What to Do If You Don’t Trust Your Custom Home Builder
Let me tell you a story. A current client of ours has a friend who’s also building a custom home right now. Their friend and her husband already designed their house and now they’re focusing on digging and foundation work at the moment. Pretty exciting, right? Not so much. They are a little concerned about the builder because of a recent event.
Before this all happened I was asked about this builder. Well, I happen to know of the builder, so I told my client to have her friend call me so I could talk through some key questions to ask preemptively so they could possibly get a better foothold on the project. Unfortunately, they never called. Instead, they went ahead with this builder, they dug a hole, and put the framework up for the concrete foundation. Meanwhile, the friend’s husband went to check out the site one day and noticed there was no rebar or steel reinforcing in the concrete. When he kindly asked the builder why this was the case, the builder responded that they didn’t need steel reinforcing because it’s over engineered.
BIG RED FLAG. In a nutshell, it's not the builder’s job to decide if something's over engineered. Their job is to build per the prints that got approved for a building permit. If they wanted to fight that fight with sound reasoning and a structural engineer on their side, they should’ve done that before they got their building permit. In this case, the building permit showed steel reinforcing in the walls, plus rebar was noted in the builder’s specification list. It’s obvious that this builder didn’t want to pay for rebar, the material, or the labor to do it. Instead, he was hoping to cover it up so no one would see.
It makes me crazy when good people in good faith hire someone they assume they can trust, only for it to be broken. Luckily, my client’s friend was smart enough to spot it before it was covered up. Of course, now that the jig is up, the builder is doing it. However, they have bigger problems: they’re stuck in an adversarial relationship that’s only going to get worse. Nobody trusts anybody.
What to do when your home builder does something shady.
So, what could they have done preemptively for this? For one, they shouldn’t have hired this guy in the first place (that’s obvious). Secondly, they should’ve asked more questions. But most importantly, there were probably enough red flags in the community about this builder—they wouldn't have had to dig very far to find some information about him. Don’t be afraid to Google search!
If you want to avoid the same thing happening to you, ask for references, call those references, and ask really specific questions from those references. Keep in mind, people are going to be eager to tell you that their home is beautiful, and maybe that the process was hard, but they made it through. Ask them to give you details about the rough patches. Ask them about timelines and communication.
That being said, if you find yourself in the same situation as this couple—where it’s still early, but they’ve already dug the foundation, and they know it’s going to be a struggle until the end—fire the builder. This couple has grounds to get out of the contract. The builder went against the building permit, which is the law.
If you choose to fire the builder, here are a few things to keep in mind: For one, you're not going to get anywhere near that price with another builder. You probably signed with your initial builder because of their low prices, which the newer, better builders won’t be able to fulfill. Any builder who’s coming into an existing mess is going to charge a premium because it's hard to find someone to take over a project like that. Hopefully you’ll have some money reserved, because it’s worth it to fire them for someone better!
On the other hand, if you decide to move forward with the builder, you’ll need to have an owner's rep as a middleman, like an architect, to ensure that the house is going to be built per the contract. If you, the homeowner, are familiar with the construction process, you can certainly do this yourself. Keep in mind though, it might be better to have that third person as the intermediary when things are tense.
You don’t need to go through the custom home process alone.
Although we talked about some nerve-wracking scenarios today, building a home you love is one of the most rewarding things you will ever do for your family. As a team of experienced and licensed architects, we know a thing or two about navigating your custom home-building process, and we’ll help you avoid potential pitfalls. So, join our FREE Facebook home-building community, Springhouse Collaborative! Whether you need a second opinion, a place to vent, or a friend who understands the journey, we offer a safe space where no one has a financial position in their answer. See you there!
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When it comes to designing and building a custom home, nothing beats having a trusted, experienced team of architects on your side. Let’s set up a call to meet, discuss your goals, answer your questions, and settle your fears. We can’t wait to meet you!