Building Your New Home

At Stearns Custom Homes we are very interested in helping you with your custom home needs. Building custom green homes is our passion and helping people is the way exercise it. If you are looking to buy a new home in Las Cruces or southern New Mexico, use this guide to help you prepare for the process. 

We designed this page to help make you comfortable as you embark on this great endeavor and adventure. This is not a comprehensive list, but is a general outline of how we build your new custom green home.

Step 1: What Can You Afford?

The first step in building a custom home in Las Cruces is getting pre-qualified for a loan. This ensures all of us that our great adventure is a worthwhile and fruitful one. If you haven't been pre-qualified, but would like to begin a planning stage based on your projected budget, we can link you up with well-respected and trustworthy lenders who can assist you with financial decisions regarding the size, amenities, and style of the home you can afford in Las Cruces.

Step 2: What Do You Want?

The next step is determining what type of custom home you want, and what subdivision in Las Cruces or southern NM you want to live in. We have a page titled "Getting Started with Your Custom Home" to help you with this step. You will want to think about the number of stories, bedrooms, living areas, bathrooms, style, as well as the size of lot you want in Las Cruces or southern NM.

Step 3: Designing, selections, finalizing and going under contract

This is one of the most exciting parts of the process. Here we develop a floor plan that suits your needs and desires. Then we go through each room and identify the different features that you want in your home. This can get exciting because we start talking about what type of flooring you want, counter tops, cabinets, and what the exterior will look like. 

In essence, this is the step where dreaming starts to become reality. 

Once we have all the details put together we finalize the contract and move forward. 

Step 4: Let's Build Your Home!

Here I'd like to take you through a general outline of what we do and in what order when building a custom green home. 

A. After we have signed a contract, there is a great deal of paperwork and legwork to be done prior to actual ‘breaking ground' on the site. (pulling permits, acquiring necessary insurance, etc)

B. Dirtwork, lot preparation (depending on whether you're in a city neighborhood lot or out in the great wide open in need of road grading, etc. we have the people and knowledge).

C. Concrete, plumbing, electrical rough ins (bringing utilities to the home, preparing the foundations and footings).

D. The actual structural ‘raising' of the house (whether it's finger joint studs in a conventional frame or abode, to any green product in between).

E. Fenestration. Quality windows and doors, along with a thoughtful design and use of the elements are the TRUE strength or weakness of a quality home.

F. Mechanical installations (the ‘guts' of the brain function of the home) electrical wiring, audio/video lines, plumbing pipes, from Energy Star lighting packages to fully automated cinemas to Crestron smart wired homes.

G. Exterior finishes (did we design your home with a tin roof? Lots of tile? Is it Mediterranean or Tuscan, with stone facades and rambling rooflines... or more of a traditional pueblo, with heavy timbers, plain stucco lines and low lying parapets?).

H. Encapsulation (spray foam, cellulose, optima; at Stearns Custom Homes if we are using batted insulation it is only for soundproofing interior walls).

I. Drywall, plaster, paint; interior finishes.

J. Floor coverings; from tile to travertine to hand scraped wood to flagstone to bamboo to cork, etc.

K. Cabinetry and countertops (with a myriad of quality sustainable green products on the market, the selections are endless when it comes to your cabinets and counters. Take a look at ecotops, icestone, richlite counter tops plus eucalyptus & bamboo cabs; each of these allows your home to be elegant and efficient).

L. The house is colored inside and out. Install cabinets, the plumbing and electrical fixtures (that we selected a few months ago), installation of the garage door opener, the alarm system, and the vacuum system.

M. Final clean up, landscaping, driveways, sidewalks, and outdoor living components.

Step 5: Let's Get You Moved In

At Stearns Custom Homes, we make this process as easy as waking up on Saturday by walking you through the process.

For instance, if you don't have an insurance agent, we are happy to give you a couple of trusted names to chose from. That way before you take the keys you will know that your greatest investment is secure.

We have a great reputation and wonderful working repoir with all the local utility companies, and whether you choose Comcast or Direct TV, we help set you up.

We walk you thru the working process of your home, and put you in DIRECT CONTACT with the folks you may have to turn to in the future (alarm monitoring, etc).

We'll encourage you to get your home's utilities set up in your name so that they are active on the day you move in. If you begin this process 3-4 weeks in advance to your closing, the day you move in you will have heat or cooling, your refrigerator, etc.

We will also do a final walk through to make sure everything is to your preferences. 

Click on a photo below to view more samples.