Customize Without Building Custom
It’s still a part of the American dream for some: find a piece of land that is all yours and build the perfect house upon it. There’s something about the idea that harkens back to the pioneering days of our history, whether it’s the adventurous French and British who first saw potential at the place where the Monongahela and Allegheny formed the Ohio, or the less adventurous souls who made Sedona a hot spot in the 1980’s. Establishing the homestead on a virgin piece of ground connects today’s buyer with something in the American psyche.

Of course, it was a lot easier finding a buildable lot back in the pioneer days.

These days, the business of homebuilding has evolved to the point where most builders, even custom homebuilders, have pointed their new construction into established or even exclusive neighborhoods. The modern subdivision creates home lots which have water and sewer utilities connected at prices that are minimized by the economies of scale that developing a whole community bring, and the close proximity of working in one neighborhood allows the builder to work more efficiently, giving the buyer the most house for their dollar.

Even with all the advantages that a neighborhood gives a home buyer, many consumers are still attracted to the vision of their own piece of land, and the privacy and independence that comes with it. Buying your own lot means that you won’t be sharing in the costs of developing all your neighbors’ lot, or the financing costs the developer has incurred. And a percentage of the buying public comes by their land through inheritance or the residue of some business enterprise, giving them the opportunity to build a new home without incurring one of the major expenses of the project, the cost of the land.

“The beauty of it is that a homeowner can truly customize the home to whatever extent he or she is comfortable,” says Mary Schumacher Becker, Vice President of Schumacher Homes. Ohio-based Schumacher builds on private lots throughout much of the country, and has an office in Greensburg. “Consumers today want to customize the kind of coffee they get at Starbucks. They can really pick whatever part of the process they want – the lot, the floor plan, the style of the home, or whatever suits their needs.”

Regardless of how you came across the property, if you want to build on your own lot you have a variety of options for executing the dream home project. Most of the options boil down to two essential questions: Where do I build on the lot? And who will I get to build the house?

As you might imagine, the first question brings into play a few significant issues about the land. The first and most obvious is topography. If you’re land is in Western PA, there’s a better than even chance that some of the land is higher in elevation than the rest. In fact, there’s a good chance that some of the land could be a ski slope! Evaluating what part of the lot makes the most sense to place the house is something best left to the experts, because proper use of the land will give the buyer the best chance to build what he wants by minimizing any inefficiency in construction or utility placement.

In addition to making sure the topography or soil conditions don’t limit your choices, it’s important to make sure that you don’t select a site that is impractical for potable water or sewers. Many of the private lots in our market are located off of public sewer systems, so it’s important to make sure your soils will support a septic system, and finding the ideal location on the site for visibility before you find where the water mains are could mean your ‘ideal’ spot requires a couple of pump stations to draw water at the new home.

A good engineer or architect can be helpful in locating the ideal site, but you may also want to use this problem as an opportunity to get a builder involved.

That’s what Rich Loperfito did when he decided to build a home for the first time. Loperfito and his wife knew they didn’t want to be part of a big neighborhood, and got Schumacher Homes involved to build there new house. “We wanted to have more acreage than you can in a neighborhood, and we wanted to have neighbors but just not too close,” says Loperfito. “We also liked the fact that we wouldn’t have to comply with any design standards that some neighborhood association might impose.”The Loperfito’s built a single-level three bedroom home in Salem Township, just south of Route 22 on the way to Greensburg. “It was actually very easy to do. Schumacher handled everything for us.”

There are a lot of do’s and don’ts of selecting a homebuilder that aren’t any different whether you’re building on your own lot or within a builder’s community. Especially in slower economic times, the financial strength of the contractor, his ability to have enough purchasing power to get you good prices and keep the subcontractors moving, is important. A builder with a long track record, who checks out solidly with the Better Business Bureau and the local homebuilders’ association will have the experience to handle your project effectively and have the staying power to service the home’s warranties (especially the longer warranty systems, like the heating and
air-conditioning or windows).

For a single private lot situation, you’ll also want to find a builder who has access to a wider variety of floor plans and elevations, or to an architect that will customize his existing plans to your site. At the early stages, this kind of builder can often see benefits to the site that will allow you to accomplish your lifestyle goals (for example, direct kitchen access from the garage), without forcing an awkward design on you. Also, at this stage, a builder who is experienced with single lot projects in your area will be helpful in identifying the utility access so that your home is placed in the best location on the property for operating considerations, like water pressure or easy fiber optic connection.

Because yours won’t be the first hilly or rocky lot in Western PA, you should be able to find a custom builder who has experienced the conditions of your homestead before. There have also been increases in the number of larger builders who have come into the area with experience in building on the owner’s lot, even though they may build hundreds or even thousands of homes each year around the nation. Wayne Homes, K. Hovnanian and Schumacher Homes are regional or national firms who have been building an increasing number of homes in the metropolitan area this decade, although the overall number is still less than 100. There has also been a renewed focus from some of Pittsburgh’s community builders.

Our region’s biggest builder, Ryan Homes, has served this segment of the market through its Ryan Owner/Builder program, which provides homeowners who act as their own contractor with Ryan Homes’ plans and specifications. In recent years, however, Ryan has begun to build on independent lots that are within close proximity to a Ryan Homes community. “We want to be able to service the customer as well as if he or she was in one of our neighborhoods, so we’ll use plans from the nearby neighborhood and have the resources to work as though it was,” says Ryan’s Grady Gaspar.

S & A Homes, with regional offices in Adams Township, expanded into Western PA as a ‘build on your lot’ builder. It still does much of its business in State College that way but has developed its own neighborhoods in Pittsburgh during the past half-decade. “We still do roughly ten percent of our homes as scattered sites,” says Chris Cinker, General Manager for S & A. “It’s a bit more restrictive now; we want to stay within half an hour of one of our communities, but there is certainly still demand for it.” Cinker says that the Pittsburgh Home & Garden Show has a big influence on the demand. “About half our scattered site sales come from that show. The customer comes to the show because he has a piece of land already and he’s looking from someone to build it.” The community homebuilder which has made the biggest change in their business in the past five years is Lawrence-based Heartland Homes. Along with shifting their business into a higher gear of development and construction in recent years, Heartland also made the strategic decision to offer homes on individual sites, formally creating the ‘Heartland Everywhere’ brand in late 2007.

“Building on individual lots is actually how the company started, and we’re running that operation almost identically to how we started,” explains Brad Roth, Director of Operations for Heartland Everywhere. “What is a big difference, because of our size, is that we can offer financing so that the buyer can proceed without getting a construction loan. That saves the homeowner thousands of dollars.”

Heartland’s ‘build on your lot’ program sold 15 new homes during 2008 (seven were completed), and has hopes for as many as 30 sales in 2009. They have become licensed in West Virginia of late, and are working in Cheat Lake. To attain an ambitious growth goal, especially this year, the builder expects to have to be very flexible.

“The first thing I tell a prospective buyer is that the experience can be like buying a home in one of the Heartland Homes communities or it can be custom from the ground up,” says Roth. “Our job is to be prepared to customize the experience to what the buyer wants.”

That’s not bad advice for anyone looking to build their slice of the American dream on their own lot. NH