How to interview a builder: Advice from pros

You want a builder who’ll offer a fair price, deliver true craftmanship, and provide a good experience. But if you’ve never built a custom home or taken on a major remodel, hiring a builder can be an intimidating process. This is why interviewing is such an important step. Interviewing a few different builders can give you the information you need to make a confident decision, especially if you know the right questions to ask.

To make it easy, we reached out to a few trusted builders from around the country to find out the questions they recommend homeowners ask before making a hiring decision.

Here’s their collective wisdom. Consider this your cheat sheet to interviewing a builder!

1. What's your process

“You want to understand how they run their business and manage their projects,” said Nick Schiffer, Owner of Boston-based NS Builders. Feeling confident you’ll be included and informed is key to confirming your builder is a good fit.

Here are the details related to process:

• Project management: How many projects are they managing at once? Who’ll be your point of contact?
• Communication: What’s the cadence of communication? What form will communication take? What’s included in communications?
• Budget: How frequently will you have budget check-ins? How frequently will you be billed? When will bills be due?

All this will help you start to understand if your expectations align with how they work and ultimately if you can trust them. “You need to be able to say, ‘I’m hiring this builder because I want them to be responsible,’” he said.

2. How do you manage changes?

Changes are a part of the custom-building process. You want assurance your builder can adapt to changes along the way and they’ll do so in a deliberate way that avoids mistakes. A “change order” is a documented change to the project scope outlined in the construction contract that’s formally agreed upon by all parties. 

Ask them how their change order process works. For example, Michael Conneely, Owner of Greenside Design Build in Chicago, defines what the change is, prices it out, and gets the client’s signature before executing any change to the scope of work.

3. How do you charge?

Builders use various fee structures, but the two most commonly used are fixed fee and cost-plus. Here’s what to know about them:

• Fixed fee: Under this structure, the builder guarantees the home’s final price, and you agree to that price and the builder’s fee upfront. This structure is most likely to be used when the project is very well defined. It incentivizes the builder to finish the project quickly and limits homeowner control throughout the process.
• Cost-plus: Under this structure, the builder bills you as the project progresses. The “cost” refers to the cost of building the home. You’ll also be paying their fee as a separate line item. The “plus” refers to the builder’s fee. Lots of builders we spoke with prefer this structure because of the transparency it provides. You’ll see all of the costs in your bills. “Cost-plus means there’s no way to be dishonest with you. There’s no way to hide anything,” said Jake Bruton, Owner of Aarow Building in Columbia, Missouri. 

Wondering what’s typical for a builder’s fee? It’ll vary depending on things like the experience they offer and your location. A typical range is 10–20% of the total construction costs, but builder fees can also be much higher. This is another reason it can be helpful to interview multiple builders and involve your architect in the process of selecting a builder. It’ll help you understand what range is typical for builder fees in your area.