I live just 30 miles away down in Lewiston. We looked at doing a custom build a few years ago in a nicer area. The builder at that time quoted $100/sq ft (not including the lot) and that included custom cabinets, granite, hard wood. His name is Lenny Keys and he might build up in Pullman too. He only does custom homes. If you didn't mind the commute, you should look into building in Lewiston. You can get a really nice (flat!) lot here for a decent price. There are half-acre lots in up-scale subdivisions selling for less than 50K -- which sounds great to me because we are moving to Utah and you can't hardly get a half acre for less than 100K there. Anyway, the weather is so much nicer down here too -- always warmer, hardly any snow, not too much wind, etc. Good luck!

I built the cabinet boxes and drawers for our kitchen remodel myself. We went that route because we've challenged ourselves to maintain a $5K total budget for a complete kitchen gut job on a $60K house. It took about 4 months of Saturdays so yeah, way slower. I did a mix of rehabbing boxes (converting door bases to drawer bases) and building new ones. I will buy doors and drawer fronts. I did luck out by getting a bunch of cabinet shop plywood blanks for $3 each off CL, and I recycled some 3/4" t&g paneling into drawer boxes, so total cost for the cabinets is around $1000 for the carcases and $1500 for the doors/drawer fronts. I bought 75-lb, full-extension drawer glides on Amazon for around $100 for 18 (9 pairs), so they don't have to be super pricey. An identical kitchen from Lowes would have cost $9K just for cabinets. Savings=$7500. That'll build us a laundry room addition. :-) I had all the tools: table saw router & router table drill/driver clamps pocket hole jig nail guns big shop (at work) to build them in big truck to bring them home in I did them in production mode so I could router all the drawer box sides at the same time, etc. So while it took a long time, I enjoyed figuring the whole thing out, and I've got the pride of craftsmanship and the pride of budgetwomanship. I also liked being able to completely customize the sizes to fit in my kitchen. And, to the OP, who wasn't asking if it's worth it, I didn't order anything from Rockler. :-)

Finished our home in the area last summer. When we began the architect search in early 2013 we were told $260/ft was about the lower limit, including everything but land. This turned out to be a pretty good estimate in the end. We have a very nice home, but it's not a magazine home. Since you are starting now, it will be more. $300 seems reasonable for the lower end. But this doesn't get you a whole lot of bling. Some of it depends on where you are exactly. In the city being more expensive. Also, what are your expectations about what custom means? Nanawalls and terrazzo floors, etc. vs more standard selections. There are a lot of costs and we felt nickel-and-dimed to death be the end. Different sites may need topographic survey, geotechnical engineer, permits can be $5,000 or $10,000. Septic, shared well, difficult utilities, etc. Good luck.

I like the comment about a better house, not bigger. We downsized last year and, although it's half the size of our previous home, I truly believe it lives bigger. We did end up buying property and building, and we drew up our own plan, taking it to an architect to tweak a little. (DH had designed our previous home, including all the construction blueprints; but this time he just wanted to get the layout done and then let the architect take over.) I think the reason it lives so well is the fact that we sat down together and discussed our daily activities and what we wanted in each room to make it work for us. We also considered the flow through the house and how it fit OUR preferences. This is our fourth house (3rd build), and I'm happy to say it's the best fit we've ever had---which is a good thing, since this is the house we will be retiring in and plan to age in place here. I don't have the breadth of experience to say whether developer or design/build your own will be more cost effective for you. I can say we definitely came out ahead with building our own (utilizing an architect and general contractor). Our builder was an acquaintance of ours who came highly recommended by friends for whom he had built a home about 5 years earlier. He stayed on schedule and finished right on time and within our budget. Of course, we stayed on top of the budget throughout the process and decided where we wanted to spend more money and where we could save money. We sourced a lot of items on our own, which also saved. We also found property in our desired area that had just been put on the market, which proved to be ideal for us and much better than any of the areas being developed in our area. It's very hard to find property in our desired area that wasn't already snatched up by a developer. If you're trying to stick to a budget, you do need to be able to discipline yourself not to splurge on everything when you're building---and, if there is something you want to upgrade, then you need to figure out how you're going to pay for it now (not over the next 10-15-20-or-30 years), such as by cutting back on something else. And, of course, allow a contingency for the unexpected. We did this by estimating line-item costs higher than we expected, thus building in a cushion . Of course, we were highly motivated because we wanted to own the house outright, with no mortgage, at the end of the build. Most of this would apply to a developer's house, as well. If you choose one before it's finished, then you could end up with the option of choosing some very expensive upgrades that could quickly put the house over budget. Hope you have success in your search for a new home. This site has some wonderful, knowledgeable contributors that can help you along the way. There are also a lot of beautiful homes with features that will inspire you to create a lovely home but also tempt you to start seeing a luxury as a necessity. : )