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6 Ways To Customize Your New Home That You Don't Even Know About

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New home builders have a list of upgrades that are available for your new home. The list may include a beautiful, open staircase in the foyer or a vaulted ceiling in the family room. There are, however, ways to customize your new home that aren't published on any list. You have to know what to ask for, but most builders are more than happy to oblige.

1. Egress Window: If you live in an area where finished basements are a popular DIY project, you should add an egress window to your new home. Providing a means of exit is not only safer in the event of a fire, but it is quickly becoming law as municipalities across the country change their building requirements. Installing an egress window during the rough framing process is relatively inexpensive, but the price increases dramatically if you decide to do so at a later date. 

2. Extra Bibbs: Most new home builders only install one hose bibb in their new homes. While that may be enough for most people, if you are an avid gardener, you can always ask for more. The request needs to made before rough plumbing starts, however, to keep costs down.

3. Christmas Tree Placement: While this may seem silly, if you put up a Christmas tree every year, you will want to consider where you will be placing it and discussing its location with your builder. You need to make sure there is an electrical socket (or two) located behind the tree. If you are a holiday light fanatic, you may want to plan on adding extra outdoor outlets at the roofline to make stringing lights easier.

4. Ceiling Fans: Most new homes are built with limited ceiling lights. There is often just a chandelier in the dining room and task lighting in the kitchen. There are rarely ceiling lights throughout the rest of the home, particularly in the bedrooms. Upgrading your electrical package to have all the rooms prepped for ceiling fans ensures that the electrical connections will be available for you to install either lights or ceiling fans in the future. 

5. Light in the Shower: Showers can be dark, especially when you are trying to shave your face or your legs. The simple addition of a ceiling light inside the shower can make all the difference. You just need to put in the request to your new home builder's team early in the process. It is an inexpensive add-on to your electrical package. 

6. Insulation: New home builders automatically put in the appropriate R-value of insulation for the area of the country that you live in. That is a given. What you may not realize, however, is that you can ask for the interior walls to be insulated. While true, sound-absorbing acoustical panels are very expensive, you can request that your builder add the traditional batt insulation between your interior walls. It will help to muffle the sound between rooms at a fraction of the cost. 

Customizing your home sometimes means asking about upgrades that aren't printed anywhere, but that will increase your future enjoyment. 

To learn more, contact a home builder.


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