From Remodeling to Custom Homes: A Builder's Journey (Corey Amira Custom Homes)

Jesse Sampley (00:00.334)

Welcome back to the Meridian Pursuit Builders Podcast. I'm your host Jesse Sampley, and this is where we sit down with home builders, developers, real estate professionals, and industry leaders who are out there doing the work. You'll hear real conversations about markets, design, mistakes, and lessons learned, and how builders can position themselves in a way that brings more customers to the table. Let's dive in.

Jesse Sampley (00:30.798)

So yeah, I got started mainly in remodeling work when I was coming up.

Jesse Sampley (00:38.254)

So a lot of my family is in construction. So my dad's a contractor. My grandpa was plaster. One of my uncles is a contractor. So it's very normal. Like for my family, half the men are in construction. So it's very normal to grow up working in construction. And so when I was coming up through high school and college, it was after the mortgage crisis. So it was in a recession. So my dad was focusing on remodeling work. So whenever I was growing up, was working for $10 an hour on the job site.

demoing bathrooms, demoing kitchens, you eventually, you know, installing bathrooms, installing kitchens. We did like porch additions and things like that. So going through remodeling work, uh, you know, we were always like fixing, fixing other people's problems. So we were fixing shower leaks or roof leaks or kitchen leaks. you're constantly going to choose where, you know, or low quality materials that broke over time.

So you're constantly fixing problems, fixing like design flaws, aesthetic flaws, or construction technique flaws. So that was like my intro into construction was doing remodeling and renovation work when I was 18, 19, 20, 21, 22. And eventually I realized, okay, rather than doing remodeling work, like I want to get licensed and be a custom home builder. So that was how I got into it. And I had the experience through doing that work when I was 18, 19, 20, 21, 22.

And so the day I turned 23, I took my contractor's exam to the state of Florida. And that was a little over 10 years ago. Wow. I've got a similar background. Ten dollars an hour. Maybe that was just like a good number for this. It's it's easy math. Just count your hours and then put a zero at the end of it. Right. But it really does teach you so many different aspects when you're able to touch so much stuff. So my dad, would take us through every single

subcontractor position and say, if you want to do this, if time allowed, then he would say, you can go ahead and do this. You can frame the house. It might take you guys four weeks, but if he had the time, a lot of what he built was spec homes. So he had some time usually. Learning every single aspect of it, you have such a comprehensive view of the entire build rather than just saying, okay, well, this is the block laying or this is the roof or this is... The biggest thing that I learned was everything shows in the sheetrock.

Jesse Sampley (03:04.974)

Right, So if you're going to do something early, just know that you're doing it for the sheetrock and the plaster because that's where it will really show. Oh, 100%. You know, if you only do new things, like you only see things when it's pretty and brand new and before it has time, like problems have time to fester basically, you're not going to fully understand what can happen 10, 20, 30, 40 years down the line. So it yeah, it was the best way to get in, in my opinion, to custom home building is starting out by seeing all the problems that...

That can you know come up years down the line. So tell me how How was the your first experience building a custom home? So the first time we built it so I got licensed I took my contractors tests in 2015 and there's a transition period but you know from going from renovations and building custom homes So we didn't actually start a custom home until maybe Eight or nine months later that first custom home. I was really just learning the ropes. You know, I knew

from a renovation standpoint, how everything went, but from, know, it's very different building everything from scratch, you know, so that the first home or two, the first two homes, which there's a cluster of two at first, those two are really just me learning. But then by the third house, I was very involved, you know, took over, you know, different stages of the home. And then about that third custom home, which was, you know, six or so months after those first two, that's really where I started taking control of certain stages and obviously grew from.

