Last week we posted an article on our Quick Home Search tool on our website.  This week we’d like to share our Interactive Floor Plan tool with you.

Have you been dreaming of your dream home?  This tool allows you to customize each room in your new home to fit your wants and needs.  You can add and remove bedrooms, bathrooms, patio doors, a garage service door, a kitchen island, a study and/or den, etc.  You can also drag and drop outlets of different wattage, choose your flooring in each room, select what pre-wired items you’d like to be in the house (e.g., surround system in the entire house) and so much more.

If you accidentally add something that you’d like to remove, you can simply click it again and the check mark will be removed.  If you’d like to start over, you can click the “clear” button in the bottom right corner and it will return your house back to it’s original version.

Below are a few examples of what our interactive floor plan tool allows you to customize.  Once you have customized your home to you liking, you can print everything out by clicking “Print Preview”, this will take you to a page where you can view each category separately.  Once you are there, simply click print and your new home floorplan will be printed!  We hope you enjoy this tool as much as we do!

The Valley’s Most recognized Homebuilder Leads the Way for a Good Cause this Holiday Season

Fulton Homes and radio station KEZ 99.9 are teaming up for the 8th annual “Books and Toys for Girls and Boys” campaign, November 19 through December 14. The program gives children, who are recovering at Phoenix Children’s Hospital, Holiday gifts – in an effort to brighten their spirits. Valley residents are encouraged to drop off toys and books at the radio station or any one of the events held throughout town.
“Fulton Homes finds this program especially meaningful since so many of these kids have to endure the stress of a chronic illness along with the Holiday season” said Douglas Fulton, CEO of Fulton Homes. Fulton adds, “It takes more than medicine for a child to heal.”
The Fulton Homes “Books and Toys for Girls and Boys kicks off  November 19th and ends  December 14th at the Phoenix Children’s Hospital at 9:00am, where Marty Manning from KEZ will be reading Christmas stories to the kids. Milk and cookies will be provided, and children will have the opportunity to pick out their favorite book and toy from the hospital’s Emily Center.
Teresa Boeger, Director of the Emily Center at Phoenix Children’s hospital said “the Fulton Homes’ Books and Toys program allows families to break away during the holidays and select something meaningful that will help their child through the healing process, and will surely add excitement and joy during the holiday season.”
For more information on “Books and Toys for Girls and Boys”, and drop off locations, please visit www.kez999.com or visit www.fultonhomes.com and click on the Fulton Foundation link.

Is Thanksgiving fun for you or a source of stress and frustration? Planning ahead makes a difference when facing a major holiday. These ideas will help you have a nice time without wearing yourself out.

Most people are good about planning the Thanksgiving food, but there’s more to a holiday meal than that. How many people are coming? Do you have chairs, table settings and linens for everyone? How about serving dishes and bowls? What about making the table and/or buffet look inviting? To make your life easier, plan and set the table and buffet up this weekend. That way if something needs to be washed or polished or ironed, you have plenty of time.

With that much eating going on, Thanksgiving invariably involves one or more spills. Do you have flooring in your dining room such as a rug or carpet, or even wood floors, that should be immediately cleaned? Plan ahead for this with the cleaners of your choice and a selection of white work towels at hand. Spills can then be handled quickly and gracefully, minimizing any embarassment for the guest.

Your final step is creating a plan for the Thanksgiving meal. Gather your recipes and create a shopping list. Don’t wait for the mad dash on Wednesday – get it done early next week. Make a plan for cooking everything – taking into consideration any oven or stovetop limits. Work your timing backwards from the planned dinner schedule, adding an extra half-hour or so for unforseen events. Cook anything you can ahead of time, leaving you only the last minute foods to prepare.

With these upfront steps, you can have a lovely holiday without the stress that last-minute problems bring. This will give you time to enjoy the day with your family and friends.

One of our favorite website tools is on our website home page, this is our Quick Home Search.  Here you can select your Location, Community and Price and it will direct you to all homes available in your search criteria.  This is a very quick, easy way to find homes that may interest you.

The search will show you what homes are available, if they are quick move-in homes, what floorplan they are, how many beds and baths, etc.  From here you can click on the one of your choice and see how you can modify it to suit your wants and needs.

This website tool is very simple, yet very useful.  We hope you enjoy it.

Light fixtures give you an opportunity to add some architectural interest to your home. A simple dining table is strongly enhanced with the right chandelier above it. Your entryway can be much more dramatic with the perfect fixture sparkling in the space.

