Parade of Homes with Dillon Custom Homes

Take a look at the 2012 Parade of Homes as Dillon Custom Homes takes us behind the scenes.

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See a photo journal of the progress as we build our 2012 Parade of Homes house in Overlook Estates of Southwest Austin Texas.

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Raise the Roof Realtor® Street Party

2012 Raise the Roof Street Party

The Damn Torpedoes perform live on Thursday, June 28, 5:00–8:00 pm at Overlook Estates. Realtors are invited to “Raise the Roof” on the streets of Austin TX to preview five homes under construction for the Parade of Homes.

PRLog (Press Release) - Jun 22, 2012

Realtors® are invited to preview five extraordinary homes under construction for the Home Builder Association of Greater Austin’s 58th annual Parade of Homes.  The Damn Torpedoes will preform live on Thursday, June 28, 2012 from 5:00 – 8:00 pm at The Overlook Estates welcoming Realtors® to a Street Party with prizes, complimentary food and drinks, and the latest information on the Parade of Homes.  Realtors®

will have the opportunity to see the progress and meet the five participating builders: Dillon Custom Homes, Enertech, JKD Builder, Pillar Custom Homes and PGM Design+Build.  Homes are priced from the mid $800s to just over $1 million.   The gated community of Overlook Estates boasts beautiful hill country views in Southwest Austin and is conveniently located just 20 minutes from downtown.  Located on Circle Drive near the Thomas Springs Road intersection, Overlook Estates is just west of the “Y” in Oak Hill.  The Hill Country Galleria is six miles away with shopping, dining and entertainment.  Some of the region’s best private schools are also nearby.   The Parade of Homes will be open to the public October 20 to November 4, 2012 featuring a variety of custom home designs including Texas Hill Country, Craftsman, Soft Contemporary and Ultra Modern.  Read more about this event at http://paradeofhomesaustin.com/.  Dillon Custom Homes shares their experience as a builder in the Parade of Homes providing a behind the scenes look throughout the process.  Visit http://paradeofhomes.tumblr.com/. Dillon Custom Homes is a boutique design and build custom home builder serving the Austin area.  They are focused on building a select number of homes per year providing homeowners a personalized experience while maintaining a budget.  For further information, visit http://www.dilloncustomhomes.com/ or call [phone].  For more information or to view an extensive collection of floor plans by Jiri Hajek of Hajek and Associates, visit http://www.HajekAssociates.com/.

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Join Dillon Custom Homes for a street party at The Overlook Estates on Lenape Trail and view the progress of the five builders in this year's Parade of Homes.

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ONLY 126 DAYS REMAIN before the Home Builders Association of Greater Austin showcases five extravagant custom homes in its 58th annual Parade of Homes at The Overlook Estates. Every year, thousands of visitor's tour fully furnished and decked out custom homes making this Dillon Custom Homes' biggest marketing event of the year. They continue to share their experiences providing a behind the scenes look from the builder's perspective. For anyone considering building a home, they give great insight into when and why different steps should be taken. Perfect for planning!

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Behind the Scenes of a Parade of Homes with Dillon Custom Homes Part 2

The Overlook Estates boasts beautiful hill country views in Southwest Austin and is conveniently located approximately 25 minutes from downtown. Expecting over 14,000 visitors if the annual trend continues, five outstanding home builders are busy planning and preparing. Dillon Custom Homes continues to take us behind the scenes of the 2012 Parade of Homes, their biggest marketing event of the year.

Homeowners watched their dream home come to life as sticks went up. For them, it was all about where the rooms, the windows and doors lay out; but for the builder, it was about quality and correctness in record time. Meeting with the framing subcontractor before, during and after setting the very first board, they walked every detail. “We are on a tight deadline if we are going to be ready for the Parade of Homes; we can’t let anything slow us down,” said owner, Greg Dillon. “We won’t sacrifice quality, but we will push through complications quickly and efficiently to stay on schedule.”

To make matters even more challenging, the homeowner left town for 10 days at a key point in the process. This meant a walk-through of construction earlier than usual to address any necessary corrections or modifications. A late Sunday night meeting on the job was scheduled. Although the framing subcontractor was instructed to leave a spotless job site, the construction manager and business owner arrived to a surprise disaster. Prepared for all occasions, they rushed to pick up and sweep it clean before the homeowner’s arrival.