How do you stage things now from client wants to build a home, take me through that process? So it's a very long process. Not everybody is prepared for how long the process is. I can only tell people it's over a year typically. A lot people will contact me and say, you know, can I be in the home in 10 months? You know, from the, from our first time we talked and that is just not likely. So, you know, a lot of homes, big home will take a year just of construction time. And there's usually, you know,

four, five, six, seven, eight months of pre-construction work that has to go in. So, you for me, the first time I meet with a client, I go over, you what they're looking to build, and I put together an estimate for them. And from that estimate, it's gonna take me like a week or two to put the estimate together, and if that looks good, then we'll move forward with design. I'll take a deposit, and we'll start drawing plans. And that'll take a couple months, and then, you know, once we finish the plans, then we have engineering and permitting and bank financing. So, before we even start construction on site,

Jesse Sampley (05:27.438)

It is a good four to eight months, depending on how complex the home is and how many design changes there are and what building department we're going through and all that type of stuff. There's you know, definitely a quite a big period before we even start work on site. What's your favorite type of project to work on? Is it more custom the better or? yeah. I want very, I love complicated houses. I like things that nobody else is building in the area. mean, of course I, you know.

all different styles of homes, know, all different sizes. But I like when clients come to me with complicated stuff. That's what gets me excited. I want to pull up to a house that is not typical. we've got, you know, we've got to learn things, learn new techniques to finish the vision. That's what I love that. I like complicated houses that most people aren't building. That's not something you hear every day. Well, if everybody can do something, if it's easy. And so I want to

When I was doing renovation work, were certain builders, so and so builder built this house 20 years ago, or so and so built this house 10 years ago. There were certain builders that had good reputations that you knew were doing quality work, and there were some builders that you knew were taking the cheapest bids and using the cheapest labor, cheapest materials. Going through that for several years and just subconsciously taking that in, was like, okay, I want to be a builder that is known for doing higher quality work, using the highest quality subs.

all that type of stuff, you know, so that definitely plays into it. know, 50 builders in the area and all of them are known for some builders are more efficiency builders or production builders. And some of them are super custom and super high quality. And I'm always striving to be as high quality and custom as possible. do you protect that reputation? So, you know, a big part of it is pricing. Like you have to budget homes that allow you to use higher quality subcontractors, higher quality materials, people that know what they're doing.

people that are experienced. so a big part of it is pricing. When you price the homes, pricing is the same when there's 50 builders in the area, there's 50 tile guys and so on and so forth. There's always a less expensive way to do things on every house. And every line item on a home, there's a way to make the cost cheaper. You don't want to do that just to sign a contract. You want to do what you're comfortable with, do what you know will work well, the subcontractor.

Jesse Sampley (07:46.978)

that will work well. And I think a lot of builders fall into the trap of it's tempting to try to win a job. And I would rather not build a house than build a house that isn't to the standard that I want to build to. Have you said no to some jobs because of that? Yeah, absolutely. really what that comes down to is when a client wants to build a certain house that they don't have a big enough budget for, you have to tell them it's just not doable for that price. So this is the price, you know, I'll put together an estimate for them. So this is the price that I'm comfortable with that

we can do the quality work that I wanna do and what I think the client is wanting to do, know, even if it doesn't match their budget. And so yeah, absolutely. mean, most people who contact me, it doesn't work out for, most people do not have a big enough budget to build the home that they wanna build using me. That they want. Correct, exactly. So you're almost acting as a bit of a guide and it sounds a little scary too to say like, hey, I'm doing this for you. Absolutely.

Yeah, it's super abstract. you know, when you look at plans, 2D plans, or you look at pictures online and then you get an estimate from a contractor, you don't know how that translates, you know. So you don't know if you're getting the home in the pictures or if you're getting a home, you know, close to it but not quite. So yeah, absolutely, you're 100 % a guide. You know, the contractor is the expert. And you get, you know, so I usually tell people I don't like to do situations where I'm bidding against five other builders.

because one of those builders or two of those builders will oftentimes be kind of bad actors and shortchange the client. We're all looking at the same pictures, but everybody has a different way, a different idea of how to achieve the pictures. And some people are not truly planning on giving them the finished result they're It's like that meme that shows the client budget and client expectation and it's just two totally different things. Correct. Now, that being said, we can make things work, but I'm the kind of person, if you show me a picture.

I do not want a client that shows me a picture and I do something that is not, um, not what they're looking for without telling them. So if somebody shows me a picture and it means that their budget for their home needs to be $800,000, that's what I'm going to price it at. I'm not going to price it at $650,000 and make concessions without telling the client. So, um, so absolutely. Yeah. From a home builder standpoint, I'm the expert. The clients, maybe it's their second or third home, but they don't do this every day. They don't know exactly what these specs mean to get the end result. And so, yeah, if clients are showing me pictures, which usually.

