Hot Off The Presses!

Lake Travis TV recently interviewed Shan Jenkins, owner of Jenkins Custom Homes, about his homes and his processes. See the interview in its entirety here:

Team Members Tour Andersen Corporation

The secret to the success of any company is a great team. For Jenkins Custom Homes, that is no exception. In fact, two of our team members – Adrian Fudge and Ryan Bates – were recently invited on an all-expense paid trip to Minnesota where for 3 days, they are touring the Andersen Corporation facilities and learning all about the windows and doors that this company produces. These types of trips help keep our employees up to date on the latest technology, which is a plus for them and ultimately, a plus for our clients.

6 Tips To Successfully Making Selections

This post was originally run in February 2010.

While building a new home is a fun process, it can at times be a daunting task. Making all the necessary selections (like picking out lighting fixtures and appliances) in a timely matter is the key to success. Here are some ideas to make the process easier:

1. Always keep a digital camera in your purse. When you see something you like, take a picture! This will save you time spent retracing your steps.
2. If your Builder doesn’t provide one, purchase a large binder, and then keep all your selections organized in it. While you may not be able to fit your tile samples in it, you can put the pictures you took under your “Kitchen Backsplash” tab!
3. Keep a running list of specific questions for your decorator. When you are ready, call and run through your list. Better yet, schedule a meeting! Just keep in mind that you are paying for her time; so it pays to be prepared.
4. It helps to narrow any selection down to your top 3. Once you weed out everything else, you will be better able to focus on the top 3 and make a decision.
5. Don’t wait until the last minute! If possible, stay ahead of the game so you don’t have to make your decisions under pressure.
6. Once you make your selection, be happy with it! You can second-guess yourself until you aren’t happy with anything.  Don’t worry…it’s going to be great!

Our Most Recently Completed Project

Custom Home Builder Jenkins Custom Homes just finished its latest masterpiece in the Rimrock subdivision located in Driftwood (not far from The Salt Lick restaurant).  This project, which was 100% conceived, designed and built in-house using our proprietary Lifestyle Analysis(C) system, is a Texas Tuscan style home with all the amenities owners have come to expect in a  Jenkins home.  Aside from the gorgeous kitchen with its custom cabinets and wrought iron details, this home also features a hidden pantry.  From the kitchen, the pantry appears to be only the standard 24 inch depth, when in reality, it opens up to the space under the stairs, giving the home owners approximately 48 linear feet of additional shelving space.

This home also features beautiful stained ceiling beams, custom lighting fixtures throughout and a great outdoor kitchen built entirely of stone and stainless steel appliances.  The outdoor kitchen, complete with a seating area and TV, extends the home’s living area and takes advantage of Central Texas’ unique temperate climate.

The master bedroom and guest bedroom are both located downstairs, while the upstairs contains two more bedrooms and a playroom (in addition to the media room).  The master bedroom contains the typical Jenkins closet with chrome hardware, pull-down racks, lots of shelving, and built-in drawers.  There is also space for seating and for placing a suitcase when packing.  Inside the master bathroom, it is the tub that draws your eye, with its beautiful chandelier above and glass tile surrounding the tub deck.  Through a door at the back of the walk-in closet is a private exercise room, which also has access to the over-sized study with wall to wall built-in cabinetry.

Another special feature of this home is the granite bar which stretches the width of the media room – a room wide enough to fit three large TVs side by side. The end result is a home that is both beautiful and functional – trademark features of a true Jenkins Custom Home.

Build A Home Without Getting A Divorce – 5 Questions You Should Ask Yourself Before Taking The Dive

According to the MarriageBuilders website, a healthy marriage is built on the willingness of each spouse to meet the others’ emotional needs, to do “what it takes to make each other happy.”  The reason marriages fail is that they “succumb to…competing interests. Instead of meeting each other’s emotional needs, they meet the needs of little Sally, or the production manager. Or they decide to buy a new home or car which forces them to work more hours and spend less quality time with each other” (source: MarriageBuilders.com).  So, before you sign on the dotted line, ask yourself these questions:

What can we afford?

The number one cause of divorce among married couples is financial concerns, and the biggest investment most couples will ever make is a house.  So it stands to reason that if you are not in agreement about what you can afford before you start building, the problems will only escalate after you have moved in.  Dream house or not, the mortgage payment will come due every month and if that causes additional stress in your marriage, it could eventually lead to irreparable damage. The best way to avoid the scenario is to be clear from the beginning about how much money you are willing to spend and what you can afford.  Then the rest will fall into place.

What elements of the home matter most to each of us?

Answer questions such as:

• Do you love to entertain?
• Are you both outdoorsy?
• Do you have pets that are your “other children”?
• Do you have children or are you planning to start a family?  How many children would you eventually like to have?
• Will you need to accommodate an elderly parent or are you empty-nesters with children who will be coming back to visit?

Once you have a working list – and it might be different for each of you – try to order the list according to priority for each of you.  For instance, if having a guest bedroom and bathroom downstairs so that you can accommodate your elderly mother is near the top of your list but your husband really wants room for a workshop in the garage, then both of these must be worked into the design of the home.  In the end, however, it is the willingness on both sides to give and take that makes you able to preserve your marriage and still end up with a home you can both enjoy.

How will we handle the additional responsibilities of building?

