Does Anyone Own A Westin Home? (Center, Magnolia: buying a home, subdivision, to live)

[Amelinckx]

Originally Posted by amsapphire

Hi AMELINCKX, i was hoping to hear your feedback on your home purchase At Discovery at Spring Trails. We LOVE the Valencia by Westin too! How was your exsperience dealing with the builder? Would appreciate any info-THANK U!!

So far, the Valencia is a great option.
Minor construction details but you can identify them previously if you hire an external inspector - strongly recommended -.
Only issue right now, the amenities center ... still coming soon!

[Thomas23]

Thanks...for the response...we are excited about the move...and to here your comments really excite us even more about the area...What are the utility cost range for the silverstone and castlebrook in NCV?

[a_guerrajr]

Originally Posted by Thomas23

Thanks...for the response...we are excited about the move...and to here your comments really excite us even more about the area...What are the utility cost range for the silverstone and castlebrook in NCV?

The new homes now are efl certified. So they should be really efficeny.
Our water.bill was 48$, trash fee included.
Light was 28$
Gas 50$, used it to warm up during cold, also had our water temp set high.

[axvu]

a_guerrajr,

My boyfriend and I have read all 25 pages of this thread (excessive, I know, but we wanted to thorough before we invest a quarter of a million into a home). We've especially read all your posts and your house. First off, congratulations on your home, it's beautiful. We are wanting to custom build a Magnolia in Shadow Creek Ranch and was wondering if you knew what comes standard to custom built homes? We also wanted to upgrade a few things (granite in the bathrooms, under mounted sinks, iron spindles, hardwood floors and stone accent on the outside) but weren't sure what the costs would be in our 6% incentive upgrade. The base price was 244,000 totaling an upgrade incentive of almost 15k.

Also, do you know if it's possible to switch out the level 1 tile to level 1 hardwood and how much it would cost if it weren't switchable?

Any advice is appreciated, thanks!

[davidrod8]

We just had out Design Center Appt last Friday with Westin. We are building a Patterson in Cardiff Ranch. Right now sitting at 375 but probably pushing to 400 when all is said and done...

I'm sure the answer to your question will vary quite a lot, there are many factors involved. Our home is a series 7, so a lot of stuff is standard... but I can tell you one thing... Stay away from doing the floors with Westin... Their prices are ridicuolous... more towards the insane side... we chose all the standard stuff and will be doing the floor once we close on the house... Some of the tile they were asking $10-$30 per sq ft.... insane!

As for your questions... spindles... depends on the model... ours is $3,000 which doesn't seem like a bad deal compared to the prices I have found... thinking about getting them through them... have heard of some houses that can go up to $6K...

Stone accent is priced per square foot... our house came out at $6K but we did a lot...

Undermount sink... we chose the rectangular ones in Ivory, they are $600 each... however they have a lot of choices, and can run north of $1000...

Prices of wood and tile are very differnt so I doubt they would "swich them"

As I said, leave the floors for later... it'll be a lot cheaper...

Also, usually you can negotiate the incentive... 6% seems a bit low... seem to recall people getting more than that... we got 8%... but it's a much larger house and in a different subdivision... everyone I talked to in Cardiff has been getting 8% I believe....

[honycombe]

@davidrod8 - Glad they will start on your house soon! Regarding spindles, if they are only charging you $3k to upgrade...do it! We were told $6k and ended up doing it ourselves as a weekend project and spent $1800 and got something no one else has. Although I do not regret doing the spindles on our own and we did get the spindles switched out, I then spent lots of time staining underneath the handrail where the wood ones came out as well as sanding the base to even out the original paint and then painting the tops twice (where the bottom of the spindles go). It looks fantastic now, but I would have gladly spent another $1k to have had it done.

Totally agree with the flooring. Most of our upgrades combined cost what just the upgraded flooring would have cost. Our stone elevation cost @$7k. Don't remember much else!

