Cameron Walker: all right you're watching Boomtown, a podcast about Huntsville's explosive growth both on and off the arsenal. I'm Cameron Walker, your host. I'm the broker owner of Cameron Walker Realty, located right here in Huntsville. You're joining me and my co-host, Megan. Love that you guys are here. We ask that you subscribe so we keep you informed of everything that's going on in Huntsville. I'm Cameron Walker, broker owner of Cameron Walker Realty. Welcome back to Boomtown Podcast. I'm here with my co-host, Megan Hines, one of my agents at my brokerage. Welcome back, welcome everyone. Cameron Walker: All right, so in our last podcast we talked a little bit about the buyer beware nature of buying homes moving to Alabama, how that can be a little bit scary and ways to kind of mitigate some of that. One of the things we talked about, and this is something I've talked about for years, is new construction as a way to mitigate that. I want to kind of dive in a little deeper and give people a little more background on new construction in the area, the pros, the cons, and what they can expect. Megan Hines: Absolutely, and one of the things that, one of the reasons this moves so seamlessly into new construction, is the fact that sometimes the buyer beware state is called a non-disclosure or a non-warranty state. With new construction, you automatically receive a warranty, so in a way it circumvents the buyer beware nature of Alabama, for sure. Cameron Walker: And that is something that's really important for people to realize is that each builder has their own warranties. There are some actually legally required warranties in the state of Alabama, according to the builders association, but each builder has their own warranties in excess of that. You can see a wide variety, and sometimes it's even just the individual components of the home, say like appliances or an HVAC or something like that. Megan Hines: Yes, so it is important when looking at new construction to read over that warranty and not to just assume that it's a blanket warranty. Maybe you talk to one builder and then you go and you like another builder better, don't just assume that what you were getting with that one builder is going to be the same in terms of warranty as what's coming with the next warranty. Cameron Walker: Absolutely, and it's one of those things where you can't even let like price point determine it. A lot of times we think something's higher price, therefore you get more, right? In the case of new construction, I know one of the highest price builders in the area, they have a strict one-year warranty on everything. And there are some of the absolute lowest cost builders in the area, they have a one-year bumper-to-bumper, two-year for mechanicals, and a 10-year structural warranty. So you really do have to pay attention to your point about what those warranties are for that specific builder. I have not run into circumstances where the same builder had different standards across communities, but I would think that would also be a question to ask because just because I haven't run into it doesn't mean it doesn't happen. And I would also urge people to come prepared when they go see a builder, maybe get some of this information before you visit because there is a tendency to walk into a builder and see the home you love, they see that you love it, you guys lock eyes, it's obvious, and then all of a sudden that home is going to be sold the next day, or it's going to go, the price is going to go up the next day, and you feel like you have to make a decision right there. And that gets people to sign things without reading them through. So just be ready when you go in there and understand that this is an active sales site, and it's not always a sales tactic. You know, at the beginning of the month they usually change what they're doing in terms of incentives and that will mean that, you know, the interest rate deal that you were going to get is going to change, something's going to change, things are always changing. So you just know that that's likely to happen when you walk in if you fall in love, this could happen to you, so have that warranty ahead of time, take a look at it. Megan Hines: Absolutely, there's two really good resources for that: us as your agent, and then also the builder website. What I've noticed is there seems to be like a threshold where like once builders reach a certain size their websites become more organized, they're more detailed, there's more information available. And most of the like national builders, those top 10 builders across the country, they generally have more of their warranty type information on there and it is more unified. They kind of offer the same thing across at least an entire state if not their entire footprint. And then of course we can always reach out to the sales rep or somebody else within that community or that builder to get that stuff. I know like recently you were selling a home and people really wanted to know about a shed on the property, so we had to get the HOA documents in advance, that's really common. But if a warranty is really important to you and it should be, especially in a buyer beware state, which is the whole reason we're talking about this, then getting out in front of that, getting that information in advance and getting it from like, I don't want anybody quoting me from recollection, I want to see it on their website or on a thumb drive or printed, you know, make sure we actually have a tangible access to the actual document. Cameron Walker: And I think something to go through right now for our viewers is the difference, what they're actually getting when they get new construction. We're not talking about custom builds, we're talking about production builds. And these are these new communities that benefit sort of