7 Overlooked Things When Buying a New Construction Home

You did it! You’ve done your initial pre-construction inspections, waited a few months for the walls to go up, and now your new construction home is move-in ready. But, wait! Before you rush off to closing, there are a couple more important inspections you and your builder need to do. Typically before closing, your builder performs one or more walkthroughs of your home with you. These walkthroughs allow your builder to explain how things operate in your new house and give you the final opportunities to inspect your home and record things that need repair, aren’t operating correctly, or show signs of poor workmanship.

It’s very important to identify every little thing that could be wrong with your new house: drywall chips and cracks, paint splotches, poor caulking, misaligned doors, inoperable outlets, etc. The final walkthroughs are one of the few opportunities you’ll have to fix anything before the builder splits.

Besides major defects, here’s a list of 7 things that buyers overlook when doing their final walkthroughs.

Water temperature. Check the water temperature at each faucet and shower. Ensure you are getting adequate cold and hot water and that the hot water temperature is satisfactory. In multi-level homes especially, with bathroom faucets and showers sometimes very far away from a water heater, you might experience lukewarm water temperatures. Water temperature can be corrected by adjusting your hot water temperature dial. Note, that if you do this, all of your faucet and shower temperatures will change, so those outlets that were hot before will get hotter. This is very important to consider when there are young children in the house. In some cases, your shower mixing valve temperature limiter needs to be adjusted to allow more or less hot water through your pipes.

Recessed lighting. Recessed lights are a type of lighting fixture installed into the ceiling or wall. They are designed to sit flush with the surface for a sleek and polished finish. Sometimes the drywall cutouts for these lights are too large causing unsightly gaps between the light fixture and the ceiling. Other times, the recessed light just needs to be adjusted so that it properly fills the cutout.

Check all doors. Check all doors to make sure they open and close properly without any rubbing or catching on the floor or door frame. Make sure all doors lock properly. Then thoroughly inspect the weather stripping around external doors and ensure there are no tears, the stripping completely encloses the door frame (in other words, goes all the way to the top, all the way to bottom, and all the way to the sides), and that there are no gaps between the door and the outside. This is best done during the day by looking for light coming in from around the door edges especially underneath the door and by feeling for any significant airflow from around the door.

Paint color. Typically, builders will provide you with a can of trim pain and a can of interior wall paint. If you didn’t get these, make sure you ask for them. In addition, make sure you get the exact name and formula for the paint. Sometimes, builders will just tell you the paint brand and color, like Sherwin Williams City Loft. However, this is not sufficient, since there are many types of paint sheens. Sheen refers to the finish of the paint, or how shiny a paint is. Different paint companies may have different sheen options. For example, Benjamin Moore features 7 sheens. From lowest to highest sheen, they are:

• flat
• matte
• eggshell
• pearl/low lustre
• satin
• semi-gloss
• high gloss

Make sure you are informed of the correct paint brand, color, and sheen. Better yet, make sure you get the paint formula and paint code.

The breaker box. Make sure you understand your breaker box or electrical panel. Breakers are the safety switches that automatically shut off power to part of your home when the electrical circuit overloads. Homes have many breakers, and they all live together in the electrical panel — the “brain” of your home’s electrical system. Ensure that the breaker switches are labeled and that you know what electrical appliances are connected to what breaker. It might come as a surprise as to what devices shut on/off when you flip a breaker and you want to know what’s normal and what’s not.

Cabinets and bi-fold closet doors. Open and close all cabinets and closet doors. Make sure there is no rubbing, the doors open smoothly, and if you have soft-close cabinet doors, that they close softly.

Washer and dryer. If your home came with a washer and dryer, go ahead and turn on the washer and dryer during your walkthrough. Listen for any unusual sounds and look for any violent vibrations, shaking, or walking. If your washer is on a tile floor, you might experience loud rattling and vibrating throughout the house. You might need to invest in a plastic washing pan, or sound and vibration dampening mats or feet. These are the anti-vibration floor pads I use: Anti-Walk Silent Feet – Anti-Vibration Washer and Dryer Machine Floor Pads