11-Month Warranty Walkthrough & Homeowner Orientation for Charlotte Custom Homes

The warranty period for a custom home is conventionally one year for workmanship, two years for systems, and ten years for major structural elements. The standard is industry-wide. What separates luxury builders is what happens during that warranty period — specifically, the proactive 11-month walkthrough that catches issues before the workmanship warranty closes.

Every Peters Custom Homes residence receives a scheduled 11-month walkthrough, conducted by the founder and the original project manager, roughly one month before the workmanship warranty expires. The walkthrough produces a punch list that is repaired on our dime within 30 days. This single program is the most-cited reason our families recommend us to friends.

This page explains exactly what the 11-month walkthrough covers, what we look for, and how the year-one service program is scheduled.

Our Approach

The walkthrough is scheduled at month 11 (not month 12) so that any items discovered have a full month of warranty runway for remediation. The walkthrough takes 2-3 hours for a typical estate residence and is conducted with the homeowner present. We bring a printed checklist organized by room and by system, and we work through it methodically.

Items inspected include: exterior caulk lines and weather seals (which often fail in their first North Carolina summer), grout joints in wet areas, window operation and weatherstripping, door alignment and hardware (homes settle in their first year), drywall joints around door and window openings, hardwood floor seams (Charlotte humidity cycles produce predictable movement), HVAC performance and filter status, water-pressure consistency, smoke and CO detector operation, and exterior paint and trim condition.

Mechanical systems get a separate inspection by the original mechanical trade: HVAC tune-up, water heater check, sump pump test (where present), generator exercise (where present), and irrigation backflow inspection. These are scheduled the same week as the walkthrough so the family is not coordinating multiple visits.

Design Collaboration

Items found during the walkthrough fall into three categories: (1) workmanship issues that fall under our warranty — we repair at no cost; (2) settlement-related cosmetic issues that are normal in year one (hairline drywall cracks at door and window corners) — we repair as a courtesy; (3) homeowner maintenance items (filter changes, gutter cleaning recommendations) — we document and educate. The family receives a written report within five business days listing every item, its category, and the remediation plan.

All warranty repairs are completed by the original trade who installed the work. This continuity matters: the original electrician knows exactly how the low-voltage system was installed, and a corrective visit takes minutes rather than hours. We do not subcontract warranty work to general handymen.

Families who do not request the walkthrough still receive it. We schedule proactively at month 10 with a calendar invite and follow up if the visit needs to be rebooked. Several builders default to reactive warranty service, which produces gaps; we default to scheduled service.

Construction & Craftsmanship

The walkthrough is also a homeowner-orientation refresher. Most families absorb roughly 30% of the operations information presented at move-in — there is too much going on. Eleven months in, we revisit the smart-home system, the HVAC zoning, the water-shutoff locations, the sub-panel layout, and the maintenance calendar. Many of our families take notes during the second pass that they did not take during move-in week.

Beyond month 12, our service program continues with annual check-ins for the first five years (covered separately on our stewardship page). The 11-month walkthrough is the formal handoff between active warranty and ongoing stewardship.

Living the Result

If you have built a custom home before and the post-occupancy experience disappointed you, the year-one service program described on this page is the structural answer. We treat the 12 months after closing as part of the build, not as the period when our involvement ends.

If you are evaluating builders for a new project, ask each one to describe their 11-month walkthrough program in writing. The answers will quickly separate luxury builders from production builders.

Begin the Conversation

Reach out for a written description of our year-one service program. We are happy to share anonymized walkthrough reports from previous projects so you can see the level of detail before you engage.