American Heritage Homes is a family-owned developer and custom home builder in Fredericksburg, Virginia. With American Heritage, you aren’t just a customer – you’re family.

Building for Families

American Heritage treats you as if you were their new neighbor. Each new home community is carefully crafted as if the builder themselves would live there. American Heritage takes a personal approach to homebuilding and puts the focus where it should be: on relationships instead of just business.

Community Spotlight: Mineral Springs Plantation

A waterfront community in Fredericksburg, Mineral Springs Plantation offers residents custom homes in the wooded and historic area of Chancellorsville. Large, private lots and Colonial-style architecture are just a few of the hallmarks you can expect from this custom community. Luxury, craftsmanship, and a sharp attention to detail can be seen throughout the custom homes in this neighborhood.

Despite its secluded and remote feel, Mineral Springs Plantation offers easy access to I-95 and express rail service to Washington, D.C., Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, and Richmond. Reagan National, Richmond International, Dulles International, and Stafford Regional airports are also close by.

American Heritage has even thought of your children. Along with multiple options for private education in the area, residents of Mineral Springs Plantation will be able to send their children to Chancellor District schools.

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Find out more about building your new custom home in Fredericksburg by contacting American Heritage Homes today.

Looking for your dream home in Florida? Look no further than Bellagio Custom Homes. A division of SeaGate Homes, Bellagio serves the Palm Coast area and is dedicated to crafting the finest custom residences for their customers.

A Fully Custom Experience

Specializing in unique custom homes, Bellagio is ready to assist no matter what stage of the process. Bring your plans or peruse their extensive plan library at their 2,000 square foot design studio for ideas before speaking with their full-time interior designer to choose the perfect interior appointments. Once you’ve chosen your dream home, Bellagio brings in trusted tradesmen to handle everything from the pouring of the foundation to the raised garden tub of your dreams.

Plan Spotlight

Bellagio’s Ravello home plan is drenched in charm, from the vaulted ceilings to the sumptuous and private master suite. Looking at a smaller lot? Bellagio has you covered! The Ravello was specially designed for narrow lots. The optional bonus room offers a covered balcony as well as a bonus room perfect for an extra bedroom or even a home office.

Or, perhaps the Venice is more your style. A gorgeous one story home, the Venice is one of Bellagio’s largest home plans. The gourmet kitchen with raised bar is sure to delight the aspiring chef and perennial entertainer, while all family members will appreciate that each bedroom includes its own walk-in closet.

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Ready to look into a design of your own? Contact Bellagio Custom Homes today to discover your dream home in the Palm Coast, Florida.

This home by Our Country Homes is like your own private castle!

If you’re looking for a builder in the Dallas/Fort Worth area of Texas, Our Country Homes wants to build you a custom home as individual as you. Their reputation for creating unique and beautiful homes means you’re getting nothing but the best in custom building. Our Country’s luxurious homes are crafted with the most desirable amenities and designed for energy efficiency. Throughout the building process, their team will keep you up-to-date every step of the way to make sure you are completely satisfied. This personal approach brings quality work, attention to detail, and the highest level of customer service to the custom building experience. As a true custom builder, they will start by helping you find the land that is perfect for your future home. If you already have one, great! Next they will guide you through the design process so that the blueprints and interior design are perfect for you. Their materials are nothing but the best, without the sticker shock. You’ll select from hand-scraped hardwood options for flooring, granite countertops, and more!

This luxurious master bath by Our Country Homes features a tub, walk-in shower, and granite-topped vanity with rich, detailed wood cabinets.

For more information about Our Country Homes, give them a call at 817-281-3388 or visit their website!

Few have failed to notice that the dominant color scheme of new construction is a universal beige, usually paired with white trim. If you’re lucky, you’ll get a real unpainted wood door or porch columns. How do you go about choosing the color scheme that is right for you without accidentally painting your house an over-saturated color so bright it aggravates your neighbors? How do you balance expressing some personality in a sea of beige without sticking out like a sore thumb? Here are some color scheme ideas for your home’s exterior that are anything but beige to inspire you to break out of the monotonous mold.

This scheme pairs dark neutrals with a rusty red trim, pale green accents, and natural mahogany-stained wood front door and garage door.  It’s fresh and contemporary while the red and green pairing gives it a woodsy feel. Try it on a heavily-wooded lot surrounded by trees.

