Transcript note: Speaker labels for Eric Alarid and Dawn Dantzler are based on dialogue context, with initially ambiguous turns confirmed by Dawn. The transcript has not been independently verified against the audio. The supplied caption wording is preserved, including possible transcription errors. Event announcements, pricing examples, and program descriptions reflect the September 15, 2026 broadcast.

Eric: Howdy, everyone. Welcome to Tilson Live. It is Tuesday. It is 2:00 o'clock. We are coming at you live on YouTube, live on Facebook, live on Instagram to talk about all things building a custom home on your land. It's Tilson Tuesday, first time in a while. We are happy to be here with you guys to talk about all things building a custom home on your land. I'm Eric Alarid, part of the fourth generation of the Tilson family, joined as I am each and every single week by Dawn Dantzler, vice president of marketing and customer experience. Good afternoon, Dawn.

Dawn: Hey, Eric. How's it going?

Eric: It's great. We are enjoying the beautiful fall weather in Texas. Leaves are falling because trees are dying because there's no water and it's 100 degrees. But all the places are forcing pumpkin spice upon us. They are willing this to happen.

Dawn: We're just trying to manifest fall.

Eric: People are serving hot drinks. I don't understand it, but anyway, it's hot. Lots of construction's happening, which is good. Making up a lot of ground. Record construction time, so that's cool. It's fun. Fun for our customers, fun for our construction team.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: But yeah, could use a little cool air. But that's what's going on, and yeah, we're very excited to be here to talk about all things building a custom home on your land. Folks, jump into the chat. Tell us where you're watching from, where you're building, what part of the process you are in. We want to hear from you. We know that we have been away for a couple of weeks. Dawn and I both were traveling a lot.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: Dawn was traveling a whole lot. I travel a little. But Dawn's traveling a lot, so thanks for bearing with us. Come back to us. Come see us if we're popping up in your feed. Welcome. Welcome back. We're excited to have you. Excited to talk about all things building a custom home on your land. And while you guys jump into the chat telling us where you're watching from, where you're building, what part of the process you are in, Dawn is going to walk us through what we're talking about today and maybe a thing or two of what's happening in the Tilsonverse. Who knows?

Dawn: Yeah. Of course. So today, this episode is all about you guys because since we've been gone for a while, we wanted to give you guys the opportunity to ask any of the questions that you didn't get to ask us while we were missing. So it's an ask us anything. So it's your opportunity to stump Eric, stump Dawn, ask us questions we don't know about. Eric's in an office, so he can throw the door open and yell for help. Or we can-

Eric: I can. Yes

Dawn: ... we can phone a friend if we need to, but ask us any of your questions about building on your lot. How is it different? What's a culvert? Do I need one? All of that kind of stuff. Land prep, design, any burning topic that you have on your mind, questions that you want to ask us, we are here to answer them. And while-

Eric: Yes. If you've got questions-- Oh, sorry. Go ahead.

Dawn: Oh, no. Go ahead.

Eric: We're out of practice. I'm very sorry.

Eric: No. Questions about-- Floodplain stuff's been coming up. We can talk mortgage. We can talk financing. We can talk, like Dawn was talking about, site prep. We can talk permits. Who's responsible for what? We can talk process. If you guys, I don't know where you are on your journey. Maybe you're just now thinking about doing this and you're looking at land, or maybe you already have your land and you've got some questions about what needs to happen with it and who does what, and how do you know who to ask? Or maybe you have started on the journey and maybe you're looking at plans and making some changes, but you've got questions about how or why we do the things we do. Or maybe you're already under contract and you're doing your site evaluation or choosing your colors, and you kind of wonder what's happening next. Or maybe you're in construction and seeing stuff unfold, if you can stand to go out there and look at it, because it's so blessed hot outside.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: And then, yeah, I recommend early in the mornings.

Dawn: If you can wave through the love bugs of Southeast Texas. You have to swat them away. It's crazy right now.

Eric: Yeah. It's exceedingly crazy right now. Or maybe you are going through the process, folks, and you're sitting there with your favorite beverage, watching the heat wave happen and enjoying this from the air conditioning of your beautiful Tilson home. Jump into the chat. Tell us where you're watching from, where you're building, and what part of the process you are in. We want to hear from you. Dawn, what else is happening in the Republic of Tilson?

Dawn: We've got the in-person seminars that are happening. We have those every weekend. This weekend, we're going to have one in our Georgetown office that's going to be talking about our financing, our EasyBuy program. So that's a good place to go if you want more information about that. And then our Weatherford office is going to be talking all things land prep. So if you're curious about what you need to do to get your property ready for building, they can kind of guide you through that process. And then we also have a really exciting event this weekend in Gatesville, Texas. So we're going to have one of our Muddy Boots home tours, and so that's an opportunity for you to actually walk one of our customer's homes that's currently under construction.

Dawn: So you're seeing it after the insulation has been put in, but before the sheetrock is put up. So it's really an opportunity for you to get to see the quality that's behind the walls of a Tilson home, because it's great to walk our models and see them completely finished, but the true difference between home builders actually lies behind the walls, not so much in the finishes. So this is a great opportunity for you to meet one of our builders out at a customer's job site, see their actual home, and hear about exactly what we do and how the Tilson construction is different. And why we choose the products that we do and kind of walk you through what that process looks like. So we still have a few seats left.

Dawn: If you guys want to register for that, because we do try to keep those events a little bit smaller than everything else, just because it is our customer's property, so we want to make sure that we're respectful of their property as well as their neighbors. And so we keep that small, but we do still have a few seats available if you guys want to register for that. So you can scan the code or you can visit our website after this stream and- ... go ahead and register for that event.

Eric: Yes, if you visit the website now, we're going to throw you back over here to the stream. Watch us.

Dawn: Yeah. And actually, you'll get a pop-up that tells you to come back here.

Eric: Where you're supposed to be. Get back where you're supposed to be.

Dawn: Come back to class.

Eric: Yes. Come back to class. Anyway, folks, drop into the chat where you're watching from, where you're building, what part of the process you are in. If you've attended one of these Muddy Boots, drop that in there. Currently, it's going to be a dusty boots tour, probably, as opposed to a Muddy Boots tour.

