Why Buy New?
9 Benefits of New Homes
Whether you are moving to a new area for work opportunities, sizing-up or planning for retirement and an empty nest, it’s important to weigh the benefits of deciding to buy new against purchasing an inventory home. A new custom home presents some great opportunities and unique advantages to you.
1. Newer materials for healthier homes
Today’s home buyers demand a home that won’t make them sick. This means custom builders must be very careful about the products and materials they use in your new home. The following are ways your builder can increase the health and safety of your home:
- Limiting exposure to chemicals (like formaldehyde in insulation and particleboard; volatile organic compounds in adhesives, sealants and paints and pesticides, fungicides and heavy metals used to treat wood) through use of non-toxic building materials and products.
- Mitigate mold and rot by employing proper building techniques and materials from foundation to roof.
- Utilize passive airflow and fresh air exchange through proper placement of windows and doors.
- Location of areas of high toxicity and combustible materials (such as the garage and utility room) away from bedrooms and primary living spaces.
The benefits are homes that are safer and require less maintenance. A healthy home is inherently more energy efficient, and therefore incurs lower monthly operating costs!
2. Home custom designed for your lifestyle
From picking out your lot to creating a space completely customized for your individual taste and style. The custom home design + build process gives you unlimited input into your new homes design. You decide what type of flooring, paint and hardware finishes your home will get. Our unique Lifestyle Analysis process allows us to build a home around every aspect of your lifestyle. We work with you to examine how you live in your home. How you entertain, the types of visitors you have, flow of traffic, hobbies, how and where you eat, how and where you work in the home, how your kids and their friends play. We also look at the shape and topography of the home site to maximize views, account for slopes and maximize space and natural features.
3. Advanced technology improvements
A newly built custom home will incorporate the newest technological advances and be designed with smart systems integrated. The more energy-efficient mechanics of the house also help reduce utility bills for new home buyers. Newly-constructed homes often include green systems and appliances—like high efficiency stoves, refrigerators, washing machines, water heaters, furnaces, or air conditioning units—that homes built years ago might not. Existing homeowners can always retrofit their property or buy higher-efficiency appliances, but doing so requires a potentially significant expense.
4. Energy efficient features save money over time
Newly constructed homes use energy more efficiently in two ways. First, they tend to have a tighter-sealed building envelope that helps prevent conditioned air—cool air in the summer, warm air in the winter—from escaping. Higher efficiency windows, doors and insulation mean a more efficient home to heat and cool. Those efficient elements work together to save you thousands over time.
5. Quicker appreciation over the first five years
When you buy new, the value of your home should appreciate quicker during the first 5 years you own it. The limited supply of new custom homes alone guarantees stable and increasing prices new units. When you compare that with appreciation for an existing home over the same five year span, the advantage goes to the new home.
6. New homes cost less to run and maintain
The features of newly constructed homes should also hold up better than those of existing homes, which may have experienced years of wear and tear. Today’s custom homes are engineered specifically to minimize maintenance requirements. A good builder will look down the road and make things as easy as possible for the homeowner so they can enjoy living there and not have to be saddled with constant maintenance.
7. EVERYTHING is new and selected by You, the homeowner
When you buy new, you control all material selections in the home. From paint and flooring to appliances and hardware, you decide what goes into your home.
8. Superior safety code compliance
Newly constructed homes often include fire safety features that may not be present in properties built years ago. We use fire retardant in our carpeting and in our insulation. In addition, all newly constructed homes are required to include hard-wired smoke detectors. These devices can provide better protection than battery-operated smoke detectors, which can fail to perform if their battery runs out. Hard-wired smoke detectors run on the electricity of the house and then have a battery backup for if the house power goes out.
9. Warranty
Our custom homes come with a two-year warranty. That means if your roof starts leaking or the water heater breaks during the warranty period, we’ll manage the repairs and pick up the tab. When you buy a resale home, even if you have a home inspection done, it still does not turn up hidden defects that you don’t find out about within the first year.
If you have questions about building a custom home in the Austin area, feel free to give us a ring anytime. 512-402-9222