from an economy of scale, they buy in bulk, things like their roof shingles, their granite for their countertops. You go in there and you have a limited number of choices, but I mean they have nice choices. You are not buying a piece of land and constructing from scratch and choosing everything, that's not what we're discussing here today, for sure. Megan Hines: And gosh, there's so much level of granularity even within that, right? So a lot of times when people think about ground up construction, they do think about custom or minimum semi-custom and that's not always the case. To your point, the vast majority of homes are production, they're built by larger builders, they might build 10 or 20 at a time. And depending on the situation, you may or may not get to make selections, but they may only have four cabinets to choose from regardless and those are all coming from the same supplier, the generally similar quality level. And other things that go into the home, say like shingles, right? So you'll have 30-year architectural shingles on a home, it's not a 30-year warranty on the roof, that's a separate thing. This is that the shingles will not degrade, but if you have a tornado come through or large wind storm or hail damage, the warranty doesn't cover those things. It's really just defects and craftsmanship and material, so that's more of a homeowner's insurance type claim, right? So that's another thing where people get a little confused by some of these. But back to your point about like the different builders and what you can get from them, there may be another builder that doesn't have 30-year architectural shingles, they have 20, right? And so there is a spread even when this is something you will see a difference in one builder across communities, there's a spread in the materials and the expected life, expect to see things like that of them including so when you're looking at new construction. Cameron Walker: There is a lot of concern if you look online about certain builders and about, you know, what exactly you're getting. You hear horror stories all the time and I talk to a lot of people who are concerned, they say things like, you know, I've heard that they don't make houses the way they used to, and I'm concerned about that. Should I buy new construction or should I buy something older? What is the better house? Megan Hines: Sure yeah, and I think that all comes down to the individual and their risk tolerance, things like that. So if you're buying a resale home, right, in Alabama you have the buyer beware aspect and you're going to have to really do your due diligence. Now if you're buying new construction, you buy a completely finished home, we don't really know what's going on behind the walls. We can do a thorough home inspection, and while I recommend home inspectors, you're always welcome to find your own. The one I work with in new construction, he is a licensed builder, so he no longer builds homes, but he's very familiar with code and the requirements for building, right? So that is one thing you have to look out for is that you have the right home inspector regardless whether you're building from the ground up or not. Recently I did a video on like builder nightmare, like a one star builder review, and the poor home buyer went into so much detail about all the different challenges they faced and I mean quite frankly, I don't know how anybody would ever warranty the home that was ended up being built. So to your point about protecting yourself, you've got to bring in, you got to understand the process, you got to understand what's due to you on the contract, and you have to bring in the right inspectors at the right time frame, and you have to keep your eye on that home once being built. You know I've had quite a few clients from across the U.S. and even overseas that have had new construction homes built here and I've had to be their eyes and ears. But we go in and check on that property every couple weeks, we take video, we do pictures, and then we bring in the home inspectors at the right time to ensure things are done properly. Cameron Walker: Absolutely, and something that I've just recently run across is a pretty high rate on reading in a brand new home. And a lot of times people will assume incorrectly that they don't even need to get a radon test because it's new construction. And I've had people tell me that, you know, it's new construction, it's on a slab, there's no way it could have high radon, I'll just pass. Well, that's not true, radon can happen anywhere. And the systems that they put in once when they find that you have radon, they work incredibly well. And actually there's a good argument to make for the fact that since it could happen at any time anywhere, having a system means you'll always be protected versus just not knowing and then you could be breathing in radiation. One of the things I've started to recommend to people is that they have somebody come back like a home inspector do a radon test a year end. So for those of you who don't know, let's define radon: it's a naturally occurring gas from breakdown of rock underneath the soil and it's carcinogenic. Yeah, it's radiation basically, right? So the EPA set a limit for, you know, it's four parts per whatever, and when you have a radon test done, the home inspector comes in, leaves a box, not supposed to open the doors or windows that much, and he's testing the level over the course of two days. And they look at the average, as long as it's below the EPA limit, you're okay. If it's above it, then we have to do some form of remediation. On new construction, particularly let's say you're a slab house, you've got a slab foundation, underneath that you have some gravel substrate before you get to the dirt, between that gravel substrate and the slab there's like a polyethylene