Dawn: That's fair.

Eric: So yeah. Nonetheless, it's a boots tour, so we're hoping maybe one day for muddy boots again, but right now it's just dusty.

Dawn: Yeah. But like you said, it's making construction go super fast right now.

Eric: Crazy. Huh? Yeah. It is crazy.

Dawn: Yeah. All right. Well, let's see. We do have a few questions that are coming in, so let's get those-

Eric: Mm-hmm

Dawn: ... answered. We got Miguel asking, "Can Tilson Homes combine land and the build of the home into one mortgage?"

Eric: Fantastic question, Miguel. Thanks for asking. Thanks for watching us on our YouTube channel. So the answer is, yes, absolutely can. There's actually two ways to do that. Excuse me. The first would be for those folks who maybe already have purchased the land. I guess there's really three ways to do it. Three ways to do it. Way one, you already have purchased the land in some way, and maybe you're still paying on it. Maybe you bought it a year, or two, or seven years ago, and you're making monthly payments on that land, but you're ready to build a house. You're ready to make that move, get out of the city, get out to the country, and you're dialed in on the price of the Tilson home that you're going to build.

Eric: And then, so what we would do is you would keep paying on that land note, just all the way through construction. You wouldn't make any payments to us during the construction for the house, and then upon completion of the home, once you've done your walk-through and you go to the title company and close, they're going to add the balance that you owed on that property to the contract price of our house, and those two will be combined as one mortgage. That's one way to do it. Another way would be maybe you are just now finding a piece of property. You're looking. Let's do two ways right now. You're looking for a piece of property. You found what you like. You haven't bought it yet.

Eric: You know what kind of house you want. We can do a one-time close construction loan, where you actually do lock the rate in upfront on the one-time close. That can be done where you close on the land. You would owe interest on the land portion of that closing. Let's say the house was $500,000 and the land was $100,000. You would owe the interest on that $100,000 part because we have to fund that upfront to get the land-

Dawn: Right

Eric: ... in your name. But that's all you would owe, and then you still wouldn't start making monthly mortgage payments until the house is completely finished. At which point, the $100,000 land and the $500,000 home will be combined into one $600,000 mortgage. So, it can be done that way. Those are the two main ways that it's done. But yes, the answer is absolutely.

Dawn: Okay. Awesome. We've got Kristen joining us on Facebook, and it's actually her home that we're doing the Muddy Boots in. So she's saying they're three months into their build, and the home is going to be on this weekend's Muddy Boots. So if you're thinking of using Tilson, contact the Waco office-

Eric: Aw

Dawn: ... and come take a look. Thank you, Kristen. Thanks so much for sharing your home with everyone.

Eric: Very cool. Yeah. Thank you for doing that.

Dawn: Then we have Susanna asking, "What does it mean that you don't have a construction loan?"

Eric: Dawn, what does it mean? What does it all mean?

Dawn: What's it all mean? So yeah, Susanna, that's a great question. So Tilson is able to offer an exclusive financing program. We're the only builder that I know of that actually does this. We actually finance the construction of all of our homes that are under construction out of our own pocket. So when you are building on your land, as long as you have 10% equity in that final project, either by owning the property outright or you could still have a balance on it. But when you figure out exactly what the final value of the property is going to be, and we'll help you do that. As long as you have 10% equity, that's it. You're just going to pay your deposit, and Tilson's going to take care of all the construction costs throughout construction, and you'll just have a final mortgage at the end. So that's how our Easy Buy program works.

Dawn: That's what we mean when we say that, and that's a huge differentiator between building with Tilson and building with someone else. Because most custom builders are going to require you to get a construction loan, which means that you're borrowing money from the bank, and that money is being paid to the builder, but you're the one that needs to pay it back. And on that loan, there's interest accruing during the entire time of construction, and with Tilson, you don't have to worry about any of that as long as you qualify for Easy Buy. So hopefully, that answered the questions. If you have any other questions, pop them in, and I'll be happy to explain more. But that's a program that's exclusive to us, and that's what we mean.

Dawn: We just mean you're not going to borrow money from the bank for the construction. You just have to worry about the final mortgage.

Eric: Yeah. It really is kind of a foreign concept, even to loan officers outside of Tilson Homes. We were dealing with one this morning at one of the other offices that just-- Loan officers, mortgage companies, banks, they don't believe it when you explain it to them.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: It really is. It sounds too good to be true, but it is true.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: And so we've had seasoned loan officers, we have to kind of sit them down, and they're like, "No. You're misunderstanding something. No builder would do that." And it's like, "No, no."

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: One builder would do that, and that would be us, so.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: But it is a difficult concept if you've never done it any other way. If you've never done it before at all, it's a super simple concept. But if you have-

Dawn: Yeah

Eric: ... built a custom home before and gone through the construction loan process, gone through the construction process with dual signature checks, you and the lender on that construction loan-

Dawn: Mm-hmm

Eric: ... interest accruing, time stacking up. Inspections have to be done before money can be released, which means progress stops when that's going on. I find that anybody who's gone through this process before, when we explain to them this, they're like, "I don't care what you build me, just that's how I'm doing it."

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: "Doing the Easy Buy, I don't care, because I'm never doing the construction loan thing again."

Dawn: Yeah, absolutely. And we did have, Damon actually submitted a question ahead of time on Facebook.

Eric: Oh.

Dawn: He wasn't going to be able to make it today. So he's curious about what are things that add to the total price of the build? Trying to build a nice home, but cut some of the expensive structure costs where I can. Looking at a four bedroom, two and a half bath, max 2,500 square feet, min 2,000.

