@brk1971 wrote:I think one thing is important to keep in mind with reviews... people who have a smooth transaction, build, and close aren't generally focused on posting about their experience, they're focused on living and moving, etc. So a slew of online reviews should be assumed to be slanted significantly negative.
I saw the comment upthread about a home inspection prior to close. I understand the concept, but I suggest a different strategy to help you take the worry out of your Lennar build. Hire a home inspection service to do a new construction inspection series. It's more expensive but also much much more helpful to peace of mind and finding issues early. A new construction series should include an inspection at foundation pour / curing, then one at pre-drywall (framing, trusses, electrical, insulation, and plumbing), a final pre-purchase inspection (finishing), and a 10 month (lived in) pre-warranty claim inspection. Hiring an inspector at the final stage only will provide you with info that is helpful - but it won't really tell you anything much that the 10 month won't also find, and the warranty claim will fix it anyway.
The above sounds like a brilliant idea!
Personally, we monitored the construction and I had my father, who was a builder, help by doing walk-throughs at each stage. I also have images of the house at each stage as well. The best thing I did was to grab an image of every single wall just prior to drywall, once electrical/plumbing/wiring/HVAC were in. Those images are invaluable when considering changes or installations - I know if there is a ventilation run or plumbing in a wall before considering drilling into it. Pure gold.
We caught a lot of issues, many that were easily fixed at the time but would have been a pain later, and we were also able to make minor modifications make things easier for us in the long run. Those had primarily to do with installation points for HDMI, wall-mounts, speaker wiring, etc. Some of them were bigger though (like when I caught that, to run ventilation for our cooktop hood, a contractor/installer cut the supports for a header - gee, I wonder why there were multiple studs all nailed together? No matter, a Sawzall will cure that 
). So yeah, you definitely want someone keeping an eye on things for you throughout the process.
What I wanted in the end was to not live with the issues discovered pre-closing until the one year warranty claim. Some of the issues were small but infuriating (ask me about the toilet plumbed with hot water and how much fun that was, lmao). That's the one thing I would change if I could.
