New construction

Seventeen of these.
Two going up right now.

A third of what I have closed was new construction, most of it in Richmond. That means I have walked these houses when they were stakes in the mud, and I know which questions get expensive if you ask them late. Here is what the build actually looks like from the inside.

Before you tour a model

Bring me to the first visit. The agent in the builder's sales office represents the builder, and some builders will not let you add representation later if you registered on your own. Having someone on your side of the table costs you nothing. Skipping it can cost you.

What the build looks like

Aerial view of a Shiloh Cove homesite with the lot boundary outlined, neighboring homes at earlier stages of construction

01 · The lot

Pick the lot before the floor plan.

You can change almost everything about the house. You cannot move it. In both Shiloh Cove and Magnolia Pointe the lots backing to the treeline go first, and the difference in how the house feels is bigger than the difference in price.

Walk it before you sign. Stand roughly where the back door will be and look at what you will actually be looking at for the next ten years. Ask which direction the afternoon sun comes from, and ask what is planned for the empty ground behind you.

Interior framing of a new build with water lines and a drain stack roughed in through the bare subfloor

02 · Framing and rough-in

Go to the rough-in walk-through.

Plumbing and electrical are in, the walls are still open, and everything is still cheap to move. This is when you find out an outlet landed on the wrong wall, or that the pantry reads smaller in person than it did on paper.

I tell every buyer not to skip it. It takes twenty minutes and it is the last time the house shows you how it is actually put together.

A new-construction kitchen with cabinets partly installed and quartz countertops in place, flooring not yet down

03 · Drywall and selections

The selection window closes early.

Once drywall goes up the house starts looking finished, and by then the choices that matter are usually already made. Cabinets, counters, flooring and fixtures get ordered a long way ahead of the day you see them installed.

On one Shiloh Cove build, buyers could still pick between LVP and engineered hardwood at no difference in cost, but only if they were under contract before materials were ordered. Being early is worth real money here, and being late is quiet about costing you.

A completed new-construction home on Mission Drive in Magnolia Pointe, Richmond

04 · Closing and the first year

The house is not done when you close.

Write everything down at the final walk-through, including the things that feel too small to mention. A list in writing before closing is a different conversation than a phone call in March.

The builders I work with in Richmond generally stand behind what they put up. Most warranties still run a year, and most people forget they have one. Put a reminder at month eleven.

On new construction specifically

Not theory.
The same streets, repeatedly.

Thirteen of these were in Magnolia Pointe alone, which means I have watched what those lots do in different weather, which floor plans people end up regretting, and what each builder will and will not adjust once the slab is poured. That is the part you cannot get from a brochure.

Neighborhood guides →

Still deciding

Tell me which neighborhood you are looking at. I will tell you which lots I would take and which I would not.

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