Eric: Yeah. So really, Damon, that's a great question. Thanks for submitting it ahead of time and for watching. Structure's not where you want to peel out, and if I'm misunderstanding the question, forgive me. But that's not where you want to skimp and save.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: So when I think structure, just for context, I'm thinking your slab, so your preparation work for the dirt, the foundation itself, so the engineer foundation design, the geotechnical investigation, beam dip, beam depth, beam width, cable spacing, all that kind of stuff, in accordance with the geotechnical investigation and the engineer's recommendations. And I think of the bones of the house, so your slab, your frame, and your roof, is kind of what I think when I think structure. Those are the-

Dawn: Mm-hmm

Eric: ... your windows, your waterproofing system on the home, your roofing system on the home. And they are systems. It's not just slap whatever up and we hope it works. These are very well-researched, practiced systems that we put into place to help the houses breathe. The next part kind of under that, that's equally important, would be your HVAC. So we're not skimping there. That's a place where, because the houses are built so tight these days, they have to be able to breathe. So the fresh air intakes, the dehumidifiers, the Manual J calculations that we run to get the correct sized HVAC system. There is such thing as too big of an AC. There's such thing as too small of an AC system, and there's such thing as too big of AC system, especially in humid places like Texas.

Eric: So really, the places to save would be if you're thinking about doing upgrades. We see customers that, I guess one structural thing you could save on would be if you were thinking about doing just a 500 square foot covered porch on the back of the house, something like that. That might be a place where you can maybe skimp on that, do a gazebo later or a separate kind of hangout area somewhere else on the property. Perhaps a garage. Again, we're about 60% that we build with a garage, about 40% that we build without. So, that could be a significant number if you're looking to cut somewhere, maybe don't do the garage or do the, because you can do a detached garage later on-

Dawn: Mm-hmm

Eric: ... and make it pretty well match the house or get real close. That's an area. And then the other areas would be kind of upgrades. So if you're considering, "I want wood floors throughout the house," okay, well, maybe let's price that out because again, it doesn't cost a dime to dream. That's kind of our thing. Let us sit there and let's just make a wish list together, and we can tell you exactly what it's going to cost, every room of that, cabinets, countertops, floor coverings, paint, doors, all the cool stuff, electrical fixtures, plumbing fixtures. And then you can just sit there and line item veto anything you decide you don't want, or it's not important right now, things that could be done later.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: So I wouldn't skimp on cabinets, probably wouldn't skimp on countertops, although to a lesser degree. But stuff that's really expensive to change out later, I probably wouldn't skimp there. But floors, they cost money, but it's not that big a deal-

Dawn: Mm-hmm

Eric: ... in 8, 10, 12 years to take your floors out and put new floors in. So that might be an area. Do you have any other suggestions, Dawn, that you can think of?

Dawn: I don't know what he is referring to as expensive or not, but things like specialty wall treatments or ceiling treatments, that's something you could come back in later if you were looking to do shiplap or a feature wall. Something like that could be done later, so you could hold that out. Adding beams to the ceiling is something you could do after the fact. But yeah, I'm with you. Definitely don't skimp on the structure, and invest your money in the things that are harder, that are going to be way more inconvenient for your family down the road if you need to take them out. Like you said, flooring can be done in a couple of days to a week if you want to trade that out later.

Dawn: So that's somewhere that if you don't want to spring for the really nice hardwoods right now because your kids are going to beat them up anyway. You can do stuff like that later. But yeah, I would make sure that your cabinets are pretty good, your countertops are good. But yeah, I would try to avoid being like, "Hey, we'll just add that extra bedroom later," because that's going to be a huge-- Do all of that kind of stuff now. Get the structure exactly where you want it to be, and maybe focus more on the finish stuff later.

Eric: That's great. Yeah, you made me think of ceiling heights. It's hard to change later. Cathedral ceilings-

Dawn: Yeah, you're not going to change a ceiling height

Eric: ... are hard to add later. If you want a cathedral ceiling, you need to do it now. You don't necessarily need to spring for the beams right now.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: But you need to, yeah, that kind of stuff. So those kind of things that definitely will not be cheaper later.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: They're more invasive and very expensive to do later. So, great question.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: And folks, drop more questions in the chat. We are live on Facebook, live on YouTube, live on Instagram.

Dawn: Instagram didn't want to play, so we're not live.

Eric: We are not live on Instagram.

Dawn: No.

Eric: It's a petulant child, Instagram is, really.

Dawn: It is sometimes. It's like, "You've been gone too long, I'm not letting you in," so.

Eric: Huh. Well, how about that? Well, don't get on Instagram then because it's going to suck you into the algorithm, and you'll disappear from us. So whatever you do, don't do that. But we are live on YouTube, live on Facebook. Drop your questions, comments into the chat. Anything you want to know about construction, about energy efficiency, about site preparation. Like Dawn said, culverts and site prep, and pads, and clearing, and water lines, and permits, and how do I get the electrical set up, and how do I get the water set up? Is it a water well? Is it a water company?

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: Am I using propane? Am I using natural gas? Am I all electric? Can I do a generator? These are all things that we would be glad to talk about today. We know we've been gone. We've been absentee parents.

Eric: We're so sorry. It's on us. Well, it's on me.

Dawn: It's okay. I know, let's go into some of our more popular questions. We get this one a lot. How long does the process take?

Eric: Oh, yes. That's a wonderful one. Yeah. So, overall process, 10 to 12 months. That's running pretty average right now.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: Even though most customers don't see it this way, and it makes perfect sense, but it is kind of a two-part process. So, in build on your lot- There is the actual land development portion, and then there's construction. So the part that you're accustomed to in production subdivision world, master plan community world, if you went in and bought fill-in-the-blank major builder across America and master plan community X, you saw probably that second half. You just saw the construction snapshot, which in those situations, sometimes only four to six months, maybe seven. Right now, we run about seven-month average, about 210 days for actual construction.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: And I think it's actually coming down. But so that's the part you saw. So if you picture the blinder over here, you didn't see any of the part over here where they had to buy the land, clear the land, run utilities to the land, get a road up to that part of the subdivision, have it platted, have the engineering done, have the civil engineering done to see how the water's going to drain, have the engineering done for the foundation to see how that's going to be designed, all the colors that were selected, which elevation of the house is going to be done, the permitting process for that city or county. That's the upfront part you're doing in that first four months, let's say, with Tilson-

Dawn: Yeah

Eric: ... homes or any other on your lot. You're doing actual land planning and land development. And so overall, the total process from the time you decide which house you want, and you do that initial agreement with us, and that can give us a deposit, until the house is finished and we hand you the keys, is that 10 to 12 month process there. During which time, as Don stated, if you're doing our Easy Buy program, you're not making any payments that entire time. Whereas if you go with another custom builder, you will have interest accruing. Sometimes they put it to the end, sometimes they put it up front, sometimes you pay it in monthly installments. But in any case, you will be paying interest on that money.

