So, in your head and in drawers around your current home you have stashes of ideas for your forever home.
But you’re getting a little itchy to get your show on the road. It’s time to start narrowing down all the ideas and it’s time to find land.
There is a big debate about whether you should design a home or first find property. The rule of thumb is that you do just a tad of decision making about what you really must have in a home and then set that aside while you search for the land it will be constructed on.
In searching for land, you will want to keep an eye out for future development plans for the area which might impact your viewscape. You’ll want to investigate codes and meet with county agricultural experts for help understanding what may be hidden in the beauty of your property like percolation issues for a possible septic system, issues associated with protected species in the area, projected blight damage to certain species of trees which may drastically change the appearance of your land.
Visit the property at various times of day. Watch for light changes and other aspects of the way the viewscape changes between early morning and evening hours. Make sure you understand any issues about building the drive to where your forever dream home might be. Check out the resources like electricity, water lines, sewer access, cable or dish TV. Check out your cell phone service.
Now it’s time for everyone who will be living at this new dream forever home to sit around the table and talk about what the ‘must haves’ are going to be. You will find that each person will have their own vision of the perfect forever home. You’ll want to make careful notes and do some research to find examples of what they are describing to help your design team get all these details into blueprints.
Once you have an idea of the size, location, and viewscapes of your land, it’s time to meet the design team. This is when all those clippings and wish list items start to take shape in a virtual drawing of your forever home.
You are almost home.