barrier and there's a PVC pipe that comes down through the roof all the way through the foundation and down into that gravel and it's at a high point. It allows the radon to funnel up through there and go out. So when you have new construction, particularly if it's recently built pad, it's really hard even if that lot does have a lot of radon underneath it, it's hard to get a positive test on those meters because the soil is recently disturbed and so much of it was released. Now when you build on a basement or something like that it can be a little different or crawl space because there is more space for that gas to build up. But if you build on a slab and there is high radon when you test for it when you buy it, you absolutely need a remediation system, but I still recommend getting one, you know, another test done within the first year. Now the remediation system if you do have high radon is literally just sticking a fan on that PVC pipe to force the radon out of the home. Megan Hines: Yeah, I mean you aren't going to change the fact that the rocks are breaking down and creating radiation. What you're going to do is move that gas to where it doesn't affect you in the home, and they've got that down to a science. Literally, we're talking thousands of square miles where the entire Southeast is in the red zone for radon. What's funny is you've run into two tests within say like the last three weeks or so that were positive, I've had 50 or 60 done since I've been selling homes in Alabama, I've never had one come back over the EPA limit. Cameron Walker: Yeah, I have no idea why that would be, I mean statistically that seems impossible. Yeah, I mean it seems really odd and even like last year I had some folks that built a house and they were waffling on whether or not they wanted the radon test on and when I set them up with the home inspector, he had tested the home next door when those buyers bought and he said, "Hey, that home was over the EPA limit, you probably want to have yours done." And sure enough, theirs came back not, and these are two homes side by side built within months of each other and yet one's above the EPA limit, one's not. So it goes to show like you may want to test over time because it seems unlikely that only one of those homes would have an increased amount of radon. Megan Hines: Absolutely, and that's that's important. I want to get back to talking about new construction right now because I think it's so important for people because a lot of people are considering that when they're moving here, and one of the reasons is there's just a lot of opportunities for new construction. We have a lot of new construction being built and it does kind of circumvent that buyer beware situation. You have warranties not only on structural warranties but there's warranties on every component of the house. So you can be pretty much assured that, you know, for the next five years, five to ten years, you're going to have minimal costs in terms of maintaining your home. I mean we all have to do some things, but you know, the big ones like your roof or your air conditioner, you'll be able to just, if you're moving here with a young family, it's nice to just be able to start your life and put away and save for the things the family needs versus things the house needs. Cameron Walker: For sure, yeah for sure, and some things people need to realize too is there's certain maintenance requirements for some of those items. So like a water heater for example, if you have a tank water heater, you need to drain it every year. If you don't and then two, three years in, even if it has a five year warranty, then you may or may not get the warranty service on it. They may decline it because you didn't do the required maintenance for that particular appliance. Another example, I'll give is like an HVAC, right? So if you don't change the filter on that ever, it's going to be sucking against what effectively becomes carpet, and eventually that may kill your HVAC system and it's terrible for the air in your home as well, right? So you've choked it out and now you may not get the warranty service that you paid for because you self-inflicted a wound. Then maybe nobody ever told you to change a filter. A lot of times, particularly either people first-time home buyers or people that haven't had one of these style appliances before, they don't know how to maintain it. Generally the builder gives you some kind of workbook, a website login, or a little card with all the documentation for these things and nobody actually reads that. I mean, exactly. Megan Hines: There's like one guy, yeah, that's all of it. No, he's always my client, yes. So I mean, yeah, lovingly but yeah, so that's something that can happen too. So you think you're doing the right thing by buying new construction, getting these warranties, these newer appliances, but there's still another step, you have to maintain all those appliances and systems to the manufacturer and the builders specifically. And it's not as it's not as financially stressful, but it still requires your attention. Cameron Walker: Yeah, you have to jump through all these little hoops to keep those warranties going, absolutely. So there's actually a really good book and I'll link it down in the description for the video, but it's actually a book on how to maintain your home and it's super easy to like peruse, go through, find what you're looking for specifically. It breaks it into seasons because a lot of things that you do on a home are seasonal. What's seasonal in Alabama may not be the same seasonal things in Wisconsin, right? So I advise my clients to winterize their sprinkler systems here. I've never done mine in six years and I've never had a problem, right? But if I was in Wisconsin, I would do it every year, right? Megan Hines: Yeah, so you know the