Dawn: Oh, absolutely.

Eric: Great question, Don. I'm glad you asked.

Dawn: Yeah. We've got Susanna with another question asking, "Can you build custom plans or just the Tilson homes?" And that's-

Eric: We can

Dawn: ... another great question.

Eric: Yeah.

Dawn: Yeah, you can do either or. So if you've got a plan that you've seen somewhere else, you're welcome to bring that to us, or just bring your ideas. Just be prepared what's going to happen when you do visit with one of our consultants in the design center. They are going to pull the Tilson plan that looks most like the plan that you've brought in, and they'll start drawing on it to change it, just because that's the easiest way for them to price something out. Because what we want to make sure you understand before we go any further is kind of what the ballpark price is going to be for that plan that you found or the plan that you're dreaming up. We want to make sure that you're comfortable with that investment level. So they're going to grab the Tilson plan that's closest to the plan that you've brought to us, start drawing on it, making changes, and then tell you what the price would be based off of that.

Dawn: And then if that's what you want to do, we'd go forward with finalizing those plans for you. But yeah, great question. You can do either way, and also you can change our plans however you want, which is what you'll see in action when you bring it in to the design center. Let's see. We've got Margaret asking, "How does your warranty work? Can you explain? I'll be building in Bandera County."

Eric: I can, yeah. So, Margaret, first of all, there is actually state law that dictates part of the warranty.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: The statute of repose, which is a legal term, but the state law is a six-year warranty on the foundation and the frame, so structural, two-year warranty on your HVAC, electrical, and plumbing, so your mechanicals, and then a one-year warranty, basically brick to brick, wall to wall, everything inside it. That's what the state of Texas requires, okay, for all home builders that build a house in the state of Texas. Tilson does 10-year structural warranty, the two-year warranty on your mechanicals, HVAC, electrical, plumbing, and the one-year brick to brick, bumper to bumper kind of warranty.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: So the 10-year structural warranty, the way that works, the whole warranty's done, we use currently a third-party company called Structure. They help us facilitate the warranty. So they have standards that the house has to be built to for them to accept our home into their warranty program. Tilson does have its own warranty department, which is very key. Not every home builder does. A lot of home builders leave the warranty work to be done by the construction team, by the building superintendent, and the trades that built the house. And while there's something to be said for maybe the accountability there, in a lot of those cases, the company, and usually it's a big, big production builder, they're pushing for closings every month-

Dawn: Mm-hmm

Eric: ... every quarter.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: Their construction team's priority is building and closing homes. So warranty sometimes can become an afterthought. Like, "When you have time, the foremen need this thing done." And that can tend to pile up. We're all about holding our folks accountable, but at the same time, we're all about taking care of our customers. And so-

Dawn: Mm-hmm

Eric: ... we do have our own customer care team. That's all they do is warranty work. So we have a team of individuals that answer the phones. There's managers in that department. There's a VP over that. We have field technicians that go out and do the physical work on the homes. And when it's appropriate to involve third-party contractors, like your HVAC, your electrical, plumbing, we're going to pull them in to, and they all have service departments that are separate from their new construction departments. So they'll come out and do that work, the heavy lifting. And those warranties are just through, that the builder has to provide and honor. So this has nothing to do with the manufacturer's warranties on all the various things that are in the house. Your compressor on your AC has a separate warranty. Your air hammer has a warranty. Your faucets have a warranty.

Eric: Your windows have a limited lifetime warranty. So those are all manufacturer's warranties. All we're talking about with respect to this question is Tilson's warranty on the home. So if something comes up, when the house is finished, you've moved in, we're celebrating, and in the first year, you see that cracked tile or maybe a sheetrock crack going down a wall or something like that, or whatever, a piece of trim pops off one of the cabinets. That's that one year, brick to brick, bumper to bumper- ... everything.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: And so you call our warranty team, our customer care team, they create a ticket. They'll probably ask you to send some pictures. It just helps us expedite the process. And then we'll come out, take a look, repair what we've got to repair, and move on down the road. And then the same HVAC, electrical, and plumbing, that's still covered through us for two years. Nothing to do with the manufacturer's warranties. We're probably, in those cases, going to have you schedule with the actual HVAC, electrical, plumbing contractor. We're not licensed electricians, plumbers, or HVAC, so there's only so much we can do. We can fix a pipe, but outside of that, we're not supposed to be jacking with that other stuff, by law, without a license.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: And so we'll involve them. And then on the structural stuff, same thing. You're going to contact us, we'll probably ask for some pictures. We're definitely going to send someone to come out and take a look at what's going on. And then we just kind of go from there based on our recommendations what has to be done. But that's how it works. So hopefully that answered your question.

Dawn: Awesome. Then we've got Ed checking in on Facebook saying howdy from the Pacific Northwest.

Eric: Hey, howdy.

Dawn: Fall and winter are already fast approaching up here.

Eric: Wonderful.

Dawn: He's bragging.

Eric: I know. Please send it our way, Ed. Good to hear from you, buddy.

Dawn: Yeah. All right. Then we've got another question from YouTube. Does Tilson only use Kent Moore for cabinets? I've looked through their website and not seeing anything I love. I'd love rift-cut white oak cabinets in full overlay, slim micro shaker style.

