Window Blinds - Purchase from Builder?? (new home, buying, construction)

[llkltk]

Does anyone recommend getting blinds from the builder? They are Hunter Douglas wood blinds. Price is comparable to window stores, no markups. They would be installed prior to closing which is a plus. Anyone have any thoughts on this either way? Of course the whole house would just be white wood blinds. No variation.

[Trainwreck20]

Our home had wood blinds installed by the builder, although we bought the house from the original owner when it was a year old, so I don't know anything specific about it (like the brand...I guess I could go look ). The bedroom windows did not have them, nor did one or two other windows where the blinds would obviously be replaced. Anyway, it was really nice to have those wood blinds in most of the major windows - one less hassle to worry about when moving in. The quality has been good...no problems at all with them and the house is now about 9 years old. They still work smoothly and no material issues (paint or cracks, etc.).

Oh, the back doors also have the blinds on them, as well. The really long window upstairs has three side-by-side sets of blinds, but it works out really well.

[NS_Highlander]

Like most builder upgrades, they usually are a rip off charging 2 to 3 times the cost. Do an apples to apples comparison to what they would cost in a store.

[llkltk]

The prices are almost exactly the same.

[achtungpv]

Doing blinds after the fact is a pain, IMHO. If it's the same cost, let them do it. Probably not a bad idea to see if you can view any blinds in some recent constructions to get an idea of quality and verify if the same firm will be installing yours.

[FromCalitoSteinerRanch]

We got ours through the builder, and the price was comparable to Lowe's, Home Depot, etc. 1st problem was they were NOT ready when we moved in, which was a big reason to go with the builder. We were taping the packing paper up on the windows just to have some privacy. I bet the neighbors loved that!

Also, several of them failed within months. They were covered under the builder's 1 year warranty, but we now have a few more that no longer open correctly, or the string has wound up in a way that means they only open one way. We even had one replaced that was part of a three blind set, and they didn't take the other two, so it is not correct, and is off by about a half inch. Hard to notice, but we do.

Granted we should have, could have, been the squeaky wheel and may have got it corrected even after the one year warranty, but we were so tired of fighting the builder up to the one year inspection items, and a couple of months afterwards. I guess you could say we were the perfect customers, they strung us along, and we gave up. Shame on us!

If Home Depot or Lowe's has a "lifetime" warranty, meaning as long as you own the home, I would go with them.

[jenkirk]

I tell my customers to price out their blinds on blinds.com. (Just google
"discount blinds" or "wholesale blinds". You can measure your windows during your first walk through and have the blinds delivered to your current home before you even move in. It takes about 30 minutes to hang the first one, and 5 minutes for each one after the first.

If you are handy, save the money. You will be buying many other things for your new home, and it adds up quick!

I recommend the white blinds in the majority of your house - better for resale to stay with something neutral.

[achtungpv]

Originally Posted by FromCalitoSteinerRanch

We were taping the packing paper up on the windows just to have some privacy. I bet the neighbors loved that!

Yeah, you don't realize how often you walk in front of windows buck naked until you don't have blinds. Our blinds weren't ready until 3 weeks after we moved in. I was too lazy to tape up paper though.

[llkltk]

Originally Posted by FromCalitoSteinerRanch

We got ours through the builder, and the price was comparable to Lowe's, Home Depot, etc. 1st problem was they were NOT ready when we moved in, which was a big reason to go with the builder. We were taping the packing paper up on the windows just to have some privacy. I bet the neighbors loved that!

Also, several of them failed within months. They were covered under the builder's 1 year warranty, but we now have a few more that no longer open correctly, or the string has wound up in a way that means they only open one way. We even had one replaced that was part of a three blind set, and they didn't take the other two, so it is not correct, and is off by about a half inch. Hard to notice, but we do.

Granted we should have, could have, been the squeaky wheel and may have got it corrected even after the one year warranty, but we were so tired of fighting the builder up to the one year inspection items, and a couple of months afterwards. I guess you could say we were the perfect customers, they strung us along, and we gave up. Shame on us!

If Home Depot or Lowe's has a "lifetime" warranty, meaning as long as you own the home, I would go with them.

Thanks for the advice. Just found out they aren't even Hunter Douglas, just some other brand. Also, the window store offers so many extra features such as a lift system. We are going to just buy them ourselves. Thanks for the advice everyone!

[Zzyzx]

Originally Posted by jenkirk

I tell my customers to price out their blinds on blinds.com. (Just google
"discount blinds" or "wholesale blinds". You can measure your windows during your first walk through and have the blinds delivered to your current home before you even move in. It takes about 30 minutes to hang the first one, and 5 minutes for each one after the first.

If you are handy, save the money. You will be buying many other things for your new home, and it adds up quick!

I recommend the white blinds in the majority of your house - better for resale to stay with something neutral.

I agree with this completely. We had a couple of local Hunter Douglas dealers quote our blinds. When I went online to blinds express and priced out the exact same ones, it was not even close. We even gave the quote from blinds express to the local dealer and said we will work with them and understood they have overhead. They said they would not do that, so we ordered online and saved 2K.