Know what to ask before you hire a builder.
What’s Inside
You'll know how a well-run project is supposed to work — which means you'll recognize one that isn't, before you've signed anything.
01 - Clarity over chaos
02 - Confidence without experience
You may hire a builder once or twice in your life. Builders sit across from homeowners every week. This playbook levels that table — seven questions to ask out loud, and what a good answer sounds like.
Most projects don't go wrong during construction. They go wrong before it, in the part nobody pays attention to. You'll know exactly where to look.
03 - Awareness of where projects actually fail
04 - Control without a second job
You'll know which decisions deserve your attention, which ones a builder should handle without you, and how to stay in command of your investment without managing the job site.
Why I Wrote This
I've been building and remodeling homes in Houston since 2004. In that time I've watched the same thing happen to smart, capable people — surgeons, attorneys, executives who run circles around me in their own field — walk into a construction project blind and pay for it later.
Not because they did anything wrong. Because nobody told them what to look for.
This playbook is what I'd tell a friend before they hired a builder. Any builder — including us. Ask every question in it. If a builder can't answer without flinching, keep looking.
Curtis LawsonPrincipal & Founder, Crafted Homes
GHBA Prism Award Winner · Certified Aging-in-Place Specialist (CAPS) · Building in Houston Since 2004The questions are free, but the lessons aren’t.
Read it before your first builder meeting.