Eric: All right. So I have not seen anything that is out there in the internet that Kent Moore can't and won't make.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: So what I would submit is just because you don't see it on their website, does not mean that they can't produce it.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: I'm dead serious when I say I have not found anything that they can't make. They're one of the largest cabinet manufacturers in the state of Texas, and actually the Southern US. They can source just about anything. Probably not featured on their website just because it's not one of their run-of-the-mill products.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: But, I don't have to say that we couldn't go try and source them somewhere else. I'd really like to try and source them through Kent Moore first, just because they have such a reliable track record with us. They know our system. They're great at accountability on, because they're doing the installs as well, which is really nice. So they're not only manufacturing the cabinets, but they're responsible for delivering and installing the cabinets. So there's nobody else to blame if there's a cabinet situation, and that sometimes can get lost in the shuffle. If we're ordering cabinets from someplace and then we're sending a trim carpenter to install it, and maybe there's a damage or a stain that's not right, or something like that, and there's this dispute, who's-

Dawn: Yeah

Eric: ... was it in the manufacturing process? Was it in delivery? Was it in install? Whereas with Kent Moore, there's one entity to hold accountable, and they do a great job of making our customers happy. So that doesn't sound like a crazy cut to me. I could be wrong, but that doesn't sound like something that Kent Moore couldn't accommodate, but good-

Dawn: Yeah, I'd encourage if you live near one of their showrooms, go see them. Because I love Kent Moore. But their website is not the most up-to-date thing that I've ever seen. I've seen a lot more recent kind of trend stuff in person in their actual design center. If you go and look at what they've got, and it's something we can custom price out for you, because I don't think they have that-

Eric: Yeah, it's basically just-

Dawn: ... in their program

Eric: ... a very contemporary full overlay is what I'm seeing.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: Absolutely, they can.

Dawn: Yeah. They probably have it, they're probably just not showing it, because they're only showing their most popular stuff on their website. So yeah. I'd encourage you to take a look at what they've got.

Eric: Great question, though.

Dawn: Yeah. And then we've got Dee asking, do all closings go through Tilson? If so, do you have a ballpark on the fees associated with that process?

Eric: So actually, no. None of the closings go through us. That's a great question.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: We help schedule them, of course. Closings are very important to us because that's when we actually get paid for building your house. So we're all in on the closing process. But all the closings are done with a title company. Aside from cash. Cash transactions, you do not have to close with a title company.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: But all other transactions, whether they're done through our mortgage company or any other mortgage company or bank, they will be done at a title company. There'll be an escrow officer that sets that up and schedules it. It's just kind of the state of Texas's way of making sure that all parties, have kind of an independent, in this case it'd be a fourth party. You've got a customer, you got a builder, and you got a lender.

Dawn: Right.

Eric: So you make sure this independent fourth party is managing all the funds.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: So making sure that you're being charged everything appropriately, that the lender is wiring the funds to the appropriate people, that the builder, that Tilson's getting paid the proper amount, less any down payment that you're putting down. So they handle those funds and make sure that nobody gets confused or nothing gets lost in the shuffle.

Dawn: Everything gets recorded properly with the county.

Eric: Yes. Yeah. So they're actually guarantee companies. They're insurance companies. Title companies are insurance companies.

Dawn: Right.

Eric: And they're typically owned by law firms or lawyers. Not always, but typically. And so to get to your second part of your question, I would just ballpark closing costs, and these are very rare. This is a combination of everything. So these will be, first of all, Tilson has no closing cost. We don't have anything that we-- The only thing that could be is if we're getting the final survey done on your behalf, that'll be part of your closing cost, but that's going to be-

Dawn: Mm-hmm

Eric: ... like $1,000. Typically, I would budget around 3% of your loan amount towards closing costs. It's going to be very close. And that entails a lot of different things from a couple of different entities. You've got some recording fees that the county charges to record all these documents, that's going to be in there. You've got a title insurance policy. So you want to pay to have that chain of title insured, for the time that-- What you're paying for is everybody who has Had that land and home and everything up to this snapshot in time.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: To pay for that to be insured in case someone comes from two generations ago, who is an illegitimate third child from somebody's crazy uncle, who says they have claim to this property and some undivided one-eighth interest, the insurance company will step in and remedy that situation. They'll either sue the person to get them out of the picture, or if that person ends up being correct, they'll cash you out of-

Dawn: Mm-hmm

Eric: ... the whole kit and caboodle, and you get the insurance money. That's a pretty good size number. The lender does have some fees. They're going to have some origination fees. They're going to have, sometimes your appraisal, funding. Depending on the mortgage program that you're doing, there's funding fees. I know VA and FHA have a number of fees because they're government programs, and the government does not like competition. They love getting paid in fees. Fees are code for taxes. But I'm not getting on the soapbox, Dawn. Calm down.

Dawn: It's okay. It's okay.

Eric: Don't mute my mic.

Dawn: We love FHA and VA.

Eric: And they do have good programs, honestly. But-

Dawn: Yeah

Eric: ... so closing cost is not just a random-- What I want to kind of go back to is closing cost isn't just a random, "Hey, here's an extra way for us to make money on the way out." The builder doesn't get any of the closing costs. That's not-

Dawn: Mm-mm

Eric: ... it's always sliced up between the mortgage company and the title company. The exception to that is probably when the builder is the seller, if that makes sense. If it's a production subdivision home that they're selling to you, they may have closing costs. But with Tilson transactions, the builder doesn't get any closing costs. All we get, we get funded for the contract amount of the house that you agree to. That's all we get funded for.

Dawn: Okay, awesome. And then Margaret is saying, "Thanks for the information on the warranty. How often would I need to be on-site during construction?"

Eric: Ooh, need or want, Dawn? What do you think?

Dawn: Yeah. So need, we do like you, and it's actually in our contract, that you come out and check it out at least a couple of times, just to make sure that everything looks kind of how you're expecting it to look, and that you're cooperating with the builder if they're asking you to come out and look at something. But really, it's a matter of how often you want to be there. We have some customers actually live on the property and watch the whole thing happen. So they're there every single day. But yeah, it's as often as you want to be there. We are going to want to meet with you on-site before construction starts. We're going to need you there for your stakeouts, to kind of determine where the home's going to go. We're definitely going to want you there then.

Dawn: We like to meet you out there for pre-construction so that you can meet your builder, and talk to them and run through, "Hey, this is just double-checking everything you determined at stakeout, that this is where your utilities are going to be. This is how everything's going to be laid out." And just look at it, and then it's really up to you, how often you want to be there. A lot of our builders do like to do kind of a walkthrough with you prior to the mechanicals coming in or when they've started to come in, just to make sure that you haven't changed your mind about where you want any of the outlets, or that we're all confirmed on this is where the switches are going to be, and that kind of stuff. But it's really as often as you like.