college kids have no shoes. But yeah, so it breaks it down by region and what you want to do seasonally to protect your home and I think that's a wise investment, 20 bucks and you really save yourself a lot of hassle in the long run. Cameron Walker: Absolutely. So the other thing about new construction is that, you know, some people are, some people suggest new construction to them. I just actually had a client who came to me and they said, "We want mid-century home with lots of character," and "You know, we have all these ideas about how cool it's going to be." And so we looked at a bunch of these, we actually went under contract and then fell out of contract because there was something wrong with the home, and they just, uh, they just went under contract for new construction. Yeah, absolutely. And that actually happens a lot because you basically you come to this process with an idea, a fantasy idea of what you want. Yeah, and in your idea you are, you're cool, you're fun, and you have this cool fun house and all you and then you're like, "Wait, am I cool and fun? Do I really want to have to deal with all this maintenance to be cool and fun?" And maybe I want this thing that's clean and nice and easy to maintain. And that's what happened with them. I still think they're cool and fun for sure, they're very cool and fun, but I find myself doing that too. It's like when you search, when you do the home search a lot of times it's like you have to like check your maturity level. Like fantasies of all the cool stuff you're going to do in your house and then you're like, "I want..." and not that new construction isn't cool and fun, but we do get the complaints that it's, you know, "I don't want to live in a neighborhood where all the houses look alike, I want character." So have you had similar experiences? Megan Hines: Absolutely, I've had it go both ways, actually. So I've been fortunate enough to have some people who are extremely handy to the point where they really could have built their own home, right? So I actually just closed on one last week like this. We initially started out looking at new construction and by the time we kind of factored everything in, this person was selling their house over in California, coming over the big lump sum of cash, and he's super handy. And he's like, "You know what, I want something a little more like a larger yard in a different part of town," and he's like, "And I'm willing to do the work on the house in order to get what I want." So we weren't able to find it in new construction, so we did buy an older home. It doesn't need a ton of work, but it's by no means it's move-in ready, but by no means turn-key. It needs, you know, a fair amount of work and he's got the skill set and the nest egg to be able to do it. He's also, you know, works from home so he's got the time too, right? So and I've seen it go the other way like you're talking about where we go out and the old adage is right, no plan encounters, you know, survives the first encounter with the enemy and it's the same way with house hunting, right? You can go in with all these well intended ideas and things you've seen online and on Pinterest, when you get there in actuality, it's not what you thought it was and now you've got to call an audible. And so when I do like a relocation or buyer consultation, that is one of the things we talk about is like on day one we're going with what you think, we're going to look at the houses you want to see that you give me a list and we, you know, kind of pare it down, see five or six houses. But understand until you see them in person and I see them with you, we really don't know how strongly like those houses are going to fit the mold for you. And so it's typically day two where we start finding the right houses, and so but we have to go through that, right? If we don't see them, touch and feel them, then we don't know what we like and what we don't like. Cameron Walker: Yeah, absolutely. And you know, one of the things with new construction in particular is that most of the time you mentioned this briefly, the yards are not as big. And, you know, I'll have people come to and be like, "I want a huge yard and I want new construction and I want it to be in Madison City schools," and, you know, those things are mutual exclusivity problem here. Yeah, absolutely. And if you find it, it's going to be considerably more expensive than what you think. And it's kind of like if you're ever talking to somebody and it's like, "Oh, what's that worth?" and it's, "All right, what does that cost?" and like, "You have to ask, you can't afford it." Yeah, that's how the housing market feels right now, particularly with large lots. Because think about it from a builder's perspective, just from a financial strictly money, right, no morals or ethics in there, the more houses they can put on one street, smaller yards, more houses, the more money they make. What is the financial incentive for them to make two acre lots versus quarter acre lots? There's not really one unless some of that land's unusable or they can sell it at a considerable markup. So you have to be really careful there. What I do see is a lot of times lots that are larger, there's some big detriment to it. It's in swamp land, it's got a huge gravel rip-rap drainage going across the backyard. So those are other things and depending on why you want the larger yard, that may not be a problem. If it's just for privacy, I've had people that would love something like that because it's grass, they don't have to cut, it gives them the privacy that they want from somebody else. So, you know, there are like when we look at the search criteria for new construction, we say, "Okay, we want a quarter acre or a half acre," it's also really important why do we want that, what are we looking for specifically? It's