[My response is limited to the construction phase. I assume you have made all of the decisions necessary in order to enter into a contract with a builder.]

If the "plans" include full design documents (all drawings and specifications) you might also need to choose the floor and wall finishes, exterior cladding, decking color, stair railings, plumbing and lighting fixtures, kitchen cabinets & counters, roofing color, trim profiles, tile color, hardware, paint colors, fireplace hearth, shutter, toilet accessories and appliances.

Some of these decisions can be in the design documents but "full design documents" should include plans, exterior elevations, interior elevations as needed, wall sections and other necessary details, interior & exterior material specifications and installation instructions, waterproofing requirements, window & door schedules, etc.

Choices not specified in the contract documents should be listed as Allowances or have Unit Prices provided so it should be possible to go through those documents and make a list of the missing information. I strongly advise you to avoid Allowances because that forces you to lose pricing control for those items. At least try to persuade the contractor to reduce or eliminate the mark-up on allowance overruns.

The important thing is to make these choices before the contractor tells you he needs the information.

This post was edited by Renovator8 on Mon, Aug 5, 13 at 8:41

There's an extensive list of things to think about in the attached thread...I think there was a part II as I recall as this one was filled...

Here is a link that might be useful: Small things that get forgotten

We are building as we speak....there are literally 1,000's of decisions!

Some that come to mind...

Selecting stain colors - gosh, we have 3 samples and it is hard to choose - these are for beams on the ceiling and some exterior doors.

Window hardware - we have casements and the crank to open them as well as the lock can be different based on what color the wood is painted in each room.

Cabinet hardware - sooo many to choose from. Our kitchen alone has 3 different ones..cup pulls, appliance pulls and knobs!

Outlet covers - I never thought of this...but since there are 100's (maybe thousands) shades of white trim colors, I was surprised that I didn't get the solid white, but selected a light almond because really our trim is not a bright white!

Exterior stone - we selected one and it is a real natural stone, not cultured or man-made. Well, when the stone came in, it looked totally different than the sample we saw 4 months ago. The same thing can happen with marble tiles!

Little things like the height of the hearth on the fireplace. Do you want to accommodate people sitting on the hearth? Then it should be larger and taller so you don't have to struggle to get up! Toilet heights too - ADA height or lower....

Electrical such as low voltage for speakers and Beam vac...where do you want the outlets? I had to really think about this for the vac. Hubby took care of the speaker placement and how they are controlled and where are they controlled from! That whole low voltage piece was alot of decisions! Camera location too!

Toilet paper holders and towel bars.....we only have frame and builder asked us to decide so he can block out with extra 2 x 4's where we want the paper holders and towel bars...that way they won't fall off the wall easily. We found that in some bathrooms, we didn't have a free wall and we didn't want to drill into our cabinets, so I will get a free standing paper holder. I also decided on hooks in my boys' bathrooms instead of a bar, so they can hang 3 towels vs. one eating up the whole towel bar. We did the same with shower shampoo niches too...all preplanned so they can be strengthened and well thought out.

Cast Stone for window sills, headers, and fireplace...we had no idea that we had to pick a style to be made into a mold! We giggled at the meeting because we didn't know our house even had that element! Luckily our architect had already had them planned on our plans with the suggested style based on the style of our home. I had to pick the color too!

I hope my list helps you a bit....

Good luck with your build!!!

Pam

Renovator8 and Pam, thank you so much for your detailed comments. it really helps us to decide a few more selections ahead of time, 1000-10 to go:)

Annie, your link is amazing! it's all about the small things

When I mentioned bathroom accessories I meant that these items can be selected later but their size and location should be part of the bathroom design along with the tile, vanity, counter, medicine cabinet, etc. and preferably be shown on bathroom interior elevations otherwise they might not fit or might look awkward. You will need these drawings for tile, and electrical/plumbing fixtures anyway. Looking at the bares studs is not the time to be doing this work.

The same goes for a fireplace. A hearth should be designed with section details in the contract documents so the appropriate foundation can be built. A zero clearance fireplace requires special detailing for the hearth to be level with the firebox floor and it is difficult to achieve this feature if not designed in advance.

Don't let design issues become construction issues.

No one can provide you a full list of decisions, since your project and your role/decision-making in it is unique to you!

The comments above are good guidelines, but your best guide is your design professional and your builder. The challenge is to:

1) Make all the decisions that impact bidding and the bid price and schedule before bidding;
2) Make the decisions about options, alternates, substitutions and allowances before they are needed during construction.

Unless you have done this hundreds of times you will not know what these selections/decisions are and when they are needed. One simply doesn't know what one doesn't know!

That's why you need a talented and experienced architect and design professional to guide you before bidding and construction and a talented and experienced builder to guide you during construction.

If you don't have both of these you are proceeding forward with a blindfold, and the suggestions here may be helpful (or not), since your scope of work and situation are unique to you.

This is one of the big challenges for first-time do-it-your-selfers.

Good luck with your project.