iNest Newsletter

Trying it on for Size: Is Your New Home a Good Fit?

Dena Kouremetis
A veteran of the homebuilding industry, Dena Kouremetis is the foremost real estate columnist specializing in new home issues, trends, products and designs. Her columns appear in the New York Post as well as other newspapers throughout the U.S.

When shopping for a new home, first impressions are king. They are what make you dream about, consider and (hopefully) return to a builder's homes for a second and third look. In fact, builders bet their livelihoods on your first impressions.

The minimum effect new homebuilders hope to have on you is for you to picture yourself living there, if even for an instant. There you are, seated at the lavishly-set mahogany dining room table with your envious but delighted guests, while the whole-house stereo system filters strains of Yanni's orchestral compositions as you chit-chat.

Just remember, however, that you're probably being bowled over by the sizzle, and not necessarily the steak, so try to get real as quickly as possible. That's not difficult to do when you realize that those crystal glasses are glued to the gold plastic tablemats, along with the dishes and the napkin-ringed serviettes. And the mood music is occasionally interrupted by a smooth voice describing the home's zone-controlled HVAC system in the background.

So what important things should you be paying attention to as you boil down your choices in a new home? Besides the location, price, builder reputation, and bedroom and bath count, you should take some time to "mentally move in to" a home before signing on the dotted line, just to make sure your life "fits" into the house.

This process is an important one. It takes keen visualization, admittedly, but even for those us who are spacially impaired, it can be done in small bytes, room by room.

On Approach and Ready to Land

Begin by standing at the front door. Does it bother you that your exterior entry is visible from every angle? Or would you prefer one that is recessed and more private? Is it sheltered from the elements?

Now step inside. Is the entry foyer a postage stamp of tiles or hardwood within a living area? Builders sometime sacrifice a formal entryway for more square footage elsewhere, and a formal entry may or may not be important to you. Or is the entry foyer offset and separated a bit, making it a true receptacle? Is there a guest closet there? Can visitors or strangers see into areas you would prefer stay screened from view?

Family Room Fluff or Practicality?

There is usually at least one focal point in a living or family room. It can be an entertainment wall or niche, a fireplace, or a massive window display. To analyze how you and your family would live there, you must picture your furniture facing or taking advantage of one of these focal points.

Model home decorators don't do a lot of heavy thinking as to whether all of a home's potential occupants can view the big screen TV at once, or whether the small sofa and two occasional chairs they have strategically placed are enough furniture for the room. They decorate the room to appear as spacious as possible, whatever the sacrifice.

One floor plan I was enlisted to sell during my new home sales tenure featured a modestly sized family room bordered on one side by a kitchen, with its diner-like breakfast bar contained within the living area. The decorator placed a love seat at one end of the little family room and an occasional chair at the other. That occasional chair was the only piece of furniture capable of permitting someone to watch television at an angle that would not cause dizziness or to appreciate the fireplace, the room's only focal point. If a real sofa had been placed there, it would have to have been wedged up against the breakfast bar, or it would risk blocking any circulation in the room, making it difficult to access the French door to the backyard.

Sometimes large sliding doors rob you of important furniture placement possibilities. A single atrium door may be in order instead if offered by the builder. French doors are elegant to look at, but require "swing space" for the exiting door itself, also sacrificing some potentially usable square footage that could be used for furniture. Try to be real-life in your assessment of this all-important room.

Kitchen Kudos and Dining Delights

Never underestimate the power of a well-designed kitchen. Kitchens are now the centers of the home and command a huge chunk of the home's value and livability. Take a look at the counter prep and display space and especially cabinet storage capacity. The average kitchen should be able to store about 800 items and have an ample amount of task and preparation space. Is there room for help with the dishes? Is the dishwasher well located for loading from the sink area?

Be critical of things like appliance locations and their relations to these food prep areas, appliance door and cabinet door clearances, and whether the kitchen offers you a vista of either a living area, the backyard, or some other pleasant sight. Also decide if you may require "overflow" entertainment seating, such as a cantilevered eating bar as a countertop extension. And don't forget lighting, overhead, under-counter and directed task lighting.

