Unless you have a specific house that you just MUST build, without a doubt find your lot first. The first rule for real estate - location! location! location! - applies equally to buying existing and building new. Find yourself a good realtor who is familiar with technology and give them your requirements - how much acreage, general location, price, etc. They can set you up in the local MLS to be notified via email whenever anything meeting your criteria hits the market. You will be among the first to know and you can just drive out there and check it out without even bothering your realtor. If your realtor won't do this for you, find another. We found our 3 acre lot 2 years ago this way, purchased it, paid off that land loan last year, and have been saving for the house ever since. We have enough saved to get started now, so we're starting to settle on certain floorplans and exterior styles. Once we get our heads fully together and agree on the basics, we will be contacting builders. We have been visiting custom builder open houses and speaking to local builders for awhile now, to shorten our preferred builder list. Just yesterday though, several new parcels of land hit the market so I checked them out. I am always looking to improve on what we already have - and if I find something better, we could sell our current land at any time as it's in a very desirable location. Since we purchased our land, 4 nearby parcels in the same neighborhood have sold and houses built on 3 of them. The parcels on each side of us have sold and one house is built (they just moved in last month) already. The owner/builder who just moved in next door told me he would have preferred our lot if we hadn't already purchased. So we're really glad we got our land first! Another benefit is watching the home styles going up in the neighborhood all around us - we are watching closely to the things we like and don't like, and incorporating these (or not!) into our plans.

If the old heater heated the house,then why would you suddenly need insulation is what I'd ask. You probably could use more insulation, but that's a whole other topic. (search air sealing--lots of info on here about it.) Does it blow heat and just can't keep up? Did they undersize you? Do you know how big your old system was vs the new one? Hindsight is 20/20 but Costco may not have been the route to go....I doubt the contractors who hook up with Costco are the best and the brightest. The good ones don't need Costco to get business. Sorry :( Good luck. I am curious if your house is an example of what my dealer mentioned when I thought he was oversizing me a little. He said that he didn't want me calling when the temps got unusually low (like they have been here in NJ) and saying the house is cold. BUT, most people on here say oversized is bad so I guess you have to pick your poison. My heat is great, the ac works well, but if it was smaller it would run longer and take out more humidity. At least I'm not cold. I would not contract with any of these people you've dealt with if you decide to get more insulation. Ask for referrals on here and you might be able to find a reputable installer. Or, if you only want insulation you can diy it. PS. My contractor was one of the higher priced, in demand ones, and I STILL had issues. I think I got a new guy (just one) and a Friday, beautiful fall day (like lets finish up and go home kind of day!)I Have to remember never to do important stuff on Fridays in case something goes wrong. (contractors and surgeries) I guess it's buyer beware.

The first thing that grabs me as a problem is ALL THOSE DOORS! First, in the golf cart /laundry /pantry area you have four doors plus a cased opening. This is going to be cumbersome: The doors are going to knock against one another and constantly be in the way. Obviously you must keep the garage door, but I'd lose all of the other doors in this area -- except the one cased opening, which -- because it's probably going to stay open most of the time -- I'd make into a pocket door. Next five doors all opening onto the same deck -- even a large deck -- are just too much. Doors are more expensive and less energy efficient than windows. They inhibit furniture placement on the deck, and they're more difficult to cover with windows treatments -- most of all, they're just not necessary so close to one another. I'd say keep the one in the master bedroom and one between the dining room and living room. Make the others into same-sized windows. At only 9' wide, the dining room is very small for a house this size. Last comment on the doors: Note that once you have a table in this small area, you won't be able to reach that set of doors. If this area MUST stay so small, I'd go with a built-in banquette across the back wall -- because you don't need to allot for space behind chairs, they require significantly less space than a traditional table. The kitchen has a funny little bump-out for the kitchen cabinets. I'd skip that and enlarge the dining room by 2' -- it's not in the direction that the dining room needs it most, but it'd probably be cheaper than building the indent. In the master bedroom, it's pretty clear where you'll place the bed -- and you have a window on what will be the left of the bed. I'd want an opposite window on the right side. Your bathroom door and linen closet will knock against one another. I'd skip the linen closet door and go with an open linen tower instead. The toilet closet looks narrow and will be dark. Your kids' bedrooms are really large! Larger than the master. I do agree that this house will be loud. I'm remembering a vacation rental in which my husband and I slept in a large upstairs loft bedroom. I loved it . . . until we realized that the living room TV echoed upstairs. We postulated that this was made worse because the house was all wooden floors and minimal window coverings. If you really want this super-open floor plan, I'd suggest you add all the "soft furnishings" you can.

What part of Texas? (It's huge--- I'm in Katy, Texas area) Certain areas of Texas are more dry than others. (Less humid) Certainly any area can have bouts of high humidity here. So sometimes this is a more difficult decision. What is important to you? Humidity reduction is achieved when the AC is running. A single stage AC main function is to drop temperature. While you will get some dehumidification from that it's primary function is to drop temperature. Because we live in a hot climate people are more prone to wanting a larger AC unit thinking that will work better, when in fact it will make things worse. -------- 2 stage AC --- It will run upwards of 90% of the time in 1st stage AC mode or more or less dehumidification mode. However, this systems short comings become abundantly clear in the shoulder seasons of our Texas climate. Because 1st stage is approximately 70% of the capacity of the machine -- in the shoulder season that first stage is often times over sized and does little to combat high humidity that certain areas of Texas are prone to. ------- Variable Speed AC --- not all are created equal here. In some cases the system in question may be limited to 5 stages, if paired with legacy controls it may be no better than the 2 stage AC unit above. A true variable speed AC will excel at a number of things - depending on the brand / model chosen could have as many as 75 speeds. In this realm it's more about 'load matching' the structure. Because of the ability to ramp very low gives this kind of AC unprecedented dehumidification. By reducing humidity a mere 5% will make you that much more comfortable than merely dropping temperature alone. It may become 'too cold' than what your current setting makes you think you are comfortable at. So if that happens, you raise the set point on the thermostat. Which will reduce your electric bill on top of the very high efficient Variable Speed AC unit. ---------- Is it for everyone? no. A variable speed AC will cost more up front. Over time it will pay for itself... how fast will depend on a wide variety of factors. If you plan to sell your home soon, it could help you sell the home sooner. But you may not recoup the investment. I recently installed a Variable Speed AC at my home in Katy, Texas. I service the Katy, Texas area.