Building your first home

Building your first home can be exciting but also a bit scary. After all, it’s a lot of money you are going to spend and you want to make sure you are going to get it right.

Sam at Profile Homes has been helping new home buyers in Melbourne and Geelong build their first homes for over 30 years. Profile Homes prides itself on building the home you want in the most cost effective and energy efficient way, making the most of the block and budget that you have.

So what is the best way to start planning your new home? Firstly, visit a few homes and make a note of what you like about the home and why – is it the high ceilings? Maybe it’s the way the house feels warm, even on a cold day. If you can, look past the decorating and try to imagine the house with just walls and flooring. If you can create a list of the top priority items you want in a home, it will help you to get a good idea of what you like.

Of course, you may not get it exactly perfect the first time, but Profile Homes will help you plan a home that gets as close to it as possible within your budget.

Profile Homes built the first home for a small family in Lara, just outside of Geelong and here is what they had to say in response to our questions about their experience.

Q: How different was your original idea to the end result?
A: Incredibly different! We started with a very standard floor plan that was a lot like the already built houses we were looking to buy in inner city Geelong – Edwardian style mostly. I think we thought we just could just build a new version. That is a crazy idea now I look back on it. We had a 777sqm block and I wanted to build a small 16 square house on it! At the time, we were looking at display homes that just had massive living areas for the sake of it and then really small bedrooms and we hated the waste of space. Sam at Profile Homes helped us work out how we could improve our design without having any wasted space and making sure we used our block well.
We did end up with a TV/media room though despite my initial protests, but now, I totally appreciate that extra space for the kids or us to play or watch their shows.

Q: Where there any other changes Profile Homes suggested that have made a big difference to your home?
A:  There are so many, but the one that we appreciate all the time are the French doors and windows on the north side of the house, in the open plan kitchen/dining lounge area. We originally only had two north windows on our plan, so Sam suggested we replace these windows with the French doors.  I am so glad we did, as well as looking amazing, they let in so much light, so even on a cold day in winter, we get warmth if the sun is out and it brightens the whole room. It also saves our heating bill too.

Q: Is there anything that didn’t quite go to plan regarding the build?
A: The build seemed quite straightforward, I think it was more about some of our decisions on things like tiles that we weren’t quite happy with, but I think that was just our inexperience making these selections and trying to save money! It is hard to pick everything in one hit, but Profile Homes really helped by providing advice where they could. At one point, we had picked a laminex for the main bathroom bench, and Carmel called us to say she wasn’t sure it was going to look good and she sent us some other options to consider, which really helped.

Q: Would you build again? With Profile Homes?
A: Definitely! As our family has grown (we added a daughter recently growing our family from three people to four people), this house has definitely allowed us to grow with it and we have repurposed rooms and changed how we use certain spaces. However, this was our first home and we are so happy with it but I would definitely like to use what we have learnt and what has worked so well and just make some tiny tweaks in another version!

Thinking about building? Contact Profile Homes for some information on how to get started.