Building a house is stressful, but such a fun experience to look back on. There is so much to think about at each stage, but I will outline 6 major things you should do once your house gets framed in. These will save you time and money down the road!
I have to give my husband all of the credit for his creativity that I will share in this post. He had a lot on his plate. Work, communicating with our contractor, physically doing a lot of the work himself, thinking of these things along the way, and actually implementing them. (Not to mention, being a dad!) I’m very lucky to have someone so creative and handy!
So, let’s get right to it! When building a house, these are a few things we did once the framing started that saved us time and money in the long run! I highly recommend you consider doing these if you’re building a house, if you haven’t done so already.
1. CREATE ATTIC SPACE WITH LEFTOVER PLYWOOD
Go dumpster diving and find all the scrap wood you can. Framers throw away some large, perfectly good pieces of wood. My husband pulled out as much as was salvageable and used it to build an attic floor. We didn’t plan to have attic space in some areas, but then viola! The more the merrier! It took a bit to piece it together, but once he had them in place, he just nailed it down. That way if we ever needed extra storage space, it was ready!
2. USE A PVC PIPE TO HIDE CORDS
Take some PVC and secure one end to the studs behind where your TV will be placed. Make sure the opening is flush with the studs. Secure the other end of the PVC to the studs near an electrical outlet. This way you will be able to have your TV/any cord on your fireplace mantle run through this tube so it is completely hidden.
3. INSTALL WOOD CROSS BARS BETWEEN CEILING STUDS FOR FUTURE FIXTURES
Building a house of our very home was always a dream of ours. However, being young and without a ton of money, we had to build what we could afford while planning to upgrade later. One of the things we wanted were wood beams on our living room ceiling, but decided to hold off until later. To save time, money, and a giant mess down the road, we put in the infrastructure to accommodate the beams. This meant putting in wood blocks between the ceiling trusses about every 16 inches or so. This is necessary to hold the weight of the beams. Maybe you don’t want beams, but perhaps a chandelier in your foyer or over your dining room table one day. This would be something to think about now before the drywall goes in.
4. RUN A CABLE WIRE TO THE ATTIC FOR A TV ANTENNA
Now that we have our forever home, and a mortgage, we are all about budgeting and ways to cut costs. One way we saved money is by getting rid our TV subscription and bought a digital antenna. To get cable in every room of the house with one wire, we ran a coax cable from the attic to the basement. This way, the cord is already behind the walls, and we are be able to get cable in all rooms, if we wish.
5. THINK ABOUT TYPES OF CLOSET DOORS
This seems minor, but it caused a huge headache, so I’m just putting it out there. Our house plans included bifold closet doors, which I was fine with. But after worrying about the girls pinching their fingers in them, and the doors constantly coming off the track, I decided I wanted double doors on the bedroom closets. I, of course, made this decision after the closets were framed in and the drywall was on. Bad choice. The double doors did not fit, and my husband ended up cutting the drywall back on each door, and we had to re-drywall most of the walls….ourselves. So, if you think you might be on the fence about type of closet door…decide before they start drywalling!
6. TAKE A VIDEO AND LOTS OF PICTURES!
Before the drywall goes up, take TONS of pictures, and even better, take a video of the house. You can look back at these pictures and videos anytime to remind yourself of what is behind each wall. This will be helpful if you need to cut into a wall for a project or renovation.
Anyone else build a house and have any recommendations on things to consider at different stages of the build? I’d love to hear other suggestions or experiences!
If you are still working on your house plan, check out my post about things you need to think about before you choose your house plan here >>
Get my free 8-month build timeline! It includes us doing a lot of the work, which is noted on it, and gives you an idea of what you can do yourself, how long it will take you, and at what point is a good time to work on each item. We created this for ourselves at the beginning, revised it along the way, and now have the final timeline. Send me your email below and I’ll send it to you!