Dining rooms are show-off rooms or areas that have become a huge statement in new homes. Sometimes they are located in plain view as you enter, offering a permanently neat and formal appearance each time. A dining room that contains direct access from the kitchen is the most practical, unless the room will exist for fluff purposes only. Those separated by a hallway or "down the road a piece" from the kitchen may find you hauling a fully dressed turkey and bowls of gravy over carpeting or a slippery hallway. Measure the room to be sure that the area is large enough for a hutch, curio or china cabinet, in addition to providing ample room for dining chairs to back up.

Mastering the Master Suite

Visually empty the master bedroom of all furniture. Now scrutinize wall space. If your queen-sized bed eventually becomes a king, is there room? How about space for armoires and dressers? Need room for an occasional chair or small desk? Do low-lying windows rob you of wall space? Is there enough natural light in the room? How about privacy concerns when the lights are on at night?

If the master contains a walk-in closet, assess its location. In newer homes, walk-in closets are sometimes located within the bathroom area, leaving clothes subject to moisture and heat properties, something that may bother you. If this is the case, does the bathroom have a powerful-enough exhaust fan or offer windows that open?

Is the master bedroom located next to a living area and if so, would the noise bother you? How about its proximity to the kitchen or laundry room when the appliances are in full gear? Closeness to these areas may be valuable to some, and an annoyance to others.

Secondary Bedrooms with Primary Concerns

In some average sized homes, decorators tend to model secondary bedrooms with twin beds shoved up against walls to make the rooms look larger and somehow find some of the smallest dressers known to man. Measure your own beds and furniture pieces and study how they may fit. The most important element of a child's room is how it will be able to adapt to their needs as they grow. The cute canopied crib with the rocking chair displayed in the corner may have looked great in the model, but you must realize that model home furnishers display homes "frozen in time."

Betting on the Bathrooms

Master bedroom water closets (self contained toilet rooms) should be large enough so that you need not huddle against a wall to close the door. And a small window that actually opens wouldn't hurt.

If the home contains a powder room, is it located within view of the main entry door? You may not realize until after you move in that an occupant emerging from this room to the sound of a flushing toilet is not the ambience you had in mind for your entry foyer.

It is popular for builders to display attractive little pedestal sinks in powder rooms. They allow more spaciousness and can be quite attractive as well. But have you considered where you can store towels, cleaning and bathroom supplies within the room? Is there any storage at all?

For full baths, look for both light and ventilation, counter space, locations of builder-included towel racks, whether any doors conflict (as you did with the kitchen), and whether the size of the bathrooms are adequate for the number of occupants who may use them.

Lucking out with the Laundry

Inside laundry rooms in even the smallest production homes began shedding their second-class garage status and becoming an element of the home's interior a while back. The location and usability of the laundry room is probably one of the more buyer-overlooked details in the grand scheme of things.

Laundry rooms can be "pass-through" or self-contained varieties, with the latter being the most popular. Pass-through laundry rooms located off garages can be quite useful if large enough for use as a mudroom or service porch area. Some are dismally small, however, with room for only a washer and dryer with a cabinet overhead. If this is the layout, a front-loading dryer door can block both traffic and other doors in a highly used thoroughfare. The self-contained types offer room to sort clothes and shut out noise; some are even designed with a door to the side-yard - a great ante-room entrance for swimmers or athletes from the back yard.

Whichever type laundry room the home has, room for sorting and folding should be scrutinized; discovering whether the builder routinely offers gas or electric receptacles (or both) will save you from finding out when its too late to do something about it, and determining whether the builder includes any cabinetry should also be a concern.

More than ever before, new home builders are striving to establish reputations for practicality of design for their homes' square footage, while trying to inject elements of style along the way. After conducting a study like this, your selection may still be influenced by emotion, the element driving many of our life-altering decisions, as homebuilders well know.

In the end, however, you are the only one who can decide if the home you choose is the one in which you'll want to awaken to each morning. Evaluating the layout, size, and practicality of each room may find you thanking yourself later on.