new construction homes

I'm glad we are starting to look now, way before we can afford it.  That way, we don't run the risk of loving the first house we see and getting too excited over it and having problems.  We can look at lots of houses now, since it will be at least 2 years until we could get a mortgage and have a downpayment.   We can really see what is out there and what we like or don't like. 

tashakota

But we've also purchased two pre-owned homes that need some serious work. 

We've avoided this by doing inspections with an inspector we chose...and in 2 of 3 cases also paid for a structural engineer's report. Invaluable really. Our first home our inspector said "water heater should go in about 30 days..." and guess what? it did...LOL. All over the floor...we let it because of the warranty we had...bit of wet linoleum and $35 later, new water heater

For the OP or whoever is reading and might be curious, new homes are inspected, for code aherence, etc...but many times the inspectors are on the take or in the builders back pocket...same with realtor recommended ones...always pick your own inspector preferably via word of mouth from others. Don't be afraid to get the S Engineer if you are unsure or really want an unbiased opinion on foundation or wall or structural issues.

rwbeagles

For the OP or whoever is reading and might be curious, new homes are inspected, for code aherence, etc...but many times the inspectors are on the take or in the builders back pocket...same with realtor recommended ones...always pick your own inspector preferably via word of mouth from others. Don't be afraid to get the S Engineer if you are unsure or really want an unbiased opinion on foundation or wall or structural issues.

I am also a fan of privately hired home inspection services----they can even be a good idea when you are SELLING a home because they might spot something you can address before putting the house on the market.

BEWARE: If you use an inspector on a new house and he says something should be changed and the builder doesn't want to change it, you may be out of luck unless the problem violates a building code.

Now for TOWN INSPECTORS AND CODES: like Gina said, the town inspector can be less than unbiased:) But there is also something else to keep in mind : NOT ALL building codes are the same. 

A 5 or 10 year old home might be a better value for you. I can tell you from experience that you can have a brand new house and in one year, at least in Texas, you will have a few cracks in the drywall from the house settling. A slightly older house will have already done so and you will be able to see that it has held together well. Also, you can certainly buy an older house for less but still borrow a $10k extra to make the improvements you want, such as a jacuzzi. Or, make it part of the purchase agreement with the stipulation that the extra things will simply be added, with documented receipts, to the sale of the house. That way you can finance that extra 5 or 10 grand and it will only be a few dollars more on the mortgage, at most.

 we bought a new house in a new subdivision about 4 yrs ago. it is probably something like ron refers to as cookie cutter.

 now we are selling, or will be in the next month or so. we never had any really major problems with the house. i think they cut every corner possible in building it though. instead of painting they did this spray on texture crap. it isnt worth a hill of beans. you cant wash it, and if you bump the wall too hard the texture comes off and makes a smooth spot. the windows are on par with what was in some of the nicer apartments we lived in. so is the carpet.

 
then there are the little details... like painting the kick plate outside the front door with the wrong type of paint so it peeled off immediately. leaving the labels on the furnace grills so now there is paper inside every one of them. the first time i changed the furnace filter i found not only caked up dry wall mud splattered all inside the return, but there was a nice big roll of masking tape in there too. (why?)

basically, it left me wondering if anyone still has pride in their work. or like gina said, why is something that used to be standard construction techniques now thought of as an upgrade?

i wouldnt not buy another new house, but i would want more hands on input into what was going on onsite.

i will never buy another house with an HOA again either. our's is one of the more lenient ones, and it still sucks.

right now i am looking at some much smaller and much older houses. (and cheaper)
 

I feel the same way as many of the other posters about buying a new home and will probably never buy one.  I like the character and uniquness you get with a little older home, even if it does need work.  I second the inspection suggestion with someone you hired yourself.  It gives you a better idea of what you are getting into at least and may help you bargain down the price. 

