How long will it take to build my home?

How long will it take to build my home?

This is one of the most commonly asked questions that I receive from perspective clients and clients that have already agreed to have us construct their new home.

The question is actually quiet complicated to answer.

The first thing that you need to know is that any custom home builder that you want to hire should be able to give you an accurate schedule to build your home. When I say accurate schedule I mean a detailed schedule that tells you what is going to happen every month and how many days it should take to construct every part of the house.

In custom home building everything that says “custom” takes time to build. A custom home takes time to build because of that one word.

A “custom” home is “custom” because it allows the homeowners to have a say in absolutely everything that is in the house. A builder that builds subdivisions builds the same home over and over again and requires the homeowner to choose everything before they process starts from a pre-approved list.

Custom homes do not do that, they allow homeowners to pick every single thing in the home.  A lot of the choices that are made in a custom home are made before the house has even started but there are also a significant number of things that you will end up deciding on as the house is being built.

A custom home is built at a speed that the homeowner can keep up with the choices that they have to make; this allows the home to truly be called a custom home. Since all these decisions can take time then you can’t rush the building of the home, also some choices that you the homeowner will make before the building process starts you will end up changing after you start to see the building take shape and get a feel for the space.

The other reason that time is taken to build a custom home is for quality control. The faster a home is built the more mistakes can be made, and the more mistakes that are made the more problems you can end up with down the line after the home is built.

The average custom home takes from 8 months to 2 years to build. I understand that this is a large range, but because of all the variables in building a custom home it truly depends on the size and complexity of the home. Custom homes can vary from 3000 square feet up to 10 to 20,000 square feet. The larger the home the longer it takes to construct and customize it.

The one way that a homeowner can help accelerate the build process is to make as many decisions as possible before you even start building the home. Also you should hire an interior designer before the build starts so that you can have someone to bounce ideas off. It’s always easier to make decisions when you have someone to bounce ideas off, especially if that person is a professional interior designer.

Rob Abbott
Operations Manager
Village Builders Inc.