not just a number, it's the utility. Megan Hines: Absolutely. And, you know, with new construction we find that it's also these neighborhoods are getting farther and farther out. You know, like you'll also have people be like, "I might be interested in new construction but I definitely want to have a walkable lifestyle where I can walk to lots of things," and there are a few of those at city centers, but you're going to pay a premium for that. Cameron Walker: Absolutely, and you're not going to have the wide market of new construction open to you. Absolutely, I think you make a great point there. You have a handful of city centers: Town Madison, Cliff Farms, Providence, now all the way out in my area of Madison and Limestone County, you have Oakland Springs, right? And these are more of the city center walkable, smaller homes, smaller lots kind of things. But you're right, typically you're looking out further from the city, it's going to be driving distance to everything. Like you may have community amenities like a pool or a clubhouse or walking trails, yeah, walking trails, absolutely, sidewalks, playgrounds, but as far as like getting to the grocery store or restaurants, they're not typically within walking distance. You're going to have a 5, 10, 15 minute drive. Megan Hines: Who wants to walk to the grocery store? You have all those bags to carry. I've lived in cities where that was the normal. Backpack, but yeah, absolutely. You know, you're not even riding the bike there, right? So the lack of bike lanes here, lack of public transit, like once you get out to these new construction areas where there is more land for the builders to come in, then yeah, you're typically driving distance from most things. Cameron Walker: Yeah, and it is like it is a lifestyle decision as well if you're going to choose new construction because you're likely to be in an HOA. So if you if your dream is to build a giant purple dinosaur in your front yard, it's not happening. Where I will say a slight exception to that is I'm seeing more of these one-off builders. They'll go in, maybe there was a community that was built 20 years ago and there's three or four vacant lots still in that community, they'll go acquire those and build those. Or like you and I met the other day over in the Low Mill area, and there is a ton of homes that are either being renovated, raised all the way to the ground and rebuilt, or they were vacant lots again that are being built up. And so many of them are so cute. They are, they are, you know, they're not the big ranch style new construction that you see in these housing developments. They're these very stylish little bungalow homes that kind of have the feel of the neighborhood still intact and they're adorable, absolutely. Megan Hines: They're really cute. There's a lot of Craftsman and bungalow style like you said. They've definitely built up higher, I feel like what was originally there was a lot of single story homes, now I'm seeing more two-story or one and a half story homes. So there's a lot more house on that original footprint. They're super cute, it's really cute driving there and it's really funny you'll find a vacant lot next to a house that's being demolished next to one that's 50, 60, 70, 80 years old and one that was built last week and it's like they're all in a four house row, right? Yeah, it's a neighborhood in transition for sure. But those are the type areas where you can get new construction and you may not be in an HOA, right? But then it's going to come with its own challenges. Those may be such small builders that you don't know if they're going to be around in three years to service a warranty that you they provided you. So you kind of have to balance all those risks. Yeah, it's not going to be the same with a with a large production builder. You're going to have this warranty that everyone expects and that you know if they didn't don't perform on it, you can you can you have retaliation towards them. But with these smaller builders, you don't know if they're going to be around. It's it's more like buying a rebuilt home, right? It's not, you know, it's not the same as buying from a production builder with the warranty. Although this is what you're going to get if you want to be in a more urban environment. If you want to be, you know, those Low Mill homes, it's a very like young hip feel. You're walking distance from Low Mill, you're walking distance from those breweries at the Camp over there. Is that the Camp? Did I get that wrong? Uh, no, you're thinking of Campus 805 which is awesome. I'm sorry. Yeah, it's all, there's building so many things in Huntsville these days that it's easy to get them confused honestly, for sure. But you know you have walking distance to awesome food, awesome shops, Low Mill, all the arts that we talked about in our last podcast. So it does that lifestyle where you just wake up and you wander to brunch and then you hang out with your friends, it's different. Yeah, but it is an exception to the rule. So like if you're building within Huntsville city limits for the most part, you're like limited to these farms or some of the communities down in Southeast Huntsville or up on Green Mountain a little bit in the north side. But by and large most of the new construction's outside of the city. I would say like Low Mill rebuilt homes and, you know, tear downs and build back up and same thing with like Five Points in some of the areas around there are really going to be the few places you can get new construction that's walkable within the city limits and you're not out one of those city centers like Providence or Town Mad. Cameron Walker: So what would you say to people who who are like, "I haven't even considered new construction because I think it's too expensive for me?" Megan Hines: Sure, boy, there's such a