As new home builders, Jay Eckert Construction has always focused on quality, and that is more than a simple sales pitch. It has been our guiding principle since 1978.
Over our many years of experience, it has been a question that we have constantly come back to. What is it that makes a home valuable? Is a good building more than the sum of its parts? Can it have life? Personality? Soul? Can it enrich and enhance the lives of the people connected to it? We definitely believe it can. But it involves more than a single step along the way. It is a whole process that requires attention to detail in every facet. Throughout the years and the large number of homes that we have made, we have come to find that an integrated Design & Build process provides the best way to create buildings of the highest quality and value.
We believe that there are several reasons, the cornerstone of our is a holistic focus on the entire project from conception to completion. We want to be engaged in each stage of the process and we want the responsibility that comes with it. Intimately involving designers and builders in the whole project allows emphasis to be placed on the best overall result and allows that result to be tailor made to all the relevant conditions
Instead of a race to the lowest possible upfront cost, or a focus only on the design irrespective of budget, each step of the process is centered on achieving the best building with the resources available, and each individual part is afforded an opportunity to inform and refine the overall vision. This direct engagement allows for things to unfold naturally and it allows space for adaptation and flexibility all the while seeking to safeguard the integrity and value of the end result.
In home building, process is very important. Each step is informed by and builds upon the previous one. Today, modern construction is often fragmented. For example, it’s not hard to find new home builders of limited building experience who are almost entirely focused on organizing and hiring a crew of subcontractors. These home builders will often have several standard plans that they offer based to a large extent on how quickly and easily they can be built. Each sub contractor is in turn given responsibility for only one small piece of the project and is often under tremendous pressure to cut costs and to finish their part as quickly as possible. While the intention is to reduce the upfront costs, it also has the additional consequence of disconnecting the people who are actually creating the building from the overall vision and the integrity of the whole. It is a process that is by design insensitive to feedback and the specific conditions and circumstances of the individuals involved. To be fair, this process can help to reduce the initial costs of a new home, and the repetition that comes from focusing on one task can increase the efficiency and skill of certain operations. But often the disconnect and lack of vision is palpable and the real costs are apparent in the end result: rows of very similar and unimaginative homes, at odds with the environment and their occupants. Homes that are built as quickly and cheapy as possible by people who, though the process of construction itself, are disengaged and disconnected from the end result. There is a better way to build.
In contrast, we are very much a custom home builder / designer. While most home builders say that they offer custom plans, typically they only offer a few variations on some pretty standardized layouts and construction techniques. We don’t offer standardized home plans. We want to come out and meet you and really understand your goals and expectations. We want to make the site as big a part of the design as possible, to harness the sun and the wind to improve comfort, lighting and energy efficiency. To essentially craft a building that tries to take advantage of all the specific conditions of you and your location. We feel this provides the best bang for the buck; not in some mass produced standardized sense but in a personal / creative one.
With that end in mind, usually the first step for us is to schedule a meeting with a potential client, and hopefully visit the site and really talk over the details. From there, if we both feel like we would work well together, we create an initial proposal that includes an overall budget for both the proposed construction and design. This initial consultation and budget proposal is free of charge.