Phasing Window Treatments Room by Room in New Pittsboro Homes

Pittsboro Window Treatments

Nobody budgets for window coverings until the house is nearly done, and by then the money is mostly spent elsewhere. A new home usually has more windows than the last one, and they're often taller. Here's what a builder allowance actually buys in a new Pittsboro home, and how to phase the rest of the work once you know where the real cost lives.

What a builder allowance actually buys

What comes with a new house is a stock product, cut down at the design center to fit the plan's window sizes. It isn't a bad product, it's just not a finished answer. The color and opacity list is short, usually one white and one light filtering fabric for the whole house, and the package addresses none of the specific problems a room can have.

Stock coverings run roughly $60 to $600 a window nationally. Custom coverings, measured in the home and installed, run roughly $250 to $2,600. A Pittsboro builder allowance is sized against the first range, and knowing that gap exists before move-in day saves a lot of frustration at the design center.

Trim style and mounting decide what's possible

Two different trim conditions show up in the same new house, and they change everything about mounting. Full wood casing gives you a sill and an apron to work with. Drywall returns give you nothing but drywall wrapping into the opening, no wood at all.

A drywall return opening usually has enough flat depth for an inside mount. An outside mount is the harder call, since drywall by itself won't hold a bracket under real load, meaning the framing above the opening has to be hit or a mounting board goes in first. Drapery hardware carries the same issue with more weight riding on it.

The cheapest time to solve this in a Pittsboro build is before the drywall goes up, adding blocking wherever a drapery rod is likely to land. It takes a builder a few minutes during framing and it's a real project to add after the fact.

Measure the house that got built, not the plan

Plan dimensions describe framing intent, not the opening you'll actually cover. Drywall thickness, corner bead, trim reveal, and a coat of paint all eat into the number, paint being trivial alone and real once it's the last thing stacked on. An opening the plan calls thirty six inches can finish anywhere across half an inch or more, often a different width at the top than the bottom.

So the order is drywall first, then trim, then paint, and only then a measurement, never before. Builders also adjust trim after the walkthrough, so wait until the punch list closes or expect to recheck anything that got touched. Drapery is the exception: it gets measured after the finished flooring goes in, since the floor sets the hem length, while hard coverings can be measured earlier because they hang from the top.

The two story great room window wall

The first question on a two story wall of glass in a Pittsboro house is whether the top units need covering at all. North facing and comfortable, leaving it bare is a legitimate answer that saves real money. West facing and unbearable by three o'clock, the upper glass is the whole problem and covering only the lower band solves very little. Either way, nothing at that height gets operated by hand, so motorization stops being optional.

Battery motors run roughly $100 to $300 a window less than hardwired versions, which looks attractive until you factor in that a battery wand commonly needs service about once a year, on a wall that needs a lift just to reach it. Hardwiring while the walls are still open avoids that recurring chore entirely.

A single enormous shade also tends to perform worse than two sensible ones. Very tall shades give up more light control at the edges, and one major manufacturer notes bigger gaps on shades 120 inches and taller or near a four to one height to width ratio. Splitting the wall into upper and lower bands, operated separately, is usually the better call, and solar fabric with the right openness factor, roughly one to ten percent, balances glare control against keeping the view.

Measure the house that actually got built, not the one on the plan. Do that once the trim and paint are truly finished, and everything else follows. Pittsboro Window Treatments measures on site and writes the numbers down opening by opening, then holds the order until the punch list is done. We're insured and bonded. Call (317) 999-5154 once your trim is in.

Phase the house instead of doing it all at once

There's no rule that says a new house gets covered all at once, and most people shouldn't try. Start with privacy, bedrooms, bathrooms, anything at eye level from the street or a neighbor's window, and any office with a screen in view. Temporary paper shades are the cheap fix everywhere else.

Move next to the rooms you're actually living in, and order each one as a complete room rather than window by window, which keeps the fabric in a single dye lot. Save drapery and top treatments for last, they read better against furniture that already exists, and drapery specifically has to wait for finished flooring before it can be measured.

The tradeoff is dye lot risk on anything bought later. A white ordered in 2008 isn't guaranteed to match a white from two years earlier, and a Pittsboro family will notice in afternoon light. Keep the product line, fabric name, color code, and mount type on file for every order so later rooms have a real shot at matching.

Frequently Asked Questions

Will custom coverings be ready when we move in?

Only if you order early enough. Custom lead times commonly run two to five weeks from the order going in, and the order can't go in until somebody has measured finished openings. If your trim and paint wrap up two weeks before closing, the math doesn't work for the whole house. The usual plan is to measure as soon as the trim is finished, order the privacy rooms first, hang inexpensive temporary shades everywhere else, and let the rest arrive on its own schedule.

If I finish rooms later, will everything still match?

Only if you keep records. Fabrics and painted finishes are produced in batches, so a white ordered in 2008 won't necessarily match a white ordered a year and a half later, and the difference shows in afternoon light. Ask for the product line, the fabric name, the color code, and the mount type to be written on every order, and keep a copy. Also order any single room complete rather than one window at a time, since matching within a room matters far more than matching between floors.

Do we need to run electrical for motorized shades on the great room wall?

If the walls are still open, it's worth doing. Battery motors run roughly $100 to $300 a window less than hardwired ones, but battery wands commonly need service about once a year, and a wall that tall usually needs a lift just to reach them. Hardwiring while the framing is exposed avoids that recurring chore for good. If the walls are already closed, battery power is still a completely workable answer, just budget for the yearly maintenance.