Ever dreamt of designing your own home? Renovating an older property can be enticing, but there are often many hidden costs. Buying off the plans may suit your budget, but the finished home often won’t address your specific needs. Then there are custom home builds – they are energy efficient, well thought out, designed with you in mind, and most importantly are great value for money.

Maximise your home’s value

Like any new home build the best place to start is by getting on board with a quality local builder – it will save you time and money. A quality builder should have many recent builds that they would be more than happy to talk to you about. As well as having a great reputation for quality, it often pays to use a local builder. Why local? Well, for instance we’ve been homes in the Hunter Valley since 1971 and over that time have developed some extremely solid relationships with the best suppliers, manufacturers and service providers in the area.

Of course, this is great for us because it makes running a business a lot easier, however the real value is for you, the homebuilder. Locally made materials, sourced from our preferred premium suppliers means you get:

• Exceptional rates that have already been negotiated to give you the best price possible
• The quality is assured because of our frequency of use and long-term knowledge of the products
• Face-to-face consultations and easily accessible showrooms
• No unnecessary freight and shipping costs added into your pricing

True value doesn’t just relate to costs

There is immense value in living in a home that 100% satisfies your and your family’s needs. Having carefully considered floor plans with the perfect room placement and dimensions, not to mention the amount of rooms, all can have an incredible impact on how satisfied you are with your home. Maybe you also want an ensuite to escape your kids at shower time, an entertaining deck to relax and getaway from it all, or maybe you need more than one study because you and your partner work from home.

If you are going to invest in a new home, why buy off the plans if you are going to end up having to run your business from the kitchen table or jostle between the kids and the bathroom sink while you try and get out the door for work? Yes, there are generally marginally more costs for a custom home design when compared with an off-the-plan build, but get it right from the beginning and you’ll never want to leave the home and never want to sell, which means more in your pocket in the long run – after all your home is a long-term investment.

So what pricing is involved with a typical custom build at Valley Homes?

If you have been nodding along up until this point, you are probably now thinking, so exactly how much more will this type of build cost, what is included and how should I budget? Well, firstly most people assume that building an off-the-plans home means everything is included in the price. That’s not always the case, take for instance landscaping. For some companies that is an extra cost or just something you have to sort out for yourself.

Also, if you want to upgrade any fittings, fixtures, floor coverings, windows, doors, appliances you name it from the standard inclusions, then this will obviously be added to your initial off-the-plan figure, and in some cases the option to upgrade just isn’t available, leaving you with a house that is less than you’d hoped for – but you still had to fork out a reasonable amount of money for it.

This is where custom home builds come into their own, because if you have secured the services of a quality local builder like Valley Homes to build your custom design home, everything is detailed upfront. So the figure you are given includes everything you have discussed and agreed to, as detailed on your plans without added extras. This includes your chosen materials, internal fit out, any external works agreed to and delivery date. So there won’t be any unexpected costs that you will need to budget for once the plans and price is set.

Of course, the actual pricing will depend on the finer details, such as how luxurious and/or expansive your ideal home is, however we pride ourselves on delivering value for money. So whatever inclusions or extras you need, you can trust that our Custom Design Service will deliver the best possible price and available materials. Forget about needing maintenance any time soon, you can just move in, relax and live the life you have always wanted.

If you want more information about the cost to build a custom design home, specific to your list of must-haves and block of land, contact our team of custom design specialists.