Jesse Sampley (10:07.502)

pictures off of Pinterest are going to be multimillion dollar homes. So the coolest, most interesting things wind up on Pinterest. So if a client shows something, I want to turn over every rock to make sure like, okay, what we're seeing in this picture, this is how we can do it. This is, this is a concession we have to make based on this picture, but go over it with the client and make sure they're understanding. Okay. You know, this won't look exactly like that or this detail will be different. Or this is a custom built cabinet that will.

double the cost to achieve this exactly. you encourage your clients to put together like a mood board and as much photos that they can? 100%. Are you seeing a lot of that from Pinterest? 100%. Pinterest is the best. You can achieve it through obviously Google and you can achieve it through TikTok and Instagram. AI now. People are going to send you stuff that's not even real. People are like where did this come from? That's an issue I get with AI is a lot of the renderings and stuff are AI. It's okay. There's no seam here.

Yeah, there has to be a seam somewhere. so yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I want as much information from clients as possible. So that way can see what they're going for. And usually if I see what they're going for, or, know, handful of pictures, I know the style that they want. Cause a lot of, you know, a lot of clients overlap as far as their interests and you know, what they're looking for. So yeah, I 110 % encourage them to show me pictures and mood boards because the more information I have,

the better we can do to make sure that it's going to finish the way you're looking for. Do you choose different subcontractors depending on what the client wants or do you have your staple subcontractors? So yeah, so in general there's some subcontractors like an electrician or an AC company that are pretty standard where you don't need to bounce around from different subcontractors based on their different techniques they do. But for cabinetry or for

So some of those, the different finishes, absolutely. use different, depending on what the client is looking for, cabinets are a big one. We'll bounce around from different manufacturers and different installers, depending on the style of the client. for the most part, the vast majority of subcontractors are the same on every house, but just depending on, it will change based on different styles and preferences. You try to use a lot of local supply houses.

Jesse Sampley (12:28.398)

Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, definitely. So, you know, it does depend though. like cabinets, I have a cabinet manufacturer out of Kansas that I really like a lot. It's a custom cabinet company. You sometimes people find things online that we have to order something from Canada or from Washington or wherever, you know, so you do get some of that with custom homes. But yeah, for the most part, everybody I'm using is local to this area. the tariffs affected you in any at all? So not compared to COVID. So COVID was a nightmare.

So COVID was, you know, there were material shortages, labor shortages. You know, things were backordered, scheduling was super wonky, but tariffs are kind like the boogeyman that hasn't really shown its face yet. So there's some concern with tariffs and there's price increases that are supposedly a result of tariffs, but there's price increases no matter what. Construction in general for home building has slowed down over the past

couple years, not in the custom home building side, but like production with interest rates raising. because labor is kind of freed up a little bit, you're not seeing, know, during COVID, you were seeing price jumps every year of 10, 20 % easily. So now if we get a price increase of 5 % because of tariffs on interior doors or whatever product, it is not, it's easily absorbed because COVID was like a freak scenario that we've never.

seen before, you from a lot of angles. So that kind of prepared us for nothing's as bad as COVID from a construction standpoint. there any specific things that you've done to make sure that it is a good relationship throughout the entire build? Yeah. So I try to present information as early as possible. So you want to present information about the allowances we just talked about. You know, I like to make selections, all selections before we start construction. So that way there's no s-

There's very few surprises, obviously, like lumber could jump up or there could be, we go to drill a well and we have to drill much deeper to find water or there's potential for a couple of surprises, but I want to limit those as much as possible. So yeah, do from a communication standpoint, just get as much information to the client as early as possible. So that way they're not surprised in the middle of construction. you grew up around construction. You chose to stay focused on custom homes instead of scaling into volume building. Was that any interest?

