Thank you for the info and advice. We are definitely looking forward to and are preparing for our "LONG DAYS" at the DC.
My wife and I went on the 45 minute tour today (before the two scheduled appointments) and it was actually a good experience for us. The woman who gave us the tour was very pleasant.
One of the things I was hoping for when we go to our first appointment a week and a half from now was to get a price list of the amenities that are available at the Design Center, so we can "comparison shop" at Lowes and Home Depot for the same items, such as garage door openers, light fixtures, appliances, etc. I was pleasantly surprised that they actually
gave us our price list before the tour today. So we'll have all that time to analyze and compare prices with a fine-toothed comb. For those items that cost more on KB's list, we will just opt either not to get them and buy them later, if it is an item we can live without for a while (ie: the garage door opener), or just get the "Builder Included" items from KB installed and simply remove them, upgrade to our preferred, less expensive item from one of the home improvement stores, and sell the "BI" item to someone else for less than what they would pay for it (ie: light fixtures and appliances). Buying later with cash will save us money in interest as these items would become part of our loan of both principal and interest if we were to get them through KB.
We also figure we can live without the more expensive countertops and cabinets for a while. We plan on living in this house for at least ten years. (I've moved too much in my life, bouncing from apartment to apartment, to living with my in-laws, and back to apartments again. Needless to say, I'm ready to settle down for a while.) We can upgrade gradually later on to better cabinets and countertops, so that when we do sell, the better pieces will be more attractive to buyers.
My father-in-law is a general contractor and knows all the Good v. Bad products and materials on the market. And my brother-in-law is very knowledgable in this regard, too. (Like father, like son.) They can look at the list and tell us what is worth getting through KB as far as time and labor in letting them (KB) do it versus us doing it ourselves.
My wife and I are very frugal and don't need extras like the covered porches and the fancy exteriors. The available exterior facades that KB has are all very nice, IMHO, anyway. So far, a preliminary selection of the things we do want, which do BTW include a few top-end upgrades, have us spending only 60% of our budgeted amount. I'd say that's pretty good thus far. I have no delusions that as we dig deeper into the selections available to us we will spend more. But, so far, I am feeling good about our overall experience.
I'd be interested in hearing about the complaints people had about the DC. I've read about some of them on this forum, but nothing recent. I wonder, with the slowdown in housing purchases, if KB has "cleaned up their act" so to speak.