Home Security Measures to Keep Your Home Secure and Safe

Home security measures such as alarm systems, hi-tech home monitoring systems, or smartphone monitoring services can monitor your home while you’re away.

Weekenders and snowbirds should consider their secondary homes the same way as their primary residences.

During the winter months care should be taken to properly dispose of any fireplace ashes in a metal container. Keep it away from flammables and not inside your home. It is known fact that many people dump their ashes into a cardboard box and place it in their garage. That’s a big no.

Check that all smoke and carbon monoxide detectors are working and that your dryer vents are cleaned of excessive dryer lint.

If you are away for long periods of time it may be advisable to arrange for a neighbor or friend to check on your home periodically, especially in the winter.

Especially important is to arrange that your driveway and front entrance-way are cleared of snow and ice. Emergency vehicles need unobstructed access to your home. It also prevents the possibility of any slip and fall accidents.

If you haven’t already done so, install strong dead bolts on all doors and possibly secondary locking mechanisms on windows and patio doors. A length of wood or pipe can prevent the opening of your sliding windows and doors.

Do your best to create the appearance that you and your family are living in the home by setting timers to turn on and off interior and exterior lights. Flood lighting around the house is a good way of thwarting any potential break to your property.

Tips & Secrets You Need to Know

Before Building Your Dream Home

The Ultimate Custom Home Checklist provides Simple Steps to
Successfully Build Your Dream Home to Last a Lifetime.

If you are way from your home for several months in the winter, follow additional precautions:

• pack up all food and alcohol;
• don’t leave firearms in the home;
• winterize and secure any vehicles left on your property;
• leave a spare key with a trusted contact person;
• avoid leaving any valuables (if you must, take photos, record their serial numbers or have them engraved with a unique identifier.

Check your insurance policy with respect to the regularity of home monitoring. You may be required to have someone physically check your home at predetermined periods of time while you are away. A good idea is to check with your insurance agent.

The post Keeping Your Home Safe and Secure During the Holidays appeared first on Custom Cedar Homes & House Plans.

Q: Cedar Homes – What is a kit home package and how does Custom Homes by Cedar Designs differ from other competitors?

A: A cedar kit home is meant to package all the necessary precut materials needed to build your enclosed structure without having to worry about buying each piece individually. Each area of your custom house is manufactured, precut for easy construction, and panelizes the exterior walls systems as an option.

The custom home package offered is one of the most comprehensive kits available in the industry right down to the windows, doors, roofing, clips, nails, caulking, and adhesives.

Cedar Homes by Cedar Designs, also stands out above the rest by offering top quality, kiln dried, precut and panelized framing materials with quality specifications, such as their 15″ rafters and laminated glulam beams, and select grade Canadian Western Red Cedar. Window selections include vinyl, vinyl with wood jams, wood case, wood case/metal clad from the largest window and door manufacturer in North America.

Buying a Design and Material Home Package

We represent and build five different product lines, ranging from traditional styles, timber frame, to log homes. Log homes can be built in full-round, D-profile (round on the outside, flat on the inside) and other profiles. Our homes are designed as post and beam home construction.

Cedar Homes by Cedar Designs offers over 400 different cedar home designs which can all be customized to suit individual budgets and tastes. Prices range from under $40,000 to over $220,000. Each home package includes design, detailed construction drawings and all the material required to build the structure and weather-tight exterior finishing of the home. We can also create a unique home package based on your own design.

Q: What are the Advantages of Using a Design and Material Home Package?

One-Stop Solution

A: The contents have been developed over thousands of successful projects to give you the best and most affordable way to build any type of custom home. Design, detailed construction drawings, technical assistance and all the materials required to build the structure of the home are included. Choose one our network of local builders or use your own to construct the home to either the lock-up stage or full turnkey.

Faster Build Time

The time taken will depend on how fast you make decisions about your design and the materials you want. We can always deliver materials by the time they are needed on site because they can be manufactured and shipped while you are clearing the land and getting foundations in place. Time saved is also money saved and there is no faster way to build a custom home.

Q: How do I Create the Best Design for My Property?

Complete Design Flexibility

A: All our existing designs can be changed to meet the needs of individual homeowners and their property. You can make the design smaller or larger, change the exterior look and interior floor plan or add a basement of loft. Nearly all our customers take advantage of our complete design flexibility to get the home of their dreams.

Tips & Secrets You Need to Know

Before Building Your Dream Home

The Ultimate Custom Home Checklist provides Simple Steps to
Successfully Build Your Dream Home to Last a Lifetime.

Q: What Material Choices Do I Have?

Extensive Range of Materials

A: You can fully customize your home by choosing from thousands of different products. These are all carefully selected by our in-house experts to give you the best combination of appearance, performance and value for money. The quality of our lumber and other building materials is renowned. Using the materials in our home package gives you a better looking and better built home.

