Whether you’re renovating or building from scratch, no doubt you have a vision of the end product. Find out how these locals brought their dream homes to life.
Alan and Sharon
Lovegrove
First-time home builders Alan and Sharon Lovegrove had a myriad of design ideas in mind for their dream home, which they were keen to locate near the Townsville Golf Course for the uninterrupted views of the greens.
“We wanted to take advantage of the view and the breeze, so we designed our patio (which is the entire width of the house) to be an extension of the kitchen and living area,” Alan says. “It was important to us to have a big activity area for our grandkids and we’re very happy with how it turned out.”
Alan and Sharon chose New Home Solutions as their building partner because their business model gave them confidence and their administration back-up and pricing also appealed.
“Having a builder with an internal architect meant we could communicate our thoughts directly to that person,” Alan says. “Some builders don’t have an internal architect and we found in our research that some communication was lost between us, the builder and their external architect.”
New Home Solutions’ 5 top tips for home builders
1. Identify your ideal new home layout with your land or home site already known (or at the very least with a chosen aspect and orientation to the natural elements) in order to achieve a smart and energy-efficient design.
2. Make sure your new home is designed to control and maximise breezes as well as limit the effects of the summer sun. Get it wrong and you will probably move.
3. Research thoroughly and don’t decide too early. There are some clever sales strategies out there designed to get you committed before you identify the best value. Best price is usually NOT best value.
4. Talk to past and current customers either during the build process or recently after. Most will give you advice on how close the starting price was to the finished price.
5. Choose a builder experienced in building your style of project and one with regular tradespeople who work for them on a regular basis.