Jesse Sampley (14:48.78)

volume building or was it you kind of knew that custom home building was your path? So yeah, not really. So there's definitely been lot of opportunities even in production building. Yeah, for me that was not really much interest. You're incentivized, I think, if you do production builds to make the house look as pretty as possible, but also build it for as cheap as possible to sell and make a profit. And that's not something that appealed to me at all, you know. What are the deliberate construction decisions that you make that the client never sees?

but they will appreciate what they just start to see. Yeah, it's like that. There's tons of things like that in the home. You know, the foundation, the wall structure, the roof, these are things that, you know, there's a million decisions that a builder has to make that the client will never see. So like, you know, for the foundation, if you're building a pad, if you're building a myolithic pad, do you bring a roller to the job site or you just call it good and with a tamp? Or do you put welded wire in your slabs or do you go for the less expensive option of fibercrete, you know, or fiber mesh? For the...

walls, are you building with two by six or two by four? These are things that most people would never know, the average person would never see. So, yeah, there's a million, a million decisions that we make. And my goal is to build the highest quality homes possible. Obviously it depends on client budget. So you want clients coming to you that see the value in these decisions and can help contribute to building a high quality home. And so that's my goal. I do want to educate my clients so that way they see

You know how we're building homes and why you know, we're different than other builders. Why going with Cory Meir would be better than going with XYZ builder. So yeah, absolutely. There's a million decisions that go into a And it builds that good foundation for your reputation too because someone who's in the market, you know, do you have a list of references of, call these other people that I've built their homes? Yeah, so I do. So I have to do that.

all the time with banks. Every bank wants a list of references. But for clients, are some clients request that. most of my clients, a big portion of my clients, they're calling me because somebody knows me. I built for their friend or someone went to school with me or you know, there's a lot of it is word of mouth. So there's a comfortability built in there where they, they either know or familiar with my work or they have a friend that is very familiar with my work. That's a good segue into the marketing side. So how do people

Jesse Sampley (17:13.902)

become more familiar with your work? Yeah. So, uh, you know, um, it's really, it's multifaceted. Obviously social media is great for that. If someone's ever seen my work, they're not, they're probably not going to call me. They're not going to value me as a builder. You know, someone's no one's ever seen the product I put out there. You know, uh, have a Instagram, I have a Tik Tok, YouTube, just so that way people can become familiar with the work and know, you know, I tell people there's 50 builders in the area.

And I'm not the right builder for every client, but I want the right clients to find me. And so through social media, that's important. And then I have other marketing, billboards, and I have an office in Hale Village in Gainesville. It's kind of like a main strip where there's a farmers market every week. So a lot of people see my office. That's another little touch point. yeah, really, for me, giving people as many

There's many ways it's an opportunity to learn about me, to find out about me. I have a website where I try to put as much information on there as possible on my previous builds. So just giving people an opportunity to learn about me so they can see if I'm the right builder for them. You have to create a really wide net to be able to attract more. I that's the top of the funnel. And then you can almost pre-qualify those people on the type of content you're putting out.

I saw on your YouTube channel you had, how much does it cost to build a home? So you put this parameter for people so that they know, okay, well, that's way outside of my budget. I thought I was going to get a 3000 square foot home for $300,000. Well, this guy's telling me that I'm in a 200 to $500 range per square foot. I've already disqualified myself. then the time that people are actually getting to you, they've got all the opportunity to know, hey, who is this guy? What is his values? What's his leadership style?

What's his build style? They come so much more prepared, which I think is a, it's a by-product of all of that stuff. But when people actually come to the table and talk with you, then they're so better informed and they've got a new respect for you because you're the expert and here's all this content that they can consume that now they know so much more about you. Correct. Like I said, I'm not the perfect builder for every client. So it's great. Like you said,

Jesse Sampley (19:30.958)

giving them the information to make that decision and see whether I am or not before they contact me is great. Rather than, you know, what does not work very well is when a potential client just goes through Google, calls five random builders, does not, you know, does not know anything about the builders. We're just going to meet with five random builders and see if you can give me the best price. That is not an ideal client. You want the client to be, you know, at least somewhat informed, know what they're getting into and kind of do some pre-qualification, like you said. Tell me about one of your favorite builds and why it was your favorite.