Dawn: We absolutely encourage you to be there. At that pre-construction meeting, the builder's actually going to give you a key to your invisible house. And what that's going to work is when the actual doors go on during construction, that'll get you into the home, because we're not trying to keep you out of it. So once it gets to the point where we do want to lock it up so that we don't have strangers coming in, you will have a key to be able to access it at any point. So yeah, it's as often as you want to be there.

Eric: Very cool.

Dawn: All right. And then we've got Kevin, who says, "Good afternoon from Lakeland, Florida." Hey, Kevin. How's it going?

Eric: Thanks for joining us, man.

Dawn: Good to see you.

Eric: So yeah, folks, keep dropping questions and comments into the chat. We'll answer every single one of them. It is ask us anything.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: You want to talk construction, you want to talk energy efficiency, you want to talk site preparation, you want to talk financing, you want to talk some crazy requirement that your county or your city is asking for, we can talk that.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: Dawn may or may not mute my mic. See what happens. We can talk, we can tell you what's going on, and then any opinions that are stated are the opinions of Eric Alarid, and not-

Dawn: They are Eric's opinion.

Eric: That was the biggest favor subject. Anyway, so- ... jump into the chat, folks. Tell us where you're watching from, where you're building, what part of the process you're in, and any and all questions you have. There's no such thing as dumb questions, except for the ones you don't ask. Because if you're thinking it-

Dawn: Yeah

Eric: ... someone else is thinking it. So be brave, be bold. Ask the question. We want to hear from you, but we have some other ones stacked up probably that people do ask.

Dawn: We do. I'm trying to find some of the ones that I know that we get asked a lot. Let's see. This is one that comes up sometimes. Do I need to own the land before I come and see you?

Eric: Oh, absolutely not. No.

Dawn: Yeah, that kind of could go hand in hand with how early on. Is it too early to start designing my home?

Eric: Yeah.

Eric: Never.

Eric: I think most people understand that prices change. If it goes six months or a year or two years, and which by the way, is not uncommon for us to start designing a home with someone, at all. The design is a design. A couple of pricing things may change, but it's not going to fluctuate a ton. And yeah, there is no requirement to have to own land to set appointment with us and come in and sit there and start dreaming about your custom home on your land. And we do have some customers, they're not in the majority, but a number of them that end up kind of buying the land to fit the house that they've designed.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: That does happen. And so, in those cases, it's actually kind of cool because we can help you look for things like building lines, utility easements. So in other words, just because you're buying a piece of property that's 100 feet wide, that doesn't mean you have all 100 feet to use, right?

Dawn: Right.

Eric: You may have a 15-foot building line on either side of your 100-foot wide lot, and you own all that property, and you can do certain things in it like- ... plant grass, put up a fence.

Dawn: Or pay taxes.

Eric: You will do that. But-

Dawn: And you'll take care of it

Eric: And you'll take care of it, yeah, or they'll tax you again in the form of a HOA fee. But you can't build over those lines, let's say. So that 100-foot wide piece of property with 15-foot side building lines is now really you have 70 feet to work with, if that makes sense. So, we can help you shopping for land, looking at those kind of things, because those restrictions are typically always recorded with the counties.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: They have to be of record. They can't just declare, even though some will try, what the building lines are going to be on a whim. They have to be recorded with the county. And so that, yeah, very common for us to help folks plan that. Front setbacks, rear setbacks, those all come into play when you're trying to-- Where's the garage going to go? Am I doing a side entry? Do they require a side entry garage? Okay, they do, so now I need enough land where I can do a 25-foot turn into my garage.

Dawn: Yeah, I need a wide way to get me into the garage.

Eric: Yeah. But yeah, it's never too early to come in and start planning. Great question. Great question, Don. Well done.

Dawn: Yeah. Well, and I would also encourage, if you've got it kind of narrowed down, if you're in the process of choosing property, if you've got it narrowed down to a couple, come visit with one of our consultants and let them take a second look at the surveys for you, because we might spot things that you don't necessarily. Like, "Hey, what's that weird squiggly line? We need to talk about that." Because usually a squiggly line on a survey can mean a lot of money. But, so-

Eric: Squiggly lines in general are probably not good. Squiggly lines-

Dawn: Yeah, if you see a squiggly line on those, come, let's talk about where that squiggly line is-

Eric: Yeah

Dawn: ... and if it's going to be a problem. All right, awesome. We've got Dee sharing, "We're in the framing stage and want to give a shout-out to Joe. Everything's been fantastic since we were released to construction."

Eric: Oh, great.

Dawn: Oh, that's awesome. Glad to hear that.

Eric: Way to go, Joe.

Dawn: And then we've got Adrian from Douglas, building in Angelina C. "We actually live on property and enjoy seeing the house take shape almost daily. And we have sheetrock." Oh, that's exciting.

Eric: Nice. Very cool.

Dawn: Nice.

Eric: Yeah, that's when the house-

Dawn: Now the pretty stuff's about to come in

Eric: ... yeah, begins to take shape. You can start seeing real room dimensions and real ceiling heights and you don't quite get lost in the shuffle of being able to see through walls as you do in the framing stage. It's hard to get spatial awareness whenever there's no sheetrock.

Dawn: Yeah, but once the sheetrock goes up, you're like, "Ah, how am I going to fill this with furniture?"

Eric: Oh, okay.

Eric: Yeah.

Dawn: That makes sense. Yeah, it's so funny how as you go through the stages, it looks smaller. Like when you pour the foundation, it looks smaller than when you have the framing because your sense of scale is all-

Eric: Yeah. It's messed up

Dawn: ... is all off, so. But yeah, at each phase, you're like, "I don't know, this looks a little bit smaller than I thought it was going to be." And then you're like, "Oh, no, never mind. Never mind."

Eric: Yeah, now we have walls. Yes.

Dawn: I've got walls. Yeah. This was big. This is the right size. So that's awesome. All right, and then we've got somebody from YouTube who's asking about cabinets. "Thanks for the cabinet info. I'm in Northeast San Antonio, so I'll swing by their Schertz showroom. I just purchased a half acre lot in River Mountain, Spring Branch, and hoping to build in the next five years."

