Custom Home Builder in Utah

Yes, in all eight: Salt Lake, Utah, Wasatch, Summit, Davis, Weber, Morgan, and Cache Counties. Each structure is designed to the snow load for its location. The schedule is set around the building season at the lot.

Yes. A review of your lot is the first step, before the drawings are final.

We do, as part of site work. We schedule the sewer, water, gas, and electrical connections with each utility provider.

No. You can bring your own architect, or we assemble the design team during preconstruction. An engineer joins it where the plans call for one.

It depends on the office that issues the permit and on the site. Draper, for example, takes plans for a new home only after the city has accepted a geotechnical engineering report for the property. We confirm the requirement for your lot first.

No. Utah leaves passive radon-resistant construction to the owner's choice. A system that is built follows the residential code's Appendix F. Because the Utah Department of Environmental Quality reports that one in three Utah homes has elevated radon, the decision is made before the foundation is poured.

Yes, with the protection Utah requires: a reduced pressure principle assembly directly downstream of the culinary connection and a dual source connection beyond it. The two water systems are never connected at once.

Yes. The potable supply to lawn irrigation runs through an atmospheric vacuum breaker, a pressure vacuum breaker, or a reduced pressure principle assembly. Where chemicals are introduced into the system, that supply runs through a reduced pressure principle assembly. Utah requires testable assemblies to be tested when installed, after any repair or relocation, and at least once a year.

Not statewide. Utah's amendments make residential sprinklers optional under the IRC, though a county, city, or town can have its own requirement. We confirm the rule for your address.

Utah replaces the residential code's energy chapter with its own. A new home meets the chapter's prescriptive insulation and window values, or achieves a REScheck result at least 5 percent better than Utah's 2012 standard or a HERS rating of 67 or better. Its envelope also passes the state's air leakage test at 50 pascals or is built to the state checklist.

Yes, unless the house uses both of the energy chapter's alternatives: the state's air barrier and insulation checklist in place of the Section R1105 test, and mechanical ventilation under Section M1505 in place of the Section R1104.1.3 test. The blower door test measures air leakage at 50 pascals. Under Section R1105, a single-family home may not exceed 5.0 air changes per hour or 0.25 cubic feet per minute per square foot of enclosure area.

Payments are made through draws as costs are incurred. Each draw request carries the invoices and receipts for the work it covers. Project management and builder's risk insurance are billed at direct cost with no markup.

A custom home takes longer than a remodel, because design, any engineering it calls for, and permitting come before site work, and weather affects the exterior phases. The schedule is set once drawings and selections are final. We secure the final inspection and the certificate of occupancy from the Authority Having Jurisdiction before you move in.