Pre Construction:

During this phase of the process is the where you can save the most time and money down the road.  The better organized before actual construction begins the better chance your project has to be completed on time and within  your budget.  The timeline we are using is by no means the only way to do it.  We sold our house in October of the previous year and we knew we could not start building until the following April because our new home will be located in the country.  So we moved into an apartment, hopefully we will only be here a year.

After deciding on a house plan we searched for a builder.  It is a good idea to get your builder lined up first.  In our area quality builders are very busy, and we found out that some builders will not work with us since we were being the general contractors.  Once you find a builder, ask to see his work and check with his clients and make sure they were happy with them on their respective construction project. Next, we went  to talk to a lender for pre approval for the amount of mortgage we could qualify for.  After receiving our pre qualification amount it was time to do some leg work and get bids.

Be prepared for this process to take 4-6 weeks, depending on level of detail and how many bids you ask for.  Rule of thumb is at least 2 bids, preferably 3, for each sub-contractor you will need.
A lot of subs will give you allowances for fixtures, cabinets, etc..  We actually went out and priced fixtures to see how accurate those allowances are.  Once the bids came in (be prepared for sticker shock) we went through them and decided which sub-contractors to use.  Note:  Our original bids went over budget, so we had to make choices on certain items that we could not do, i.e. fireplace.
The criteria we used on deciding what to cut was.  How hard would it be to add this feature later on down the road.  If it was something that could be easily added at a later time, that was put at the top of the cut list.

After getting the bids within our budget it was now time to start the house.  Our schedule start date is May 1, 2000.

Note:  We would highly recommend that all major decisions are decided ahead of time.  You should have your windows, floor covering, cabinets, etc. picked out.  This is not necessary, but this will prevent having to make quick decisions down the road.