Before you buy the land, have Dale walk it with you.

What he is looking at

Slope. Grade. Where the water goes. The setbacks. How you get onto the property. And where you want the house placed — including which way you want it to face.

He brings equipment that reads grade, elevation, angles and drainage.

What you get at the end of it

One of three answers.

This is a good property. This is not a good property. Or: here is what has to happen when we start building on this property, and what it needs.

He has given the second answer. Not often, but it happens, and it happened fairly recently. A customer wanted a lot that sat in a 100-year floodplain. We took all the measurements and did all the surveys, and we physically could not raise it high enough to get it out. That left flood insurance or nothing. They were not willing to buy the insurance, so we advised them not to buy the lot, and they moved on and bought somewhere else.

That is the whole point of doing this before the money moves.

The things that actually change the number

Dirt work. This is the one that surprises people. Buyers do not understand the level of dirt work that has to be done or what that dirt work costs, and overruns on it can be pretty common, especially where you are dealing with any kind of floodplain or drainage issue. We do try to be up front about what that is going to cost before anything happens.

The driveway. How far it runs, where legally and by code it is allowed to go, and how much concrete that takes. Dale can generally read that one pretty quick, standing on the lot.

Water. If the lot is in a development, there is a co-op and we know that going in. If it is well optioned, we look at the options. There are two aquifers we can tap into here — the Paluxy and the Trinity — at different depths, one with better access than the other. Which one you are drilling into can raise the price of the build, and it can also get you a better water source. Being able to put in a well is a benefit, and a lot of the properties we build on have that ability.

Septic. Sometimes this is dictated by the HOA, or by the rules of the land under the governing political subdivision. Where the choice is yours, 90 to 95 percent of our customers choose an aerobic system — in Dale's view it typically is the better system — and we have only put in a few standard septics, because most people do not want those anymore.

Power. In a subdivision or any kind of development, the developer provides it. On acreage outside a development the distance depends, and it can get fairly large, but not usually large enough to be an excluder. It is usually a small portion of what the build is.

Setbacks, easements, deed restrictions, HOA rules. These generally do not stop a build. They change it: the house moves to a different location on the property, or over a few feet. On an established development the HOA will tell you exactly what they are. On acreage outside a development it is county rules, or the land is unrestricted. Pipeline corridors are real out here and do have to be dealt with — so far, on every build we have ever had, we have managed that with no issues.

Trees. If it is a very common tree we generally do not worry about it. A shade tree, a lot of the time the customer wants to keep, and so do we, because it brings down what the house costs to run on air conditioning in the hot summer months. And an older tree — an old oak, something rare or well established — we like to keep, for the history it brings to the build, where it fits the aesthetic. We only take what we need to.

How long it takes

Usually about an hour on the property with you. Sometimes we will come out later on our own and look at it more and take more measurements, and that can run to two, three, four hours. It depends on the lot.

And nothing gets promised until we have all the information. Anything Dale says standing in a pasture is a builder's read, not a quote.