This scheme brings sunny yellow into your life without going overboard. Pick a few surfaces to pop with brightness and the rest can be a medium tan. Give the trim a deep brown coat or leave the wood unpainted with a dark stain and paint the accents forest green. Add some personality with a pop of turquoise on the front door.

If your home has a Victorian vibe with lots of details, give it a pop with a dark teal body with contrasting ivory and burgundy trim and accents. You’ll be glad you paid extra attention to the little things.

If pale colors and a more traditional scheme are more your thing, try  a pale green body with white trim, dark green accents. Throw in a few pops of rusty orange, especially on your front door. You can also achieve this look using unpainted wood stained with a warm finish.

For a cool look, go monochrome! Use blueish-grays for the body of the house, white trim with dark teal accents, and pops of turquoise in the pediments and on the front door. This can also make a nice contrast to tan stone foundations.

Another dark, woodsy scheme uses natural wood browns that can be stained dark for the second story, front door and garage door, and then a lighter, warmer color in pediments for contrast. The first floor can be painted tan or be built as natural stone, while the trim is a dark teal-blue with goldenrod accents.

It’s that time of year: everyone is breaking out the lights for some festive holiday cheer. There are so many kinds of lights and so many creative ways to display them for the world. The trickiest, and the most gratifying, are always the trees. Those who are lucky enough to have great trees in front of their houses have been coming up with clever and beautiful ways to decorate for decades. Here are some tree-lighting designs to get you inspired this year.

1. The Spanish Moss. This method is beautifully striking and elegantly simple. Just hang entire strands vertically from the upper branches of the tree to just above the ground. Image via Your Cool City Blog. 

2. The Net. The concept is simple enough: You drape strands vertically and horizontally around the very exterior of the tree or a group of trees. The result is an interwoven net. Image via Car Angel. 

3. The Web. Strands are crisscrossed all around the perimeter of a tree to form a ball of light around the trunks. Image via Denver Post. 

4. The Cone. This would be especially great for evergreen trees which are naturally conical. Strands of lights are attached to a center point at the top of the tree and cascade down to the lowest branches. Image via Five Star Holiday Decor. 

5. The Classic. Everybody’s favorite way of decorating outdoor trees for the holidays: wrapping the trunks and biggest branches tightly with densely sparkling lights. These look especially good in a series along a street or in a cluster in your front yard. Image via Ourdoor Lighting Nashville. 

It’s well-known that home buyers look first at the kitchens and bathrooms to inform their decision. Investing in these areas of the house can yield the best return if you expect to some day sell your house. If you’re looking to make some upgrades that will make your life easier, make your home more beautiful, and increase the value of your home, here are some kitchen upgrade ideas to get you inspired.

1. This kitchen has 2 really great features: one is the faucet. Upgrading to a good kitchen faucet with a powerful, easily maneuverable sprayer will save you time and energy when washing dishes or rinsing off food residue before putting them in the dishwasher. The second upgrade shown is the projecting greenhouse window. If you have an East-, West-, or South-facing window in your kitchen, this is a great way to bring in more light and create a place for a potted herb garden. Image via Porch. 

2. A big problem faced by people who love baking is where to put the standing mixer. It’s heavy, so you want it easily accessible, but it’s big and bulky so it takes up a lot of counter space. This kitchen incorporates a work surface that swings out and up from the cabinet below, with your mixer already on it! For an extra upgrade, you can include an opening for the cord and and outlet inside the cabinet so you don’t have to mess around with plugging it in every time. Image via Honey and Fitz. 

3. If you’re low on space in your upper cabinets but a little weary of having to crouch down and reach into the depths of your lower cabinets, consider wide drawers with heavy-duty sliders and customizable dividers. This makes it effortless to access everything you need without straining yourself by digging around. Image via homedit. 

4. This kitchen solves 2 problems in one: what to do with that extra-deep cabinet above the fridge and how to store all your wide, flat items like cutting boards and cookie sheets. Vertical dividers in an extra-deep cabinet are a great solution to an awkward storage problem. Image via DIY Home Decor. 

5. If you’re the kind of person who always runs out of counter space because you need to keep lots of appliances like toasters and blenders handy, consider a slide-out counter extension! It’s extra workspace where and when you need it. Just slide it back when you’re done! Image via HGTV. 

6. Last but not least, consider upgrading your pots and pans storage. If you like the convenience of hanging them on hooks, but aren’t crazy about having them on display all the time, why not put in a slide-out bar of hooks under the counter? Just slide them back in and close the door when you’re done! Image via 733 Blog. 

