What to Check in the First Two Years of a New Collin County Home
The window in which a builder is responsible for a defect is shorter than the window in which the defect reveals itself. That is the whole problem.
August 14, 2026 · 6 min read
The US-380 corridor through McKinney, Princeton and out toward Farmersville has absorbed an extraordinary number of new houses in the last few years. A large share of them are inside a builder warranty period right now, and a large share of those owners have never gone looking for anything.
That matters because of a timing mismatch. Most builder warranties cover mechanical systems for a period measured in a small number of years, while several of the most common installation defects take about that long to reveal themselves. If you wait for the symptom to become obvious, you can miss the window by months.
The inspection worth doing yourself this weekend
Run everything
Every fixture, including the ones in rooms nobody uses. A guest bathroom that has never been used has never been tested, and a drain branch with insufficient fall will not announce itself until it is used regularly.
Fill each tub and drain it while you watch. Listen elsewhere in the house for gurgling, which indicates a venting problem.
Look at the condensate line
Go into the attic and follow the small PVC line leaving the air handler. It should run continuously downhill. Any sag or uphill section will hold water, grow biological slime and eventually block. There should also be a float switch that shuts the system down if the pan fills — confirm one exists.
Check the water heater installation
If it is in the attic: is there a pan, does the pan have a drain, and does that drain terminate outside where you can see it? Pour a bucket of water in and watch for it to arrive. If it does not, that is a defect and it is worth reporting now.
Measure house pressure
Ten-dollar gauge, outside hose bib, nothing else running. Newer subdivisions frequently see high street pressure, and the PRV setting on a new build is not always what it should be. Over 80 psi needs addressing, and it is shortening the life of everything in the house until it is.
Feel around showers
Baseboards and flooring on the far side of shower walls, and ceilings below upstairs showers. A pan that was never flood tested leaks slowly, and the first evidence is usually damp somewhere adjacent rather than in the shower itself.
The two-storey question
If your new house is two storeys and the upstairs is noticeably warmer in summer, do not accept that as normal. It usually is not an equipment fault — it is undersized return air, or attic duct that is leaking or poorly insulated.
Whether that is a warranty matter depends on whether the system was built to specification, which is precisely why having static pressure measured and documented is useful. A measurement is an argument; a complaint that a room feels hot is not.
What is not a defect
It is worth being fair about this. Some things people report in new houses are normal and will not be covered by anybody, and knowing which is which saves an unproductive conversation with a builder.
- Minor drywall cracking in the first year as the house settles and the slab moves with the seasons.
- Water that runs hot slowly at a fixture far from the water heater — that is distance, not a fault.
- Occasional discoloured water after work on the street mains.
- A toilet that occasionally needs a second flush, which is usually the fixture design rather than the plumbing.
Family-owned, based in Rockwall, working across Collin County. TX Master Plumber TXM11693, TX HVAC TACLB2360E. (469) 338-5533.
Frequently asked
What should I check before my builder warranty expires?
Run every fixture including unused ones, fill and drain every tub, check the attic condensate line for sags and confirm it has a float switch, test the water heater pan drain, measure house pressure at a hose bib, and check for damp around and below showers. Those cover the defects that most commonly surface just as the window is closing.
Can I hire my own plumber for a warranty issue?
You can hire your own for a diagnosis, and it is usually worth doing — an independent written assessment changes the conversation. For the repair itself, if it is inside the warranty period, go through the builder, because paying someone else to fix it generally forfeits the claim.
Is a hot upstairs in a new two-storey house a warranty issue?
It can be, if the system or ductwork was not built to the design specification. What makes that case is measurement — static pressure and airflow readings documented by a technician — rather than a description of how the room feels. Get it measured while you are still inside the window.