1. Who runs my job day to day?
Ask for a name, not a title. Then ask how many other projects that person will be running alongside yours. A superintendent spread across six sites cannot give each one the attention a custom home needs.
Listen for a builder who knows exactly who will be on your site, and who keeps that number of projects deliberately small.
2. How is your fee calculated?
Fixed price, cost-plus or open book: each works differently, and each puts risk in a different place. Ask the builder to walk you through their model and to show you what a monthly cost report looks like.
If the fee is a percentage, ask what it applies to. If it is fixed, ask what happens to it when the scope changes.
3. How do you price changes?
Every custom home changes as it is built. The question is whether those changes are priced and approved in writing before they are built, or added to a bill at the end.
A good answer includes a written change order, a price, a schedule impact and your signature, every time.
4. Can I see the invoices?
On an open-book job the answer is always yes: every supplier and trade invoice, matched to the budget. On a fixed-price job the answer may be no, which is not necessarily wrong, but you should know which kind of contract you are signing.
Either way, ask how you will know where your money has gone at any point in the build.
5. What happens when something goes wrong?
Something always does: a late delivery, a hidden condition, a storm in August. Be wary of anyone who promises it won't.
Listen instead for a process: how problems are reported to you, how quickly, who decides what happens next, and how the cost is handled. The best builders talk about problems before you have to ask.
Bring these questions to every builder you meet, including us.