Building a house with plans from a competing builder.

[Ven]

Anyone have experience with this? We found a great plan but it's not offered with our builder, although they say they're a custom home builder and will build anything we want. Curious if I could be exposing myself to some legal pitfalls here.

[Anton]

From what I know they can definitely use the plan you found. They will, however, need to change a certain % of the plan to avoid legal implications.

This info may be inaccurate but that's what I heard.

[benyl]

What are you basing it on? The website?

Our builder didn't have the plan on their website, but they had it as an older plan. It was close enough and we modified it to suit.

Truth is, we modified it so much that there was nothing left of the original plan except for relative locations of things.

[CapnCrunch]

It's fine. All builders steal plans from each other. Don't worry about it.

[ZorroAMG]

Yeah by the end of the build, it's not like you can trademark a window placement or toilet orientation.

Good luck with your new home!