Q: What is post and beam construction and why is it so desirable?

A: Cedar Homes by Cedar Designs relies upon Post and Beam architecture and construction to support the weight of the roof instead of conventional trussed, stick house construction. It can also be combined with conventional construction for cost and design efficiency. This engineering system allows you to design your dream home with as much open space areas as desired without the interior wall supports that would ordinarily be needed, obstructing the view and limiting the open effect.

Q: Can I design my own cedar home, or must Cedar Homes by Cedar Designs plans be used?

A: Cedar Designs can help you design that custom dream home you have always wanted. We encourage the use of your own custom designs and plans and do not charge extra for them. Submit competitor’s designs or choose from ideas from our variety of plan books, a combined selection of over 400 building plans. We find that most of our customers will find the perfect design in the plan books, on our website and modify the floor plan, dimensions, and square footage to meet their needs.

Q: What is so special about Western Red Cedar?

A: Western Red Cedar is recognized for its superior qualities outdoors. It is pitch free, fine grained, and has natural preservative oils, which allows it to resist cracking, splitting, shrinking, rotting, and insect molestation including termites. Western Red Cedar is graded by quality; number 1, number 2, premium, and select grades. We use only select grade Western Red Cedar, which is the highest quality, graded for its uniformity, beautiful grains, varied color, natural oil extraction, and clear or tight knot features.

Q: What is the cost of building such a quality home?

A: This will depend on the type of construction, size, design complexity and quality of finishing of the home you want. The location and nature of the property can also make a big difference. For these reasons using a rough dollars per square foot approach for budgeting is not a good idea. We can help you determine a realistic building budget based on the design you want and the specific details of your project.

Construction Savings

On average we find that our customers save about $5 to $10 per square foot on the total cost of building the home. For more complex homes on challenging sites the savings can be much higher. Making sure the design is what you want and is best suited to the property before construction work starts can save a lot of money and stress.

To provide you a base price point you can use to project a price, the average Post and Beam home kit (blueprints included) costs between $65-$85 per sq. ft. The cost of construction, including the kit, will vary by area, state and country, but many of our owner/builders (one who does his own contracting) can finish the full construction for an additional $200-$250 per sq. ft. It is important to take into consideration the construction cost index for your specific area of your state.

Q: How can I get additional information on the Cedar Homes by Cedar Designs custom cedar homes? 

Feel free to give us a call, we’re happy to help…1 (800) 728-4474

The post Cedar Homes by Cedar Designs Need to Know FAQ appeared first on Custom Cedar Homes & House Plans.

Cedar Homes

Why owner-builders choose Cedar Designs/Linwood:

Customized Home Building Solution

The Linwood home package works equally well for an owner-builder as it does for a hired general contractor. This is because it has been developed to offer a complete home building solution to meet individual homeowner needs. The objective is the same – to get the required result at the best possible price. Each package is fully customized to deliver the right combination of design and materials so that the home can be built in the most cost efficient manner.

Ability to Save Money

Many of our customers want the satisfaction of being involved in the building of their home and being able to save money at the same time. This makes a lot of sense if you have the time and expertise to do so. Some customers want to organize the entire job while others want to be take over the finishing of the home once the structure is complete. We help you understand what is going on so you can decide what works best for you.

Maintain Budget Control During Construction

We help you generate a realistic budget based on a design that is suitable for your project. This can be used to obtain accurate written quotes from subcontractors and trades. These quotes should include the scope of work which details the work to be carried out. You can then use the budget to pay for work satisfactorily performed and maintain financial control over the project.

Managing the Project

Building is largely a predictable process as the basic steps are the same once the design and property characteristics are taken into consideration. However, someone must be in charge of the project and manage construction. You need to determine if you want to act as general contractor or in some other capacity. We help you make the right informed decisions so that you can hire and supervise people with the right skill levels for the different tasks involved.

The basic elements for you to consider and manage include:

• Selecting the right design and building materials
• Finalizing a proper budget to control the project
• Getting building permits
• Hiring qualified contractors and trades
• Ensuring scope of work is defined in written contracts
• Obtaining proper liability and course of construction insurance
• Preparing the building site
• Scheduling necessary inspections
• Coordinating foundation construction
• Supervising construction to the lock-up stage
• Organizing Trades to Finish to Occupancy

There are lot of different tasks involved and many of them need to be carried out sequentially. This takes a lot of organization and decision making which in turn requires you to understand what is going on at each stage of construction. We can advise and support you through the key stages of getting your home built at the best price.

We understand what it takes to get an organized and successful result and can get you started down the right path. This is why owner-builders find Cedar Designs is such a great resource.

Download A Better Solution for Owner-Builders Brochure

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