Homebuilding Tips

These days there are a lot of options for people who want to build a new home. When considering your options, you might want to look into kit homes and on-your-lot builders—also known as custom home builders—if you want to save money and do some of the work yourself. While both approaches allow you to get more house for your money by building sweat equity, they are two very different approaches:

• Kit homes are the easy-to-build, DIY approach to homebuilding. 
• Custom homes are the best option if you want to personalize nearly every aspect of your home. 

Understanding the difference between them can help you decide which option is right for you. Let’s find out more about how to choose your dream home.

With such excitement about the dozens of custom home floor plans that we offer, we thought it would be fun to share with you the top five most visited floor plans on our website. These plans are the designs that more people visited than any others, and that makes them a terrific starting point for choosing your own custom home floor plan

There is something romantic about the idea of a quaint cottage. Whether it’s a mountain getaway, an oceanside retreat with the sound of crashing waves just outside, or just a special place to come home to every day, a cottage is timeless.

While a cottage can feel like it comes right out of a favorite childhood book, it can also have a modern, sleek design. There are a lot of practical qualities, including that:

• They’re perfect for rural, suburban, or urban settings.
• They’re suitable for different family sizes.
• They can be used as a vacation home, first home, or retirement property. 
• They can be one or two stories with a smaller upstairs. 

The classic cottage design is gaining in popularity because it fits so many different lifestyles, including those of:

• First-time homebuyers who want something affordable yet charming.
• Retirees who want convenient living that’s easy to lock and leave for effortless travel.
• Weekend warriors who want an affordable vacation home near the mountains or ocean.
• Families who simply want to downsize their homes.

Fortunately, at Adair Homes, we have clever cottage floor plans that combine classic architectural charm with modern features for a home that feels just right. And like every Adair Homes floor plan, our cottages include an almost unlimited number of ways to personalize your home.

Here are six of our popular cottage plans:

Have you heard? Small is the new big. Some homebuyers are opting out of large houses to simplify their life with homes that are small in square footage but big on style and functionality.

Who is buying small homes? People of all ages! But, according to an iProperty Management article, 63 percent of millennials are interested in purchasing a small home, and 40 percent of tiny house owners are 50 or older. There are a number of factors contributing to the popularity of these smaller homes:

Accessible floor plans are a top priority for many homebuyers. Most standard homes lack many features that would make a home easy to live in and comfortable for people with disabilities or those looking to age in place. If you choose to build a custom home, it will give you the ability to choose selections that will benefit your lifestyle. You will choose all the design features, fixtures, and even the finishes you require.

If you’re in the market for an Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)-compliant home, it’s important to seek out a builder that offers flexible designs and customizable floor plans.

At Adair Homes, we offer thoughtfully designed floor plans that make use of every square foot of space, limiting hallways and encouraging easy movement throughout each room. And each floor plan is customizable, so you can add exactly the features that you need.

Planning on starting or growing your family? Congratulations! Chances are you’ll need more space. So what do you look for in a home when you’re starting or expanding a young family? You’ve probably already started a mental list: a newer kitchen, another bedroom, a better school district, or all of the above! You could spend hours browsing real estate listings online or weeks looking at open houses and still not find what you’re looking for. Sounds exhausting, right?

Fortunately, we’ve done the hard work for you.

There’s no need to try to make a bad house work just because it’s in the right school district or live in a house on a busy street because that’s the only one with a big enough kitchen. We have floor plans that are designed specifically for the needs of new and growing families. Best of all, you can build anywhere you like.

Here are a few of the family-friendly features and floor plans we offer—and ways to customize each one.

If you are considering building a new custom home, you probably have some questions about the construction process, especially if you have never done it before. There are several ways to build a home, and as modern technology continues to evolve, even more are emerging. But some are staying the same. 

“Stick-built” is the term used for homes that use the traditional building method of bringing materials to the site and assembling the home on the foundation.

Flooring is one of the most important features of any home.

There’s no doubt about it: Flooring is one of the most important features of any home. From hardwood and laminate to tile and carpet, flooring not only serves a functional purpose, but it also helps establish the style and “feel” of a room. Luckily, there are incredible flooring options available today to ensure that you can find exactly what you want while staying within your budget.

As you design your new custom home, you want to ensure that you select flooring that will wear well over the years, especially if you have young children or pets. You’ll also want to choose materials and colors that complement the rest of the home and will maintain their beauty for years to come. Easy maintenance and durability are also factors to consider, especially if you live a busy, active lifestyle.

One of the ways Adair Homes helps control the costs of building a new home is by developing strong relationships with suppliers. 

When it comes to windows, we partner with Jeld-Wen, one of the world’s largest reliable window manufacturers. Jeld-Wen has more than a hundred facilities throughout the world, and two of them are near Adair Homes locations in the Pacific Northwest, allowing us to source our materials locally and save on shipping costs. 

Founded in Oregon in 1960, Jeld-Wen has always cared about the communities that its employees live in. One of the ways it does this is by making contributions to the Jeld-Wen Foundation, which enhances the communities of its employees. We respect the company’s commitment to both quality products and its communities, which is why we have partnered with Jeld-Wen for nearly seven years. We are confident that the Jeld-Wen windows we install today will provide protection against weather for years to come.

To learn more about why we choose to partner with this quality, caring company over other window manufacturers, read on.

Adair Homes is excited to introduce a brand new duplex custom home floor plan:
The Pines.

If you’re in the market for a flexible home, Adair Homes has the home for you. 

The Pines is a side-by-side duplex packed with some of our most popular design features and offers an almost unlimited number of options for use: as a first home, a vacation home, investment property, and more. The Pines is also a popular option for multigenerational families because both units are very spacious. 

The two units are designed with great room concepts that are suitable for hosting or relaxing. One can imagine the many activities that could take place here: a dinner party with friends or a quiet night spent with the family. The spaciousness extends to practical use in these units too. The bedrooms are on separate sides of the house, and the master bedroom comes with a utility closet for extra storage.

Just as we promote customization on nearly every house we design, buyers of The Pines have the opportunity to add a back patio, extra garage space, or studio. Regardless of the size of your family, you can bet that The Pines will suit your living needs.