broad range there, right, when it comes to the pricing of a new construction. And I always tell people there's two prices we're looking at. There's the top line, what are you paying for the house, and there's your monthly payment if you're financing. Depending on how long you're going to be in the home and what your total financial goals are from home ownership is really going to determine which one of those is more important. You're going to be in the home 10 years plus, having a lower monthly payment is really important because over time you're going to pay that bank way more money by having a higher monthly payment. But if you're going to sell in three years, that's really difficult to recoup the amount of equity that you need to to grow the equity in the property so that you're at least break even after you take into account fees, commissions, things like that. So then top line number is really important, cheaper you can get that house, particularly in relationship to market value, the better off you are. So then it's a business decision for you, but it's also a business decision for the builder. So that's where negotiations come in, their strength in the market and all that. But as a general rule of thumb, I am finding that new construction is as affordable as resale homes, if not more so, even for the same size home. Cameron Walker: I am too, and I think that's very shocking. And one of the reasons is that depending on what time of year you purchase new construction or how the market's doing, you can get incentives on interest rates, yes. And that affects your monthly payments tremendously, especially nowadays. Megan Hines: Yeah, yeah, well, you know how it is as an agent, like we get calls, emails, texts from builders daily, like five, six a day, yes, kid you not, right? I've got a whole folder in my email address that everything just forwards to so that doesn't fill up the rest of my inbox. And I had a call with a gentleman yesterday, it's a builder, they're a large national builder, but they're just now coming in the Huntsville area. We had some mutual acquaintances, so they put us in touch and he kind of called me to give his big pitch, but in that conversation I did learn a lot. So they are offering interest rates that are over two percent below what the market rate is if you were going to buy a resale home from the best bank right now, just getting the best flat rate they offer. They're covering all the closing costs and then from a monthly extent, spent standpoint, I've never seen this in this price range, they are doing full foam insulation behind the walls and the roof. So all of your systems are under one insulation service. So like if you have a two-story home, now your attic, your second store, and your first floor are roughly the same temperature. You're no longer heating and cooling spaces that you don't live in or losing that heating and cooling to outside areas. And at their price point, like sub 350, I've never seen spray foam insulation. Cameron Walker: That's fantastic. And, you know, bringing up insulation and the way the houses are built, I do think that's an advantage to new construction 100%. They are better insulated, more eco-friendly, your power bills are almost definitely going to be less than if you buy a 20 year old home. Megan Hines: Yeah, like this builder, I don't know if you're familiar with the HERS score. So the HERS Energy Score, it's a home energy and I forget what the other two letters stand for, but anyway, it's like golf, the lower your score the better you did. And so when I sold new construction years and years ago, our HERS scores were in the 70 to 90 range, so better than the a comparable new home but not significantly so, right? This guy with the spray foam, he was telling me their HERS scores are down in the 60s. And what's cool about that is they test each individual home. This isn't like they tested one in Texas three years ago and now they just get to put that everywhere, you know, like a crash test, right, like every car that's the same model is five star, no, they test each individual home. How they get there is it's really cool. Like if you if you haven't been in a home under construction like during the framing phase, I highly advise walking through them. Nowadays, they spray foam every single little crack in there, you're not going to see any daylight. And even like, let's say your wiring for your electrical comes down in from the attic and it goes through the top plate in your wall, it used to be that just came down because that was considered interior of the home, they didn't do anything about it, you just had a hole in that wood. Now they spray foam that. So around any door, window, the base plate where your wall meets the foundation, around any outlets, light switches, anything like that get spray foam in addition to whatever other insulation is in the home. And they call that area the envelope. They're looking to do is minimize any inflow or outflow of air. And then they use other components like they use energy efficient appliances throughout the home, they use low-e coated windows so it reflects heat. And there's some builders are even doing like radiant barrier in the attic so which knocks down about 20 to 30 degrees of temperature difference in the summer. Cameron Walker: Yeah, that is excellent, and I think that that's something people don't really think about, is, you know, the savings that you're going to get from your interest rate, also from your electric bill. Yeah, it's tremendous with new construction. Megan Hines: It is, and it's hard for people because it comes off as such a sales pitch. Like even that conversation I had yesterday, nice guy, but he was very much trying to pitch me on that's the builder, but now here I am on this podcast talking about like right talking about what I