A custom builder can create a home that works with your lot's contour and layout.

If you took my advice from last week's column and did some serious show-homing on Sunday, you're now familiar with the workings of several of Manitoba's finer builders.

Once my wife Rosanne and I scoped out all of the best builders in and around the city, we decided -- as the name of this column may hint at -- to build "from scratch" with a custom builder.

(And you thought the title referred to my heartbreak of psoriasis.)

Why custom, you ask? It was a combination of a little knowledge going a long way and the realization that, after building a standard plan in Calgary, we were ready to play a more active role in the final design this time.

In preparing to build our home in Calgary, we scoped out more than 150 show homes in and around that cow-loving city. By the time we signed with our builder of choice, we knew exactly what we wanted.

Reviewed more than 60 show homes

I also reviewed more than 60 show homes in Winnipeg back in 2000 for The Sun's former Home Style section, so I knew which builders were doing things that raised our roof trusses, if you know what I mean.

The clincher was the location and layout of our lot. Because Pritchard Farm Properties is a "country" development, with large half-acre lots and very specific design requirements, we figured we'd be best-served by going custom.

Our property is an odd shape on the corner of a cul de sac, so we wanted to make sure we took full advantage of the natural contours and landscaping with an architectural draftsperson.

This isn't to say that standard-plan builders couldn't have come up with a suitable design. We just wanted to use our past experiences in developing our new dream home.

We also plan on staying in this home for many years. (Of course, now I've just jinxed it -- we'll get word next week that we're moving to Malagash, N. S.)

While the decision to go custom was an easy one, our selection of a builder hit a "snag" early on. Let's just say the phrase, "If I knew then what I know now..." came into play ...

We met with a popular custom builder on several occasions, and worked on a set of plans and elevations that we thought would work. We paid the design fees (more than $1,000) up front, confident with assurances from the builder that we would get what we wanted within our budget.

Everything seemed fine, until we got the construction estimate after weeks of waiting. Call it a miscommunication, but the quote we received came in "a little higher" than we were budgeting for.

After I picked my internal organs up off of the floor, I called Rosanne and gave her the grim news.

Not only was the estimate way over budget, but we didn't actually own the plans that we paid top dollar for because the builder kept the rights to the design.

It took us a week to get over the shock, but we eventually had to hop back up on the builder bicycle, even though our butts were still sore from the first go-round.

This time, we called two different custom builders after researching their backgrounds (more on that next week), and both suggested we go to a designer and have them plan the home.

Because the designer was independent of any builder, we would own the plan outright. We could then take the preliminary drawings to our new builder finalists and quickly get accurate and competing estimates.

We're calling our painful false start "expensive lesson No. 1."

But based on the early sketches from our designer (more on that in two weeks), it may prove to be worth it.