What should I do in the first year in a new custom home (the 11-month warranty walkthrough)?

The short answer

In your first year, log every defect in writing, keep up routine maintenance, and do an 11-month warranty walkthrough. Submit one written punch list of every workmanship item before your one-year builder warranty expires, since that broad coverage tier ends at the 12-month mark.

Three things protect you during the first twelve months in a new custom home: track every defect in writing, keep up routine maintenance, and do an 11-month warranty walkthrough before your one-year builder warranty expires. The first year of a builder warranty is the broadest coverage you will ever have, covering workmanship and finishes, and it ends at the 12-month mark from your certificate of occupancy. For the full coverage tiers, see what a new home builder warranty in Arizona covers. The 11-month walkthrough is your scheduled chance to catch and submit every covered item while the builder is still on the hook to fix it for free.

A new home also settles in its first year. Small cracks and a few sticking doors are normal as materials adjust to Arizona's heat and dry air. The skill is telling normal settling from a real defect, and getting the real defects on a written list before the clock runs out.

Settling: what is normal in the first year

Some cracking and movement in a new home's first year is normal, not a defect. As framing lumber dries and the structure settles onto its foundation, you will likely see hairline drywall cracks at door and window corners, small nail pops, and gaps opening slightly at trim and baseboard. Doors and windows can stick or loosen as the frame moves. In Arizona, the dry climate and big day-to-night temperature swings speed up this drying, so first-year movement tends to show up fast.

Stucco hairline cracks are common too, and there is a full guide to whether stucco cracks on a new Arizona home are normal. Arizona homes are mostly stucco over a wood frame, and as the frame settles, fine cracks can appear in the stucco, especially at corners of windows and doors where stress concentrates. A thin hairline crack is usually cosmetic and expected. A crack that is wide, growing, or stair-stepping, or one that lets water in, is a different matter and worth reporting. The width and behavior of a crack, measured against the tolerance written in your warranty, is what decides whether it is normal settling or a covered defect.

The practical move is not to chase every hairline yourself in month two. Note them, watch them, and roll the ones that persist into your 11-month list. Cosmetic cracks are often best repaired once near the end of the first year, after the bulk of settling is done, so you patch them once instead of twice.

The 11-month warranty walkthrough

The 11-month warranty walkthrough is an inspection you do near the end of your first year to catch every covered defect before the one-year warranty window closes. The timing is deliberate. Most builder warranties cover workmanship and materials for one year, the broadest tier, and that window closes 12 months after your certificate of occupancy. Walking the home in month 10 or 11 leaves you time to write up the items and submit them while the builder is still obligated to fix them. The NAHB, the national builders' association, builds first-year warranty service into its standard builder materials, which is why this walkthrough is an industry norm.

Walk the whole home like you did at the final punch list, room by room, testing rather than just looking. Open and close every door and window. Flip every switch and test every outlet. Run every faucet, flush every toilet, and check under sinks for leaks. Cycle the heating and cooling and feel the airflow at each register. Look at drywall, paint, tile, grout, and trim in good light, and note the settling cracks that stuck around. Many homeowners hire an independent home inspector for a few hundred dollars to do this walk, since a trained eye catches things you would miss.

Turn what you find into one written punch list, the same kind of itemized, location-specific list you used at closing. Submit it to your builder in writing before the 12-month deadline. One clear, complete punch list filed before the window closes is the single most valuable thing you can do with your first-year warranty.

Maintenance you own from day one

From the day you move in, routine maintenance is your job, and skipping it can void warranty coverage. A builder warranty covers defects in how the home was built, not damage from neglect. If you never service the air conditioner and the compressor fails, that is on you. A simple Arizona maintenance rhythm protects both the home and your coverage:

HVAC filters. Change them on the schedule your builder gave you, often every one to three months. Arizona's dust and long cooling season clog filters fast, and a dirty filter strains the most expensive system in the house.
Water heater. Flush it once a year to clear sediment. Arizona's hard water builds scale quickly, which shortens a water heater's life if you ignore it.
Irrigation. Check the controller and emitters seasonally, and adjust run times for summer heat and monsoon rain.
Grading and drainage. Keep soil sloped away from the foundation, and clear any debris from drainage paths before monsoon season so water runs away from the house, not toward it.
Caulk and seals. Inspect caulking at windows, doors, sinks, and tubs once a year and reseal where it has cracked or pulled away.

Keep a simple log of what you do and when. That record does double duty: it keeps the home in good shape and it proves you maintained the home if a warranty claim ever turns on whether a problem came from a defect or from neglect.

Protecting your warranty rights in Arizona

To protect your warranty, report defects in writing, keep records, and know Arizona's deadlines, because the law sets a clock separate from your builder's warranty. Behind every written warranty sits Arizona's implied warranty of workmanship and habitability, which courts attach to every new home. The Arizona Supreme Court has held that a builder impliedly warrants "that the construction was done in a workmanlike manner and that the structure is habitable," and that this warranty even passes to later buyers.

If a builder refuses to honor a valid claim, the state gives you a backstop with a firm deadline. The Arizona Registrar of Contractors (ROC), the agency that licenses and disciplines builders, can act against a licensee for failing to build "in a professional and workmanlike manner," a ground set out in A.R.S. 32-1154. But under A.R.S. 32-1162, a complaint about a new home must be filed in writing within two years after the earlier of close of escrow or actual occupancy. That two-year ROC window is shorter than your structural warranty, so calendar it the day you move in.

The takeaway for your first year is to treat the warranty as an active document. Log every issue with dates and photos, submit claims in writing so there is a record, do the 11-month walkthrough before the one-year tier expires, and keep your warranty paperwork, closing documents, and move-in date together in one file. A homeowner who does these things spends far less time fighting over fixes and far more time enjoying a home that was built right.

Where Jematell Homes comes in

Transparency, a real license, and a written scope are how we work. We would rather answer your questions before you build than after, so get in touch any time.

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