There’s no way around it.  Building a home means adding a multitude of meetings to your calendar.  How will you handle these?  Is one of you more interested in the interior design and therefore more willing to take on meetings with the decorator and make the selections?  Will you both try to be at all the meetings? What if something comes up?  Does one of your jobs allow for more flexibility?  These are some questions that will save you from additional stress should you work through them prior to beginning the process.

How will we handle inevitable disagreements? Who will arbitrate our difference of opinion?

Before breaking ground, you may think you and your spouse are like-minded on everything.  But no matter how prepared you think you are, there are always going to be disagreements.  When these occur, how will you handle it?  Talking through this question may help settle the arguments before they occur.  For instance, one way to handle this is to agree to let your builder or decorator be the tie breaker.  Having quality professionals you can lean on can help take the pressure off of the two of you.

Another way to approach these differences of opinion is to consider resale value.  “No matter how much you love the house that you are building, it’s unlikely that it will be the last home you will ever own. Knowing that, you should be mindful of its potential resale value….Ask yourself if the features you’re considering installing are likely going to appeal to others” (source: www.lendingtree.com).

Do we have what it takes to keep our marriage thriving despite the additional demands of building?

The bottom line is to maintain open communication and be willing to put the health of the marriage relationship above your individual desires.  And if any of this worries you, take heart!  Shan Jenkins of Jenkins Custom Homes says, “Given the right set of circumstances and the right people, [building a home] could actually bring the couple closer together especially once the tough choices are behind them.  In all my years in home building, I have never had a couple divorce over the stress from building.”

Photo: Copyright Grady First

How Safe Is Your Safe?

When considering buying or installing a new safe, there are many factors that come into play.  However, the first question you must answer is what you intend to protect in your safe.

Examine The Contents

Is the purpose of your safe to hide a key outside in case you lock yourself out of the house? Are you hoping to protect the antique rifle your grandfather handed down to you? Or do you have a copy of your will or other important papers that you want to protect in case of a house fire? These are the kinds of questions that will help you begin to narrow down what kind of safe you need.

While safe manufacturers claim to sell those that meet the requirements of both fire and burglary, generally speaking you have to first assess which is your greater need.  “Fire safes are reinforced with fire retardant materials but have little in the way of actual protection against unwanted entry. The typical burglary safe is built to withstand a considerable attack. But due to their reinforced steel frames and iron cladding, the burglary safe tends to act like an oven; effectively cooking the contents when exposed to heat or flame” (source: Valdes).  For the purposes of this article, we will focus on the burglary safe; however within the category of burglary safe, there are even further break-downs – gun safes, diversion safes (i.e., made to look like a pop can), luxury safes, and even laptop safes.

How Valuable Are Your Valuables?

After determining what you desire to protect, the next step is to decide on a general budget. Since safes range in price from less than $10 for the stone diversion safe, to $49,000 for the SLS Gem Anti-lance TXTL60 (the bidding starts at $49,000), you have to know what you can afford. While not many of us will have a need for the $49,000 safe – which, by the way, is one of the rarest safes in existence since only 4 were ever manufactured – not many of us will have a need to protect the “precious jewels of Great Britain royalty,” (which is why the SLS Gem Anti-lance TXTL60 was created), either.  Nevertheless, it helps to determine how much to spend on the safe once you have a clear picture of how valuable the contents are that will be housed inside.

Where Will You Put Your Safe?

If you are purchasing a stand-alone or diversion safe, then deciding where to put it is really a matter of convenience and space. But consider before you buy that the most popular method of safe-cracking is to “…simply steal the entire safe and move it to a location where the safe-cracker has the time and tools to take the safe apart and remove its contents” (source: Valdes).  The obvious benefit of a built-in safe is that it cannot be removed, but the difficulty -- especially when retrofitting into an existing home -- is deciding where to put it.

There are two basic locations for the built-in safe: floor or wall.  While the floor safe cannot be hauled off by a thief, it only takes one leak -- or even an overflow from your bathtub -- for water to seep into the safe and ruin any paperwork stored there.  Also, it is very difficult to retrofit a floor safe for obvious reasons, which leads us to the better option -- the wall safe.

A wall safe is “actually built into your wall and…can easily be concealed by a wall painting, a bookshelf or by a built in sliding panel” (source: Wagner).

This wall safe features a built-in picture frame with remote control access. To operate the safe, simply enter your access code (4-10 digits) on the remote control to deactivate the lock and then slide the door/picture frame to the right or left.  The remote control uses RF technology. The remote control is designed to work at a distance of up to 45 feet and does not require line of slight to work. The remote control is powered by rechargeable batteries. Two (2) mechanical backup keys are provided for emergency access in case of battery failure.   This wall safe has been specifically designed to be mounted into a standard residential wall with at least 2x4 construction and wall studs of at least sixteen (16) inches on center apart.An instructional installation DVD is included making installation a breeze (source: Nationwide Safes).

There are many types of wall safes, and this is just one example. However, the benefits are easy to see – it can be added to your home before or after construction, easily accessed, and well-hidden from thieves. And the price? This particular safe retails for $489.

Of course, if you really want to conceal your wall safe, you can have it installed inside your hidden room.  Remember the picture that was at the top of this post?  Were you able to locate the safe in that room?  It’s actually in the hidden room behind the rotating cabinet.

In part 2 of “How Safe Is Your Safe?” we will discuss different types of locking mechanisms, as well as common mistakes that make your safe a target for thieves.