Eric: Beautiful. Yeah.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: Yeah, their showrooms are pretty spectacular. And don't hesitate to ask questions when you get in there, and tell them you're looking at Tilson. We're one of their really good customers. And so do a little name-dropping. It's okay. It's all right.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: Not going to hurt a thing. But yeah, definitely-

Dawn: Oh, we lost Eric. There you are, you're back.

Eric: I'm back.

Dawn: We could hear you, but we couldn't see you.

Eric: Well, that's the best part.

Dawn: Yeah. I think the showroom would be a good place to start because they can kind of show you what they're capable of doing. So yeah, that'll be awesome. Go check that out. And five years from now, the options they're showing on their website are going to be completely different anyway. So, their website might have caught up at that point, so that's awesome. Let's see. Here's one we get asked a lot, like: How am I going to know how much my home's going to cost?

Eric: Ooh, Don, how does that work?

Dawn: So how that works-

Eric: Oh, we'll tell you at the end. We'll tell you at the end when the house is finished. That's what we do. No, that's everybody else. Sorry.

Dawn: So, what we're going to do is we're going to sit down with you upfront, as you're designing the home. Our consultants can actually give you the pricing for any structural changes and anything that you're making right there in front of you, most often same day. So they're doing it as they're kind of redrawing stuff. And so we're going to figure all of that out. And then, from there, we'll look at what the color selections are, let you pick out exactly what you're going to do. But basically, you're going to know exactly what your house is going to cost before we've done any type of construction work. So before construction begins, you're going to know exactly how much this home is going to cost. And we'll also do an upfront appraisal on the home to make sure that the bank is going to see it as worth what you're paying for it. So you'll know all of that upfront as well before we even start any type of construction, which is a wonderful thing to have. Make sure when you're talking to other builders, ask them when they're doing their appraisals, because you don't want to, as Eric kind of jokingly, tongue in cheek said, finding out at the end.

Dawn: You don't want to find out at the end that your home did not appraise for as much as you thought it was going to appraise for, and then you're stuck owing a lot of extra money because you don't have enough equity in the project. So, you want to make sure that you talk to your builders about exactly when are we going to do that appraisal and find out how much this home is worth. But yeah, we're going to price everything out for you as it goes along. And we'll also talk to you about the costs that aren't in our base prices, because we don't know what's going on with your land. But we'll talk about estimates for what you need for a septic system, what you're going to need for your construction drive, those kinds of things our team's going to guide you through and help you price all of that out.

Eric: Great answer.

Dawn: So-

Eric: Very nice.

Dawn: All righty. Let's see what else we got. I guess talking, I was asking you, speaking of land and well and septic and land preparation, can those costs be included in my loan?

Eric: Absolutely, yes. So not only can they be included in the loan, Tilson can do all those things. The well is the only thing that's kind of hit or miss sometimes-

Dawn: Mm-hmm

Eric: ... just depending on where you're located, but septic and land preparation and any clearing, construction drives, culverts, absolutely all that can be included in the loan amount or in the contract amount. The exception would be, as Don was just alluding to, would be the appraisal. So the appraisal's going to kind of dictate that max loan amount, even more so than what you can qualify for from a credit score standpoint, from an income standpoint, even related to your debts. The appraisal's going to ultimately drive what will and will not fit in that loan amount. So and to kind of explain what that is like Don just did, you may be able to qualify for a million dollar loan based on your income and your debts and your credit score and all that's well and good.

Eric: If there aren't other million dollar homes that the appraiser can find-

Dawn: Yeah

Eric: ... in the area that have closed in the last six months, the bank is probably not going to loan, the mortgage company's not going to loan on a million dollar loan. They don't want your house back. That's actually the last thing that they want is your house on your land. They want 30 years of your interest payments directed to them every month, for funding, for loaning you that money. That's what they want.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: The last thing they want is... And so what they certainly don't want to do if they wind up with one, they don't want to have it sit. They don't want to sit on it. They don't want REO, which stands for real estate owned. So if they're a Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac lender, those things actually count against them. They go against the amount that they can lend out if they're holding-

Dawn: Oh, okay

Eric: ... onto real estate. It's basically bad debt, and so the government kind of punishes them by saying, "Hey, you're not really making good loans. So all this REO that you have, this real estate owned that you have, yeah, that's stuff that you're not going to be able to lend out until you get rid of it." So they want to get rid of it as fast as possible. It's very difficult to do if you've loaned out more money than the area will support.

Dawn: Right.

Eric: It has nothing to do with your land being not attractive or anything like that. It just happens to be whatever the market is surrounding. And granted, where we build is rural, so sometimes the appraisals are tougher to get, because sometimes those comps or comparable sales are further out and they may be a little older, have a little more age on them than in a production subdivision or in a resale place. Sometimes you get lucky and appraisals were higher than what you're paying for it. And that's great when that happens. You can fit more stuff in the loan. But in the event that whatever you paid for the land plus what you're paying for the house, the appraisal could technically come in below that. It's not the end of the world.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: There's some things we can pull out of the house. Some people make up the difference in the down payment, particularly because you have equity in the land, that there's some different programs we can work through there. But those things can be added to the loan, so long as the appraisal will support it. Hopefully that-

Dawn: Okay

Eric: ... answers your answer. I should've done it six minutes ago before my monitor-

Dawn: Perfect. All right. Let's see. Already talked about financing. We talked about the process. I think I've hit kind of the end of my pre-prepared questions.

Eric: I love it. I love it. So folks, we'll do a last call for questions into the chat. So if you are on YouTube or on Facebook and want to ask us anything, jump in and do it. Oh, has it come?

Dawn: Oh, here we go. Kayla wants to know, "Can building a shop or pool also be included in the loan?"

