By Lew Sichelman / United Feature Syndicate
Originally published in the Orlando Sentinel, Sunday, September 23, 2001
WASHINGTON – Building or buying a house is nothing if not an emotional roller coaster. But the trick to bringing your ride to successful conclusion is to try to even out the peaks and valleys.
The way builder- educator Tom Stephanie describes it in his seminars for builders and buyers, the journey typically starts out on a high note as you through the preliminaries of finding the area where you want to live, picking a particular subdivision or neighborhood and choosing a model or design. Then the bottom tends to drop out as you pick your options and figure out how much it will cost. You plummet quickly from feeling of excitement to shock or anger. Some people give up. But those who decide to keep going often find that the trip starts to level off as they sign the contract and are approved for financing.