[davidrod8]

@honeycombe - Yes, it took us a while to get going... We didn't have an offer on our current house so we pushed the design center visit as far away as possible... Our old house is finally under contract and we'll be moving to a rental in the next couple of weeks... so now we are excited about the new house again... Our street exploded with a ton of houses under construction.... Hopefully you won't be getting too much dust...

We saw the spindles at Home Depot and another store, and while it looks like a nice project, we have so many things that we want to work on, this project does not sound like fun to me, so we'll just have them do it I don't remember how much stone your house has... I'll have to stop by next time I'm there to see... but yes, totally worth it...

[a_guerrajr]

@ AXUS

We asked for 9%, came to a little over 18K, we used 3% for closing and the rest for upgrades. They originally offered 8% as the incentive, we shot for 10%, but 9% was what they agreed upon. At the moment their incentive is different. I believe now in this neighborhood they are doing 6%, but you get level 1 granite in the kitchen/master bath/2 secondary baths , undermount sink in kitchen, spindles in the staircase(not any landings/catwalks), and rounded corners. In your case it seems like the sales person is just giving himself some wiggle room, so I would no sign @ 6%, that's too low, you can tell them that you've visited other communities and tell them 6% is not good enough.

Best suggestion is to get upgrades that you can't change later on. For example we got the shower seat, which was either now or never, we had the fireplace placed in the center of the living room, we had insulation for interior walls done, stone, media room, gas plumbing.

Flooring, or even counter tops i would put towards the end. IF anything cabinets, but even then you might get a better price afterwards.

Westin is a semi-custom builder, so somethings you can change, some are not. But they are much more flexible than builders like Meritage.

• Base Price: 203,990
• Lot Premium: 2,000
• Media Room: 8,188
• Upgraded Mortar For Brick/Stone: 1,200
• Stone: 2,133
• Maple Cabinet In the Powder Room: 263
• Memory Foam Carpet Pad and Stain Proof: 1,162
• 8" Deep Kitchen Sink: 77
• Granite in Master Bath: 980
• Under-mount Square Sinks in Master Bath: 690
• Front Door with Glass/Design: 750
• Rounded Corners: 750
• Electrical Outlet above Fireplace: 75
• Cultured Stone Fireplace: 738
• Tile in Butlers Pantry: 190
• Tile in Extended Foyer: 430
• Tile in Dining Room: 785
• Upgraded Tile in Master Bath Floor: 594
• Upgraded Tile in Master Bath Shower: 689
• Tile in Jack and Jill Restroom Upstairs: 205
• Nickel Lighting and Hardware: 1920
• R38/R15 Insulation Upgrade: 1380
• Two Tone Exterior Paint: 225
• Gas Plumbing For Gas Oven: 195
• Bronze Plumbing Fixtures in Master Bath: 386
• Tub w/ Whirlpool Jets: 650
• Phone Jack Outlet above Fireplace: 75
• Conduit over fireplace (for wiring TV stuff): 225
• Bronze Shower Enclosure: 250
• Glass block window in master: 650
• Shower Seat in master bath: 875
• Bronze Iron Spindles in Stairs and Landings: 5,930
• Tech-shield in the Attic - 1,120

[axvu]

Thanks so much for your input! We are planning on making an appointment with the salesperson to see what he can offer us. We really want to stick to our 250,000 budget but still get some of the things we want. Any tips on the types of questions and comments we should make and what we should look for? Thanks for all your help!

[a_guerrajr]

Originally Posted by axvu

Thanks so much for your input! We are planning on making an appointment with the salesperson to see what he can offer us. We really want to stick to our 250,000 budget but still get some of the things we want. Any tips on the types of questions and comments we should make and what we should look for? Thanks for all your help!

Are you planning to use some.of the incentive for closing?
If you do only 3% can be applied. So that leaves 6k to max out at 250 and whatever is left from incentive money.

Main thing is seeing the lots, if you find a lot that you like with no premium, then that's great. Second, ask for more than 6%, atleast 8%, more money to play with.

Are you using a realtor?
First time buyer?