Yeah, so I have a lot. Man, I have a lot. That's good. Yeah, so it's, there's definitely a lot of favorite builds. Builds where there was really cool things that we did. When it's cool and different, hard. A cool, hard to build home is, those are where the good memories are, really. If I had to pick one, I built a house in town here on Main Street on High Springs.

that I put in the parade in fall of 2024. And it was a smaller home. So it's much smaller than most of my houses, but we wanted to fit in with other historical homes on Main Street and High Springs. And so we built it kind of like leaning into like a pre-1945 style. So we did a lot of things that you don't see on most, know, 20, 25 new builds.

You know, we did like wood windows in the house, we did a 5V metal roof, we did a brick wainscoting around the whole house, we did a smaller reveal on the siding. And we did a lot of these things that gave it like a historic charm, is what we were going for. And so, so yeah, that was probably my favorite build just because it was kind of, it's kind of like a dream. It's got like a passion project really, because, you know, there's not very many main street lots left. And so I'm kind of like big into history. You know, I love, I love seeing the historic homes on.

on Main Street in Alachua and High Springs and downtown Gainesville and all these areas. just thinking, know, looking at how they built the homes and who built the homes and, you know, everything that went into it. And so because there's not very many homes on Main Streets anywhere, there, it was, I wasn't sure if I was ever going be able to do it. And so I actually had the idea to do that for some time. And then a home came, a lot came up on Main Street and High Springs. They was listed. I knew the realtor, called the realtor.

Jesse Sampley (21:49.71)

Right when I saw the listing, put an offer in that day and it was accepted and we were off from there. So that was probably my favorite one. And that's the only, technically a spec home that I built. Every other home I've built has been custom where that one, I funded the project and then sold it. But that's the only one of those that I've done. But that was probably my, there's other ones that are equally as cool and it's for different reasons. But that one, if I had to point to one, it'd probably be that one. What advice would you give a a new builder that's thinking about?

You know, which route do I go? Do I go custom homes? Do I go production homes? What advice would you give that person? Yeah. So if I had to give advice to a new builder, man, there's a lot of builders that do ask for this advice. You know, it's tough. You know, I was fortunate to kind of be brought along slowly initially, like I had a nice.

Intro to five years of remodeling work. And then I was able to, you know, when I started building homes, I was able to work with my dad who had experienced building houses. And so that was great. Everyone has different circumstances. And definitely for me, my first five years doing remodeling work, I was not prepared to be the sole home builder in the first house I built. So finding ways to get good experience and different types of experience is key. I wouldn't try to jump right into it. There's some professions where you can just go like.

some trades even where you can have very little experience and jump right in and figure it out. And home building is not like that. There's so dynamic, you kind of have to be a jack of all trades. You have to really have done kind of everything at some point to understand like the good techniques and bad techniques. And there's certain principles that kind of overlay with other things, but you kind of have to be a jack of all trades. And so you really just need to get as much experience as possible. Otherwise you're not going to be very good at it. probably helps with working with your subs to, to be able to know a little bit about. Yeah.

Obviously, sometimes I have to use new subs and it takes, you know, five, 10 projects for us, for them to really know what I want them to do. So the first time that they work for me, obviously there's things we go over, but then the second project, third project, fourth project, there's still things that, you know, the other builders won't ask them to do this or the other builders want it done a different way. And so getting on the same page, it just takes repetition and going through different things, different circumstances coming up. So.

Jesse Sampley (24:04.834)

Yeah, using the same subs, so I don't bid out every home and go with the lowest bid. You know, there's some builders that do kind of have that building style, but I like to find good subs and then use them over and over. So that way we're very, and they're not going to be the cheapest. They're not going to be the lowest cost. And I understand that, but it's most important that they know how I want them to do it. And that I'm very comfortable with the way that they do things. Probably know, all right, this sub is more for this type of builder.

the sub is someone that really cares about this project and will do whatever it takes. They bring education, they bring knowledge to the table, and they are going to do a much better job for this project than someone that may just be the cheapest. Like you said, the cheapest isn't gonna give you the best at all. And you're just gonna turn through those different subs over and over and over because they're gonna get pissed off and be like, man, I had to do 100 changes. It's like, well, if you just took some more ownership, you and you knew my style for...

what we're trying to go for, then they're gonna be a lot more proactive in what they're doing. Absolutely. So I do have subcontractors that I've used for 10 years, right? And so every so often there's a situation that comes up where a subcontractor will close up shop or go to business, what have you, move to somewhere else. That does happen occasionally and when it does, there's...

like a vetting process for the new subcontractor, whatever trade we have to replace. And yes, there is, you you try to figure out and advance those things. And then sometimes you figure it out on the first job or second job or third job, you know, okay, we need to go back to the vetting process. So yeah, it is, it's. That is probably the most important. There's a lot of important parts of custom home building, but getting the right subcontractors, they're going to do quality work. That is probably the most important part. If you don't have that, then you will not have a good reputation and your clients will be happy.