If you’re looking for a custom home in Illinois, check out O’Neal Builders. Based in Normal, IL, they build in the Bloomington-Normal, Peoria, and Champagin-Urbana areas. Jim O’Neal, president of the company, has experience in building and carpentry, so he appreciates the importance of attention to detail. Their construction process averages six months, and you will be continually updated on a daily basis by the O’Neal team on the progress of your home build. Amy O’Neal, is their designer. She selects and coordinates the products and materials used in O’Neal custom homes to make sure they are beautiful and high-quality. Their project managers will supervise the construction process on-site every day, so make sure everything goes smoothly and on time, an so you can be up-to-date on the status of your home.

You’ll start making exterior selections such as windows, doors, and siding by looking at the Homeowner Manual O’Neal Builders provides, which includes a list of preferred vendors. Then you’ll get to move inside and start making your material and color selections! From there, O’Neal takes care of all the ordering and scheduling. When all is said and done, O’Neal provides a 1-year warranty to make sure your needs are met after you’ve already moved in.

For more information about O’Neal Builders, visit their website or give them a call at (309) 454-6700.

If you’re looking for a custom home in San Antonio with “Practical Luxury,” then Whitestone Custom Homes may be the builder for you. Tim Rice founded Whitestone more than twenty years ago with the mission to build luxury custom design as a local builder at a great price. From the day you walk in it takes them as little as 6 months to build you your dream home and hand you the keys. Although they are one of the biggest builders in the area, this is not their aim; their true goal is to be the best builder. Whitestone takes customer satisfaction seriously, providing a full 10-year warranty.

If you have your own lot anywhere within 20 miles of their communities, Whitestone will happily build there for you. They will do an assessment of the land for free, giving you a price and timeline estimate before you do the project. Their design/build system means you can have a truly custom home, whether you bring in plans you want them to build or let them work with you to design your home. The sky is the limit with what Whitestone can do. Any idea you have, they can do it. Their 15,000 square-foot Design Studio serves as a space of inspiration for you to choose all the finishes you could want in your home, all in one place! You can personalize your home from more than 40,000 choices on display.

For more information about Whitestone, give them a call at or visit their website.

If you’re hoping to build a custom home in Texas, Arkansas, Oklahoma, or Missouri, then look no further! Southwest Homes can build any home on any land. The Southwest team has the knowledge to guide you through the process and the expertise to make your part in it easy and fun. Their portfolio includes a wide variety of houses in many styles including New American, Mediterranean, and classic farmhouse styles such as the house pictured above. They are happy to work with you to personalize one of their own plans, but they are also able to work with any plans for a house you like that you bring to the table! They have many upgrades and options to select to make your home unique to you.

Southwest makes it their mission to keep up to date with ever-changing home design trends and help customers build their perfect home at a price that’s right for them. They currently have offices in Arkansas and Texas, but also build in Missouri and Oklahoma. If you’ve got the land, they are willing to travel to build your home! They are a family-owned, independent builder, happy to problem-solve with you and educate you about the endless possibilities in building your custom dream home.

For more information about Southwest Homes, visit their website or give them a call at 830-626-3030.

Most home builders are men, but Magnolia Homes of Memphis, Tennessee is a custom home building company founded by Karen Garner in 1987. She is proud to say that her company treats all their customers like family and commits to high standards. In a male-dominated business, she has succeeded for more than 25 years against people’s expectations with hard work and respect for her customers.

Magnolia homes are custom-built with the finest luxury, some of the best in the Mid-South. All of their homes include a large covered back porch, a must in the South. Each design is personalized for the customer. Magnolia even offers a coffee table book of their previous work that they will send to you as you get inspired and dream of what you want your home to be. Then, the Magnolia team will work with you to design, build, and decorate your home just the way you want it. All cabinetry and built-ins are custom-designed and locally made with solid wood and strong dovetail joints, giving them the quality of being hand-crafted rather than industrially made in a factory. Closets are made with custom, sturdy, maintenance-free shelving from Incognito, never cheap wire racks. The details are what sets Magnolia’s custom homes apart: they use self-closing drawer tracks in the kitchen, Venetian Bronze Moen faucets, hand scraped hardwood floors, baseboards throughout the home, and custom built-in benches with coat hooks by the door.

If you’re looking for a custom-built home or a remodel in the Memphis area with all the fine touches, you can learn more about Magnolia Homes at their website, or by giving them a call at (901) 755-4258.