Covid-19 may have slowed our normal lifestyles and altered old routines, but it doesn’t have to impact the planning of your dream home build. With many Australians having more time on their hands, now is the perfect time to create vision boards and plan to build a new home when your life returns to normal.

Q: So what are some of the things you could be doing right now?

A: Research, research, research!

Research is one of the easiest first steps of turning your dreams into a reality, especially as internet access is available to most Australians and many businesses are either online or only a phone call away. This means your custom design planning can be done without walking out of your front door.

New home research step 1 – vision board

Researching a new home build can seem like a daunting task at first, as there are many bits of information required over the entire duration of planning and building, but if you break it into manageable chunks it’s really quite simple. Plus, it’s very easy to get started, as step one in your home research journey is by far the most fun – creating a vision board!

If you haven’t heard the term vision board before, it simply means a visual collection of images, trends and ideas laid out on a page. Vision boards can be physical boards, like your old-fashioned corkboard, or an online document, such as a word doc or even a Pinterest board.

To fill your vision board all you need to do is spend some time trawling websites, catalogues and brochures and either copy or physically cut out the things that stand out to you as beautiful, striking or just ‘your dream style’ and pop them on your board. Things to collect are ideas you like, trends in finishes and interiors, design inspiration, and even architectural plans that align with your own style. During the process you might find that you change your style and remove ideas and inspiration that you previously thought were great. This is exactly why vision boards are such excellent tools – they are a refining process.

Vision boards allow you to play around, to see what colours, finishes, interior design features and materials work well together and give you time to try different custom design combinations. You might start your vision board thinking your new home will have loads of sharp lines and bold colours, but by the end you might realise that you actually love neutral tones and natural wood.

Vision boards aren’t just about looking inwards either. The location of your land may impact the style you lean towards. If your new home build is going to take place in Port Stephens or Newcastle, you might find yourself drawn towards coastal style elements. Or for somewhere like the Hunter Valley, country finishes and acreage floor plans might be more your thing. Whatever it is that you like, eventually, what you will be left with is a visual representation of your design style, giving both you and your potential architect or new home builder a solid starting point to start your custom design.

New home research step 2 – design and floor plans

After your vision board is finished and you know your personal style and current trends, your next step in the new home research journey is who is going to design it. So you need to decide one of two things. Are you going to seek architectural plans and then engage a separate builder? Or are you looking to streamline the process to build a new home and go directly to a new home builder that offers a custom design service? With budget being a big considerations for most, the latter option tends to be more cost effective. But whatever option you think you might choose, before you make any final decisions the next step is…you guessed it, more research!

Of course, face-to-face meetings with potential architects or builders are a very important part of the process. After all, you need to determine if the person or firm you will work with has similar values, understands your vision, and generally makes you feel that you can trust them to bring your new home to life. Although the current restrictions might make this difficult for some people, fortunately there is always online platforms, such as Zoom or Skype, that allow you to be able to make eye contact with the person you are speaking to and build a rapport.

 

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Here at Valley Homes we have measures in place to help you navigate the custom design planning process without compromising your safety. Simply call or email us and we can discuss setting up a socially distanced meeting or online meeting to discuss your new home build. We’d love to take a look at your newly created vision board and initiate the design and quote process for you. If you have land – Valley Homes offers a free concept design service, and work with you to design the home you want.