You can't fake a reputation. What are some of the key relationships for a builder? So, yeah, man. So key relationships, I mean, there's a million. It's, it's so multifaceted. I mean, you need, you need a really good team, you know, a lot of people on your team. So, you know, for me, a good draftsman, engineer, you know, good mortgage companies to work with, you know, obviously real estate agents that can refer you to clients. Those are, those are really big. mean, and then every subcontractor and there are.

Jesse Sampley (26:25.934)

I mean, probably 50 subcontractors you have to have good relationships with, and you don't want to be lacking in any one area. If you are going to do a stucco home, you want to have a good stucco guy. You know, if you, you obviously have to have good plumbers and good electricians. There's so many pieces of the puzzle. It's almost endless. Are there other builders, architects or designers that you look to that you drive some inspiration from? Um, yeah, absolutely. Especially like at other places, like whenever I go on a vacation, I love.

driving through neighborhoods. love talking to contractors and construction workers, like whoever on job sites when I'm in another place, you see so many different things. And yeah, I, there, there's a lot of inspiration. There's constantly, you know, inspiration. There's, I'm, you know, always want to learn, you know, always want to, there's always a new trend or a new technique or a new product that you want to learn about. And so that's how I am. I'm constantly.

drawing inspiration from other places. Yeah, so I watch a lot of YouTube videos from other builders and other places. So yeah, I do watch, know, Matt Risinger is a really good one. He's got a great channel. And it's great for just expanding your knowledge. like you don't, for me, I don't want someone when they move here from Miami or Texas or New York to bring up a technique or an idea that I'm not familiar with. So yeah, I love watching videos.

from other parts of the country. So that way I kind of know what the lay of the land is, where my clients are coming from. Because half of my clients are from out of town. And so if they're moving to North Central Florida, I want to know what they're used to and how they do it, where they are, and if it will or won't work here. Do you see them bringing in a lot of elements? Absolutely. 3%. So a big thing, if you are from a lateral high springs, Gainesville, Ocala area, I know what you're used to.

I know generally the kind of home you're to want to build, if somebody is moving here from California or New York every time they're going to be used to different things. And so they're going to bring those different things here and give them an example of that. a big thing is in this area, we do sheetrock and plaster. So we do, we do a hard coat, like a light plaster texture. so

Jesse Sampley (28:44.044)

almost nowhere else in the country is that a standard everywhere else. Everyone's used to smooth walls or orange peel or knockdown. And so, in the Gainesville area specifically, plaster is on probably about half of all new home builds because for whatever reasons, the technique that everybody grew up here using. if I am talking to somebody that is moving here from, like even Orlando or Jacksonville, I have to prep them for, just so you know, I use plaster and sheet rock and plaster because in my opinion, it's a superior product.

I've had some situations where people have seen it early on or people saw it for the first time, like, what is this? It was on the contract, but they didn't know what it was. They were just assuming it was the same thing as where they're from in Boston or Miami or wherever. So yeah, absolutely. There's a million things like that where you have to be familiar with what they're used to there so that way you can point out the things that are going to be different here. Or if you build for somebody from the Middle East, they're used to concrete roofs.

That's something that I've had a lot people bring up to me. know, it's like, why don't we do concrete roofs? You know, so you have to be familiar with it, different techniques that people use all over the country and all over the world. All right. That's a wrap for this conversation. If you know someone who should be on this podcast, send us an email at info at brady and pursuit dot com and nominate them. We're always looking for great stories to share. And if you got something out of this episode, please leave us a quick review on the show. And if you're watching on YouTube, tap like and subscribe so we can share this with more people.

I'm Jesse Sampley, thanks for listening and I'll see you on the next one.