learned, right? But, you know, it seems a very aggressive approach to rather than educating people on it, you're selling them on it. Yeah, and people just don't like to be sold and they know when they are being. But if you take a step back from that, you just do look at it from an educational standpoint. You've got top line price is very competitive with similarly sized homes that are resale that might be 20, 30, 40 years old that have the buyer beware issues that have their own aging infrastructure and, you know, roofs so old the HVAC so old, right? So your dollar for dollar for their in most cases, maybe you're not getting as big of a lot, you've got all new appliances, you have the warranties, and then now you have the monthly savings on the energy efficiency. Oh yeah, you get a two percent lower interest rate and they pay all your closing costs, so it's like, you know, it's kind of a no-brainer for a lot of people. And they don't all, they're not all doing that exact deal, but if you want to know who is, just reach out to us, we'll tell you. We're not actually trying to keep this completely mysterious, it changes daily. Yeah, it changes daily, so that's the other thing I always want to tell people is like new construction pricing is all supply and demand, it is. There's not an emotional component. The builder doesn't care if they sell it for one dollar or a million dollars as long as they have enough profit. And so some builders are more willing to negotiate, some are not, and some make local pricing decisions, some don't. And then they have incentives that roll over every month or they get three for this month and if they sell three homes on the first day of the month, that's it, the next 28, 30 days they don't get anything. So it just depends. Cameron Walker: Yeah, a lot of times people think that you can't negotiate with a builder. Because, you know, they're just too big, agents think that, unfortunately. Negotiating with builder is just different. Sometimes what you have to do is walk away and come back, um, because things can change with the builder. You can't negotiate with anybody if you're not willing to lose. You have no negotiating power if you're like, "I want this and it's the only thing I will ever want," that's that's not a negotiation. Megan Hines: Yeah, no, my sister-in-law about six years ago bought her first new construction home and I was with a national builder and her agent just told her like it's like going to the grocery store, the price you see on the stickers the price you pay. And my sister-in-law, she can squeeze a nickel until it's a dime so she called me and she goes, "All right, is this true?" And I was like, "Absolutely not." And she's like, "What do I do?" And it turns out they had done all the right steps already and we were just in the waiting game. They waited 10 days, it was the end of the month, into the quarter, end of the year. That sales rep called them, she got a free fence, she got all her closing costs paid, she got a free island and free upgrade to granite that was not on offer 10 days before. And her agent told her she couldn't get that stuff. I mean, they couldn't 10 days before, yeah, right. Well, they didn't even try. No, they didn't, that's the thing. Like I think there's a lot of agents out there and even more home buyers, right, that don't realize that with some builders and depending on the market and their need and their desire, there is more room for negotiating. I think there's a churn and burn issue. Yeah, you know, basically that agent might feel like they don't have as much of a connection with their client that they're able to negotiate, whether they feel like if they don't sell this thing, then this person has no connection to them and this might not happen. Yeah, and that's that's I think that's why that happens, absolutely. Right, buy today or otherwise you're going? Because there's nothing, there's they have not formed that connection with their client. When I started in the industry, that we called that commission versus mission, right? Yeah, so like, you know, we're just trying to close on something. Yeah, and and that's like a lot of it also comes with experience. Like there's two builders in town like I'll try to negotiate with them every time, but I don't really go into it expecting to win anything. They would rather close than negotiate. Yeah, and then there's some that I know if we can find mutually aligned, like if they're trying to make a quarterly quota or monthly quota, you know, I can reach out to them say, "Hey look, is this the situation you guys are in? Because this is what my client really wants, if we can meet, then you know, maybe we can get there and make this happen." And knowing who you can call in those scenarios and what part of town and what builder. It's also like, you know, if you're looking for a mansion but the $250,000 builder is the one that's going to negotiate, that's valueless for our clients. Absolutely, so there's strata to it, there's locations where you're going to be at in the market, so all these little factors come in to those negotiations. Cameron Walker: Yeah, yeah, I mean we could go on for hours about new construction, but honestly it comes down to individual case-by-case, house by house situation. So if people have questions about new construction, reach out to us, we'd love to talk to you about your specific situation and how we can, you know, bridge that gap for you. Megan Hines: Absolutely, and thank you so much for joining us. Yeah, if you have questions drop them in the comments. Thanks for watching or listening, you can always catch us on audio on wherever you get your podcast, Spotify, Apple, or you can watch our video on YouTube. Really appreciate you guys being here, ask that you subscribe so we can keep you informed of everything going on here in Huntsville.