My wife and I are in the process of having a new house built for us. It has already been a long undertaking and has not exactly been easy. If you have ever had a house built yourself, you will be able to empathize. If you are considering building your dream home down the road, pay close attention to my story. It may save you a few headaches that are totally preventable.

One of the most difficult decisions was choosing the land that we wanted our house built on. There were many plots of land in various subdivisions that were roughly a third of an acre in size and they were going for anywhere from $30,000 to $50,000 each. The price seemed a bit crazy to me. The town only had at most ten thousand residents. We would spend hours driving around in the country searching for any farmland that was for sale instead. After about a year of looking, we finally found a 7 acre plot that was for sale. Unfortunately, negotiations took forever when we were trying to purchase it. I’m not kidding when I say this, but it took about six months before we were able to agree on a price with the seller and the banks.

My wife wanted to build a house because she wanted it built to our needs. Our needs were basically two master bathrooms and two master closets for our one master bedroom. She was not interested in us buying a house and then just remodeling it. She is a bit of a perfectionist and did not want an architect to just draw up our plans either. Instead, she downloaded a program and did the designs herself on how she felt the house should be. Did I have a say in how the house should be designed? That is a good question. Most husbands will know the answer.

After successfully finding our contractor, we have been going out and picking out the finishes of the house. For men, we can choose the siding style and color in one trip. Once you throw a wife in the mix, it takes three different trips to the business and several visits to other houses with the same siding to make that one decision. Have you ever walked around big retail stores looking at all the fixtures? One day we spent two hours looking up at chandeliers and other light fixtures. My neck still hasn’t been the same.

I will have a bit of a mancave and gym in the basement, so I picked my battles well through this whole process. We are having an inground pool placed in our backyard because the wife has always wanted one. I guess now would be a good time to learn how to swim. I am figuring she is having the pool installed so my future death will look less suspicious when they find me drowned. Hopefully, Dateline will still do some research on it and make it an episode.

We are still three months away from having the house totally completed. But since everything seems to take longer than what we were originally told, those three months could easily stretch into another five or six. Once the house is finished, I am sure it will be well worth it, but right now I am feeling a bit like Tom Hanks’ character in the film Money Pit.