Something else to keep in mind when buying a new home in a subdivision that isn't finished or that is finished but not filled is the neighborhood.  I personally prefer to buy in an established neighborhood where for the most part I can tell how the neighbors have kept their yards, maintained the outside of their home, not left run down cars in the driveway, trash on the side of the house etc etc.  Where I live, there are certain areas that have their own reputations.  For example, not far from me is mostly college students with a lot of rental homes.  They are loud and throw parties and don't care how the house or yard look.  That may be just fine for a young couple, but for someone trying to start a family, that may become  a nuisance.  As a buyer, that is something I always look at and as a seller, you can't really change what your neighbors do.  I know with an HOA this isn't necessarily the case, but there are plenty of new subdivisions, around here at least, that don't have an HOA as far as I know.  You don't know what kinds of neighbors you may end up with in the future if it isn't a somewhat established neighborhood.  Some of that too has to do with what the property value in that area does and only time will really tell. 

I hope that made sense and didn't come across in a derogatory way.  That is not what I am intending at all...just pointing out some other things to think about rather than just the quality of the home itself. 

I love love love having a new home.  No one else has ever lived in it, everything is new and unused.  I like it.   My first new home we built and my husband has previous experience so he was at the site like 5 times a week.  Good thing too...it was in Missouri so we had basements there...well our home was suppose to have windows from top to bottom on one side so the basement too would have a wall of windows.  Well they accidentally poured a normal basement with a cement wall.  They had to cut one wall of the cement.  The builders made empty promises.  Make sure everything is in writing.  They agreed to upgrade our appliances for going past our finish date by like 2 months....but that never happened.  Trying to get them to do things or fix things is impossible!!!  It was the worst experience ever.  It was a corner house and we wanted the driveway poured to enter from the less busy street.....yeah...wishful thinking!  I swore I would never build a house again.

So now in Texas I wanted a new home again....I didn't build this time though....I bought the model.  Way less of a headache and it's a small sub division with only 34 houses. One way in and one way out so no thru traffic...no HOA.  I couldnt be happier and it's been 2.5 years now.

boneyjean

You don't know what kinds of neighbors you may end up with in the future if it isn't a somewhat established neighborhood.

That's the biggest negative I see to buying a new home. I guess if you bought a new home in a very upscale area, it might not be an issue. I've owned 2 new homes in new subdivisions and in both cases, the neighborhood began to change for the worse after a few years. If the homes are relatively low-priced, you'll sometimes find quite a few of them are rentals and that's almost never a good sign. After going thru some rough changes with two homes, we chose to buy in a gated community with an HOA. Our house was 10 yrs old at that time but it still felt very modern and needed on minor cosmetic changes. Our HOA is very lenient but they do maintain all the common areas and so the development still looks as nice as it did when we moved in 7 years ago. I've heard horror stories about HOAs though, so I'm not suggesting anyone go that direction. Fortunately, it's worked out okay for us.

Totally nitpicky here BUT...I would not trade the BIG HUGE pecan and oak trees...wiiiiiide twisty roads in our neighborhood for any money lol. I swear the new places...they have NO trees or little baby ones...and streets that once a car parks on them...feel waay too narrow. The summer here is bearable because of these big ole' trees...our heating bill is high...but imagining it WITHOUT the shade of the big girl out front?? truly frightening LOL.

I like things big...that's why I like Texas....that includes the trees and roads LOL!

rwbeagles

Totally nitpicky here BUT...I would not trade the BIG HUGE pecan and oak trees...

I completely agree. I love big trees and mature landscaping and when you buy a new home, it can be many years before a tree even casts a shadow.  The homes in the older, downtown area have some of the most beautiful trees and bushes. Yep, definitely a huge plus for an older home.

oh and they do have their downsides for sure! Stepping on acorn caps (owie!) raking leaves, if you aren't careful where they are, plumbing issues...but gosh I love em! (not that I am an actual tree-hugger tho LOL)

My other pet peeve is how CLOSE the new home builders, build to the one next door. Why do they do that? We looked at some late 90's builds that literally you could reach across to the neighbor's window...and window's lined up so you could see in there...I cna understand that in Cali where space is at a premium but in TEXAS? *lol*

Oy! Combine that with the en vogue thing of no fences allowed and that's waaay to neighborly for me haha!

rwbeagles

My other pet peeve is how CLOSE the new home builders, build to the one next door.

