Not wanting to look at something else that needs to be fixed? Hoo boy, can I relate! How nice would it be to answer the question “what do you want to do this weekend?” with “go to the beach!” instead of “we could stain trim, or tile the kitchen, or patch the roof, or….”

Don’t get me wrong. We definitely understand that “new home” doesn’t necessarily equal “no problems” but for a brief moment in time, the appeal of moving somewhere “finished” was undeniable. But when we caught ourselves saying “we could add a bedroom above the living room” and “we could build a loft and catwalk at the mezzanine level and connect the great room to the sleeping porch” it became clear that no matter where we live, we will always dream up new remodeling projects. So, ultimately, moving would simply have meant trading one big renovation for another, and the truth is, we’ve grown pretty fond of this “bungalow insanity.”

Most new construction is simply not as good as stuff built decades ago. Within a few years of moving in, the condo needed a new roof, new juliet balconies, deck repairs, replaced doors and locks, and a new garage door. There’s more repairs to come, but we wiped out a large chunk of our reserves taking care of stuff we would not have anticipated needing to address for 15 to 20 years.

Our inspector told us that this was a national problem; aside from sub-par construction, new systems aren’t always designed to go with other new systems, and old houses breathe better overall.

New homes have a whole different set of problems and upkeep requirements.

If you are thinking new construction, I’d suggest being there from the design phase on so you have control over all aspects.

What we found was that most required more work than ours, were out of our price range, or we further out than we wanted to live.

We took a month off from projects, and then jumped in to tackle the bigger stuff. Currently, we are working on the bathroom addition that we hoped we’d have done last November.

Have we ever wanted to jump ship? YES!!! But, at this point our house is so customized to us that even if we moved into a “completed” house I would be begging Chris to tile the fireplace “like our old house.”

If you do decide to move make sure you take into consideration all the costs of moving: Realtor’s fees, moving van, cost to get your house ready to sell, closing costs on your new loan (easy to forget about that since it’s usually rolled into the loan), etc…. Then compare that to the cost of hiring a GC to “finish” the house you’re in. Then of course there are the intangibles: Do you like your neighborhood? How’s the commute? If your house was “done” would it meet all of your needs?

Good luck!

This is what I’m afraid of. I think where we’d really like to be is to the point where all the “have to” work is done, and we still have some long term projects to satisfy those remodeling urges when they kick up.