Eric: Awesome question. Yeah. So kind of same rules apply. It's going to have to fit in the appraisal. A little bit more complicated on these just because they're a little bit longer on the old Gantt chart in your project, those of you who want to go back-

Dawn: Mm-hmm

Eric: ... to college in your project management days. But they take longer to do than like a water well or a septic system. A septic system's like a two-day project. Water well is a day or two. A shop could take a month to build. A pool can take a month to six weeks to build. And so with things like that, we want to get ahold of whatever contractor you're looking at and get ahold of their contract that you and he or she are working on-

Dawn: Mm-hmm

Eric: ... because it's going to determine how payments work. You can't close on your home if anything that's being included in the loan isn't finished. So that goes for your well, septic system, site preparation stuff, and in these cases, if you're including a shop and/or a pool, you can't close on your new home if those things aren't completed. Pools are very sketchy.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: Because pool builders are... Anyway, there's-

Dawn: It's very weather-dependent and there's-

Eric: Yes

Dawn: ... some whims.

Eric: That's what I-

Dawn: There's some whims in pool.

Eric: That's what I meant.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: Anyway, so we're very cautious about including pools. Shops is not as big a deal, although we do want to check out what their payment terms are and how long they're going to take. But they're a little bit simpler to do. Pools, it can be really challenging to get those included in the loan. Not impossible, but the appraisals almost never support a pool. So in other words-

Dawn: Mm-hmm

Eric: ... the best kind of pool to buy is one that was installed by the previous owner of the house.

Dawn: By someone else. Yeah.

Eric: Yeah. Because you don't get the value out of them that they cost to build. You just don't. Fireplaces are pretty similar.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: I mean, fireplace is cool, they're beautiful, but on an appraisal, you might get $10,000 worth of value out of a fireplace, but that's what it costs to put it in. Same thing on a pool. You're probably not going to get 100, $150,000 in value on your appraisal out of a pool, but that's what it costs to put one in. So you may only get $50,000 worth of value

Dawn: Because whoever buys the house next may not even want a pool.

Eric: Right.

Dawn: Or they may not want that pool, but the house has it, so they're stuck with it.

Eric: Shops are a different ballgame. Most people in a rural area, the more place to put toys, the better. They're good with that. But pools can be very challenging on appraisals and really weigh down. So then you have to make that decision of, okay, what's more important to me, my bonus room and third-car garage or a swimming pool that I could probably do later on a second mortgage or something like that.

Dawn: All right. Makes sense.

Eric: That makes sense? Okay.

Dawn: It does.

Eric: All right. So that was the second to last call for questions. Now we'll do a formal last call for questions. Ask us anything, guys.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: It's utilities or energy efficiency or site preparation or design or finance. Ask them all here. What can we include in a loan that's important stuff? What county's requiring? And then while do that, we'll let Dawn run through what's going on again, give people a chance to scan in where they want to attend some stuff. So-

Dawn: Yeah. So like I was talking about at the beginning, we do have another opportunity this weekend if you want to walk through a customer home that is under construction. This is letting you see everything that's kind of behind the walls, meeting on site with one of our builders, who's going to talk you through the exact construction process for Tilson, why we choose the things that we choose. And actually, we'll be able to show you, this is what the foundation looks like because here it is. This is what your mechanicals look like. This is what the HVAC looks like behind the walls. All the stuff you can't see when you're touring one of the beautifully finished models. So, good opportunity to see where the quality truly lies in our homes. So we love to offer those when we have the opportunity.

Dawn: And then, if you're looking for a more air-conditioned environment because it's a little warm out there for you, we are also having seminars in person in our Georgetown and our Weatherford offices-

Eric: Mm

Dawn: ... this weekend. So that's a great opportunity to come to meet other folks who are thinking about going through this process and kind of talk to them, hear what their questions are. If you're too shy to ask your own and kind of see presentations on different topics about building on your land. So good time to come out and visit with us.

Eric: Yeah, it's great stuff to do. Meet a lot of cool people that are on the same journey. Kind of iron sharpens iron situation. Questions spur other questions, and it's a really, really cool interaction to see happen and how this whole community here that Dawn has helped create on our Facebook and YouTube channels, that they help each other out, which is really cool.

Dawn: Mm.

Eric: So yeah, I would encourage you to get out to either the muddy boots tour or an in-person seminar. It's a really, really cool deal to see unfold. And obviously, the journey doesn't have to end here. It never does. We have a YouTube channel that's got thousands of hours of content over there. It's all very well organized, too, by Dawn and her team. We have a Facebook page that has a lot of information on there. A great community of people. We have an Instagram page. It's over there. It's got cool stuff. Every now and then they let us go live. Actually-

Dawn: Maybe next week.

Eric: Maybe next week. Yeah, we'll try again. Yeah, so obviously we have a website. It's open 24/7. You can go on there, play with plans, look at different colors, and do custom option changes. It's got pricing. Base pricing for the homes is there. And then obviously we have new home specialists on standby. They'll take your phone. They're not AI, they're not chatbots, they're not pretend people. They are real human beings that know Tilson through and through, that you can call, talk to, ask questions, and they will happily figure out which design center is best for you, set you an appointment, and get you in there to any of our 12 design centers that are open seven days a week with model homes wide open for you. 10 to 6 Monday through Saturday, noon to 6 on Sundays.

Eric: That's why those folks are there. They can help you sit there and dream through all this stuff. Best places to go for more location-specific information. So if you need help with why Kendall County is requiring a certain thing, go to Vernon and they can help you through that.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: Why Brazoria County is requiring a certain thing, go to Angleton. They'll walk you through that. That, and all the surrounding counties. They do 80% of their business in that county and the counties that border it. So they're great, great subject matter experts. They're excellent with their design skills. And then, of course, we have a whole team of people behind the scenes. Our design and drafting team, our cost management team, our warranty team, accounting team, strategic response team, marketing, customer experience ambassador. The list goes on, folks. I can't get them all.

Dawn: Yeah.

Eric: We have an executive team, but that doesn't matter. So that's, trust. Anyway, so you got a whole team of people helping you. We're a family-owned, Texas-based, only in Texas company, so we understand it. We understand the lifestyle that you're after. And, if we don't have the answer to your questions, we'll find it.

Dawn: Mm-hmm.

Eric: So really do appreciate you watching. Dawn, thanks for putting this on.

Dawn: Absolutely.

Eric: We hope you'll join us next week as we do this again, and we genuinely, soon, hope to make you part of the Tilson family. We'll see you all later.

Dawn: Bye, everybody.