We have .26 acres, which is tiny compared to some other areas of the country, but is large by Calif. standards. Still, I daydream about living on an acre or more. The older I get, the less I like being close to people. Most of the new homes in this area have a lot size of .15 or so. Top that off with no trees for privacy and it's pretty cozy living

Fer reals...I guess it's good if you're the vouyer type LOL! Have a "Rear Window" of one's own!

Nicole,

If you have any questions or need advice let me know. DH and I just bought our house last year at this time, and the year before that we spent saving and looking. We bought a small starter home, its big enough for us and the dogs for now especially since we don't want kids anytime soon. We live in Jefferson Hills and I have to say I absolutely love it. I love it out here, and the area and even though its a bit away from everything, it's definately worth it. Not to mention the school district is great for if/when we do have children.

I don't blame you for not wanting to live in the city, I wouldn't either! 

jennyx0023

Nicole,

If you have any questions or need advice let me know. DH and I just bought our house last year at this time, and the year before that we spent saving and looking. We bought a small starter home, its big enough for us and the dogs for now especially since we don't want kids anytime soon. We live in Jefferson Hills and I have to say I absolutely love it. I love it out here, and the area and even though its a bit away from everything, it's definately worth it. Not to mention the school district is great for if/when we do have children.

I don't blame you for not wanting to live in the city, I wouldn't either! 

Thanks!  It's been great reading what everyone's opinions are.  It's just such an overwhelming thing, to buy something you have to pay 3x as much for over the next 30 years!  Eeeek!

We've been looking to move a bit more north, though we live in the south now and like it, we just commute so much to Buffalo that it would be nice to be by the highway!  You're not that far from us, actually -- we live in West Mifflin, on the Munhall border.

We've thought about either going with a starter home or buying something we want to stay in for quite some time.  Unfortunately, I'm afraid if we do starter home we'll turn into my folks -- starter home + child = not moving into nice home until kid is off at college! LOL.  Though we are still young, by the time we save up and get a house and want to have kids, we'll be 26 or so while I feel is around a good time to start a family.  We haven't ruled out smaller starter homes, but here in West Mifflin houses are around 90-140k for something that only looks "ok" at least from the descriptions.  For not that much more I feel like we can get something pretty nice and just be done with it for a while.  What made you go for a starter home, if you don't me asking?  Actually maybe I'll just PM you!

I agree that the neighborhood and surrounding area is at least as important as the actual house.  Though my folks lived in the suburbs of Buffalo, I practically grew up at my grandparents in the city.  It was a nice area then, going back maybe 10 years now.  A few months ago we drove through the area and it is the PITS - graffiti everywhere, all buildings boarded up, even my grandparent's home has gone to the dumps (it was sold after they both passed many years ago).  Something that was once a nice city neighborhood with a park is now druggie haven. So I'm thinking that maybe whoever mentioned not knowing what kind of neighborhood a new development will turn into has a really good point. 

We've only lived in Pittsburgh now for about 2 years... so long enough to know where not to go at night, but not long enough to know what's good or bad.  We "accidently" moved into a ghetto when we moved here from Albany....  basically we had visited once or twice, place looked nice so we signed a lease.  Well, the scary people were hiding those days!  Turned out to be horrible, most of the (huge, 1000 apartment) complex was on federal assistance so partied all day AND all night, since they couldn't work and *gasp* earn money!  It was in a really nice borough, it just happened to be a bad area of that really nice borough.  I even called the police station before moving there and they wouldn't tell me anything -- shoulda been my first clue!

So I guess for now we start looking at *everything* -- even things we don't think we will like -- until we really decide what we DO like, and get to do more research on the areas.  Pittsburgh is very much a city where a block can be amazing million dollar homes and a street or two over is ghetto.  The suburbs are a little better, but we've seen it out here as well (Homestead, anyone?)

Next step, how soon is too soon to sit down with mortgage people to find out what would help us get a better interest rate, etc?  No point in waiting until we NEED a loan to find out why we can't get one, right? We have really good credit, but we're young and haven't held the same jobs/apartment very long, so I know that goes against us, but we've already paid off one new car and are making good strides in our student loans.... gotta count for something, right?