there with the other highest ranked question asked in custom homebuilding (what this is going to cost anyway). the best short answer is “it depends.”
I wish I had a one-size-fits-all, simple answer, but seriously there are soooo many factors that play into being able to put a timeline on a custom home project and every custom home build is truly different.
While we can’t provide a one-answer-fits-all solution in a blog post, we can provide you with some general guidelines and take you through some of the variables that can impact how long a custom home building project will take. We can also offer a little guidance about how to avoid some common mistakes and keep your project on course.
How Long Does It Normally Take to Build a Custom Home?
But 10 months – 2 years is the timeframe to build a true custom home. While a semi-custom home might take 6 to 8 months to complete (if everyone has their acts together and you are lucky), plan for a minimum of 10 months for a fully custom-built home.
The scale and intricacy of your home design will also factor into how long the whole project will take: a 5,000 square foot bungalow is going to be a different timeline than a 30,000 square foot estate.
And while a good builder can ramp up the work force to help a larger project proceed at a nice pace, such grand designs with intricate details simply take time to do well. At the end of the day, the key is in understanding that by taking the time upfront to get it right the first time allows you to save money and time in the long run. Speed by cheating is never right.
Remember, the timeline we’re describing here (10 months – 2 years) is just for the building of the home itself. Luxury Home Concepts will typically spend 3 to 9 months with a new custom home customer in architecture and pre-construction stages prior to breaking ground.
This time frames vary based on the size and complexity of your home’s design, as well as an architect’s current workload, your city’s permitting process, and how efficient and experienced your builder is.
What Can Add Time to Moving In?
There are various factors that can derail a project. Many of these factors can be managed or avoided through intelligent project management and a dependable, flexible work force. Right there, some of these delays are just a matter of bad luck, but even when you’re getting an act of God, the people you have working with you on the project can make an enormous difference in how long it takes to put the delay behind you and get your project back on track.
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Weather
There are so many things we can control on a site, but the weather, sadly, is not one of them.
A savvy builder will build in some cushion for poor weather to avoid having a mild inconvenience ruin the entire chain of events, but when a true hissy fit comes from Mother Nature, even the most dogged work crew occasionally must throw in the towel and readjust.
Temperature changes: It’s one that we’re fortunate not to experience too often here in Santa Fe, NM. Elsewhere in the country, drastic temperature shifts can impact how far a project comes along.
Concrete to harden or paint to dry, may be freezing temperatures. On the other end of the scale, with global warming these days weeks of sustained temperatures in the high 90’s and low 100’s can also cause issues. And beyond any structural problems, neither is particularly friendly to working crews.
Too much rain: Now this is something we need to handle in Santa Fe, NM from time to time. Naturally, any type of precipitation, including rain, freezing rain or any type of snow accumulation, can be the bane of just about any contracting job, particularly initial construction.
High amounts of rain, not just the accumulation of precipitation, can put site work on hold (too much mud makes a mess of a bulldozing project), and delay the pour for the foundation (more water can never be added to concrete).
They can also delay framing, to some degree. But once a home is dried in, precipitation should not have a large impact on how long your build takes. As it turns out, working in the rain is part of the job.
Not having the appropriate permits:
Construction Bureaucracy is inevitable in any construction project, especially in Santa Fe, NM. There are papers to complete, and everything must be crossed and dotted and signed (in triplicate, often!).
A missing permit or a delayed inspection can shut down a project and create enormous frustration. The good news is, there’s a simple solution to this if you have a well-organized builder with strong internal systems and processes for managing permits, inspections, HOA approvals, and all the other back-and-forth you’ll go through when building a custom home.
What Can Homeowners Do to Expedite a Project?
Building a custom home should be a partnership. As the homeowner, you are an invaluable member of the team, and you have more control over how long it takes to finish the project than you might realize. Even though you may not actually show up on site daily, there are many things you can do to help ensure your construction time is as short as possible.
Choose the right builder
It’s truly the most important decision you’ll make and the single biggest factor in how long it will take to build. What goes back at the office might just be as important as anything that’s happening on site, so every part of how your builders do business matters.
Select a builder who has systems in place for the straightforward, efficient and proven tracking of the project’s schedule, and budget, for gathering selections and ordering materials, and for communications with every part of the team – architect, subs and vendors, the interior designer, and you, the client.
Ensure your builder has a good team of quality, reliable subcontractors. One bad sub can ultimately lead to massive delays to everyone else, it’s a domino effect that can send a project (read schedule) spiraling out of control.
Hire an Interior Designer
Even if you have an impeccable design eye, don’t do it by yourself. A superior interior designer does so much more than select tile samples or paint colors. You can be as hands-off or collaborative as you prefer, but there are hundreds of design decisions, big and small, that will need to be hammered out during your home’s construction.
The timing of those decisions can make or break a schedule. You need someone to keep them on track. A great organized interior designer who has the experience to keep you in front of the builder’s selection schedule is worth its weight in gold.
Keep a little budget wiggle room
Constructing a custom home is a living, breathing process. Although your right builder will give you realistic budget projections before you even start, there is always unforeseen costs that can appear.
From whether you fall in love with a specific finish to an unexpected snag in the process, the idea that you can budget more broadly will help to smooth things over. You can afford a loss, change gears or grab some of that emergency gear at the last minute if you must.
Know the lead time for some products & materials
This bring us back around to the power of an organized builder and interior designer, and to the absolute importance of being as decisive as you possibly can be when you do your selections. Some items (like windows, doors and anything custom made) could also take weeks to get.
Sitting and waiting for some missing item that is holding up the completion of the project is a typical but unnecessary reason for construction to lag. Do what you can to make decisions and have your builder and subcontractors order materials quickly.
Be sure your builder schedules regular site walks and visits with you
Not only does this allow you to assure that everything is progressing as it should be, but also, you can notice any changes that need to be made or reassessments at the earliest possible time. This will save you from having to re-write stuff.
Stick to the original design as much as you can
I would highly recommend having your architect and builder work together from the start, that way you understand that you have a design and a layout that you love and is buildable. Listening to her tweak this from the start is crucial because there is no worse time to tweak a design than halfway through a project.
We’re realists and what occasionally happens is a homeowner recognizes the need or desire changes in the eleventh hour from the original plan. But indecision can be a time suck (and a money sucker), as change orders can throw a schedule off course in a heartbeat.
Even in a particularly intricate job like a custom home build, things do happen, and the chances that something could go wrong — or the project might take longer than expected — are veritably high. The real question is whether your team has the collective ability to foresee and prevent problems before they can result in delays.
A good builder won’t leave you to fend for yourself against everything the building process can throw at you. Your project will be a success by being well organized, thoughtfully planned, and with good communication in a timely manner.
If you are considering a new custom home and would like to learn more about the process or how timelines for building are scheduled, contact the Luxury Home Concepts today. We are here and are happy to chat with you about any ideas or questions.