The homeowner, sales consultant, builder, construction manager and design consultant all began to walk the house marking up the slab in red, all changes that if caught at a later time would prove time consuming and costly. Now, the homeowner could leave town feeling confident their home would be constructed as they envisioned. The builder, on the other hand, had his work cut out for him overseeing that modifications were done properly.

With the clock ticking, there were certain selections that needed decided upon. Dillon Custom Homes acted as a professional while keeping the job moving. Eager to see the choices, the builder overnighted samples to the out of state homeowner. To keep that enthusiasm, the builder referred the homeowner to Houzz, an online site full of design and décor ideas.

With the home progressing and selections underway, Dillon Custom Homes had the pieces requested by the Home Builders Association to begin marketing. They submitted plans for creating a high-end, photo realistic 3D rendering. This is only the beginning. Later this month, a street dance is being held at The Overlook Estates encouraging Realtors to see the progress each of the five participating builders has made.

Opening day is coming soon, October 20th. There are just over four months to complete a million dollar home. Dillon Custom Homes will continue to provide us with the inside scoop on building in a Parade of Homes.

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The Home Builder's Association of Greater Austin is hosting its 58th annual Parade of Homes at The Overlook Estates October 20th - November 4th, 2012.  Save the Date! 

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In our last post, we shared the importance of an engineered foundation.  Here are pictures to show the progress from preparing the home site to a poured foundation.  Have questions about this?  Just ask.

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Behind the Scenes of the Parade of Homes: Foundation

Have you ever wondered how builders prepare for a Parade of Homes event? Think they just pick a plan, start building and throw in a few cool features? According to Greg Dillon, owner of Dillon Custom Homes, there is much more that goes into this event. For them, it is their biggest marketing event of the year, so it must be incredible which requires a lot of preparation and oversight.

The Home Builders Association (HBA) of Greater Austin chose The Overlook Estates in Southwest Austin to showcase five participating builders this year: Dillon Custom Homes, Pillar Custom Homes, JKD Builder, Enertech and PGM. With homes priced from $700,000 to over $900,000, these builders have their work cut out for them if they are going to be ready for the thousands of guests from October 20 through November 4, 2012. In 2010, over 14,000 visitors toured seven homes. Dillon Custom Homes will take us along the journey giving us a behind the scenes look at preparing for, building and marketing such a huge event.

Each year, several homes are pre-sold while others are speculative, meaning they are not built for a particular owner but are available for sale. Dillon Custom Homes is custom building their Parade Home for the Robert family, a repeat customer for Custom Home Consultant Howard Kirk. They loved their home, but are moving closer to their children's private school.

They begin by selecting the home site. After walking multiple home sites in several communities, they narrowed down their selection to a home site with amazing hill country views. Next it was time to design the floor plan. Jiri Hajek of Hajek and Associates consulted to take full advantage of the views. With Howard Kirk, they spent nearly three weeks on placing the house and its rooms in the perfect locations for the site. Once the foundation is poured, it is extremely costly to tear it out and move, so this step was vital.

The foundation is a key element in the home building process. It is the base of the structure; therefore, it is important to make sure the foundation will carry an adequate load capacity with limited settlement. A structural engineer will consider the soil, climate and the structure to determine the best course for the foundation and provide the builder with a design. Basically, it's the floor plan for the foundation that prepares the home for future stability.

Things were not going quite to plan, but builders are familiar with this. Typically, determining house placement does not take so many weeks. This put them behind schedule. Regardless, Dillon Custom Homes refused to on this. There will be hiccups. This is why it is wise to hire a professional builder. A good builder will strive for exceptional design and placement for the homeowner. Then, not only do they ensure all of the proper permits and utilities are obtained, they verify vendors and subcontractors are constructing the home properly and as specified by the homeowner. On Friday, May 25th at 3:00 a.m. the foundation pour began. Truckloads of concrete and hours went into getting the job done right. Only 147 days left to complete the entire house including furnishings, to meet the deadline for the 2012 Parade of Homes. Follow us as we check back on the progress next week.