One of the top three questions when building a home is how long it will take to complete. The question is valid as there are many moving parts for the buyers with interest rate locks, scheduling the moving company, enrolling children into a new school, and more. The honest answer to how long it will take to build the home is that it depends. Please indulge me as we dive deeper into the building process, from submitting a permit to handing over the keys to your new home.
I will use our latest build as an example for this article. We designed and built a 2,600-square-foot, two-story home on a slab foundation. The permit process will vary depending on the location in which you are building. We built our home in Goochland County, Virginia, with a 2-6 week permit turnaround. While waiting for the permit to be issued, we focused on selections and hiring the contractors that would be necessary, from breaking ground to drywall.
As the county progresses on its permit issue process, we could follow along on the county website. We anticipated the permit release and penciled in the clearing and foundation contractors. As efficient as we could be at this stage, we lost a week due to weather rolling in between clearing and digging our footer. The following stages of block foundation, plumbing, backfill, and slab-on-grade installation went by in the blink of an eye. Our careful planning and communication paid dividends as we compensated for the lost week in record time.
Framing is an exciting stage because your vision and home start to come to life, and you can see them with each stick. It can also be frustrating as it will take one to several weeks to complete, and sometimes, it will seem like things are sitting still. Once you have finished and the home has a roof, windows, and doors installed, you are ready to start plumbing, mechanical, and electrical rough-ins. It took us three weeks to complete framing and an additional three weeks to meet all trades so we could have a framing and trade inspection. Fortunately, we finished everything at this stage by the two-month mark of our build.
It isn’t easy to estimate the length of a build due to the information above. It is difficult to pinpoint a timeline as weather and labor restraints can create delays that are hard to quantify. However, hanging sheetrock to finish is an entirely different discussion as we are in complete control without worrying about weather or labor challenges.
The finishes you choose for your home could add time to the schedule, so each schedule will need more or less time based on what you select. The quickest home can be completed in thirty days, which is fast and challenging to get right. We estimated forty-five days from sheetrock to closing to allow breathing room and arrived on schedule. If you have more features or a bigger home, factor in ninety or more days, as this portion of the schedule is when it all counts.
In closing, homes can be built in three months or longer depending on selections, fit and finish, and jurisdiction. The builder you choose to partner with should be able to give you a timeline so you can plan for the future. While they cannot be definitive initially, it is safe to lock in a closing date once the sheetrock is hung, as the builder has more control from this stage to turnover. To be safe, estimate a minimum of six months to build a home.
