New Home Construction - the do's and don'ts thread

[MXtras]

Looking into building a new home. Nothing fancy - just spacious and functional.

I have designed the floorplan and I am in the process of shrinking things down just a little - I got carried away and ended up with more square footage than I can afford. I will design as far as I can and then run the plans by a PE before the detailing begins. Long way to go on that.

I am estimating my build costs to be between $75-$85 per SqFt. I think this is reasonable - am I off base? I will be doing nearly all of the construction. I will farm out the foundation, drywall, siding and roofing. Other than that I plan to frame, plumb, wire and all that happy stuff myself (with a host of construction-proficient buddies, of course).

SO - if you have any tips for things to avoid or just have general comments, post 'em.

I will use this thread as a chronology of my efforts. I hope this project makes it through to completion - it's a long road.

Scott