When you buy a new appliance or piece of equipment, such as a VCR, you usually have to read the instructions before you can understand how to use all of the features. With a new house, you will be receiving a stack of instruction booklets all at once. It helps if someone can take the time to show you how to operate all of the kitchen appliances, the heating and cooling systems, the water heater, and other features in the home. Such an orientation is particularly useful considering that when moving into a new home, people often are so busy that they have trouble finding time to carefully read instruction booklets. Learning about your maintenance and upkeep responsibilities is very important.
Most new homes come with a one-year warranty on workmanship and materials.
However, such warranties do not cover problems that may develop because of the owner's failure to perform requirement maintenance. Many builders give new home owners a booklet explaining common upkeep responsibilities and how to perform them. Should a warranted problem arise after you move in, the builder is like to have specific warranty service procedures to follow. Except in emergencies, requests for service should be in writing. This is not because the builder is trying to be bureaucratic.