The rules for lighting are changing. Once chandeliers were only for dining rooms. Now, as you can see in this photo, bedrooms can get an extra touch of luxury with a delicate crystal fixture.

You may want to consider mixing your lighting options in other rooms. How about a small hanging fixture over your bathtub to add a spa feel? Pendant lights common in a kitchen might add an unusual contemporary look in your foyer or a hallway. A ceiling fan can extend the life of your covered patio (there are fans designed for outdoor use).

Whatever fixture you select, make sure the size is in proportion to the room. For a dining room, the chandelier should be about half the width of the table. Also, positioning lights at the right height makes a difference. For example, in a dining room, the recommendation is to set the bottom of the fixture about 30 inches above the surface of the table.

Lighting adds to the ambiance of your home. Take your time and make the right choice for every room.

To see our previous post called Choosing Your Lighting: Part 1 click here!

Would you like to decorate your home for Thanksgiving without expending a lot of money or effort? Follow these suggestions to put your home in an autumn mood.

To begin, take a look around your home for fall-looking elements you may already have. A dark-toned basket such as the one in the photo, antique elements, pottery bowls or plates, candlesticks, and even a pile of old books can help provide good background elements for your display.

The grocery store is the source for your next display elements. Pumpkins are generally half-off or less after Halloween. Gourds or squash provide variety in shape and color. Even a pound of unshelled nuts say fall when placed in a bowl or scattered in small groups on the table.

For the final touches, take a walk. Fall leaves, acorns, pinecones and branches with berries wrap up your decorating supplies. When fixing your displays, start with the largest pieces, and end by tucking in smaller elements to balance shapes and colors into an inviting look.

Now your home says Thanksgiving, and taking the time to add this touch of beauty to your home can help put you in a holiday mood!  We are posting our favorite Thanksgiving recipes next week, that will add to your mood too!

The Valley’s Most Ample Showroom Opens its Doors to Remodelers and Potential Homebuyers and Prospective Homebuyers

Fulton Homes invites all Valley residents to their Design Center for “Browse Night” every first and third Thursday of the month from 5:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. The Design Center is a comprehensive showroom that features affordable design trends and tangible models for every home floor plan. “Browse Night” is open to the community with no appointment needed, giving the Design Center the opportunity to showcase how their magnificent showroom to potential homebuyers and those looking to remodel. Fulton Homes Design Center is located at located at 1241 W. Warner Rd. in Suite 106.

“As the leading home builder in Arizona, we see it as an obligation to have the most innovative and inclusive showroom for prospective homebuyers and those who are looking to modernize their homes.” said Dennis Webb, VP of Operations for Fulton Homes. “Browse Night is the perfect occasion for the community to discover what the Design Center has to offer, view hands-on displays and find out what it will potentially cost to redecorate their homes.”

Since the Design Center’s inception, it has been the Fulton Homes’ goal to be the greatest design showroom in Arizona, providing incomparable display models and samples than any other showroom.  Fulton Homes instills this initiative by continually evolving their style to keep up with trends. The 13,000 square foot showroom showcases a bountiful of home design selections including kitchen fixtures, countertops, appliances, flooring, cabinets, lighting and bathroom furnishings.  Professional Design Consultants assist each client by working with their personal style and budget to redecorate their home. Designers counsel on simple home upgrades as well as complete remodeling projects.

The Fulton Design Center is the first showroom in Arizona to provide an online tool to preview present design options.  Customers are able to create a “Wish List” to gain better understanding of what is available at the Design Center, and what would be best fitting for their home.

“Designing a home is a process that should be enjoyable to the client,” said Patrick Crowely, the Design Center’s Director of Business Development. “At the Fulton Homes Design Center, we enjoy undergoing the design process with each client, making the experience of remodeling a home pleasurable, informative and affordable.”

For more information on Fulton Interiors complimentary Browse Nights, please call (480) 302-3333 or go to www.fultonhomes.com and click on the “Fulton Interiors” link.

Replacing light fixtures can be as effective as painting for changing the mood of a room. Lighting sends a message on style, period and taste. Outdated flooring is the most obvious sign of an outdated space, and lighting fixtures come a close second. Barring major architectural factors, update the flooring and lighting and you have an updated home.

When it’s time to change your light fixtures, take some time to consider certain issues before you make your purchases. Here are a few factors to take into consideration:

Budget: Calculate the lighting budget for your home, and determine how much you can afford to spend in each room. Sometimes you can save money by using a simple light in one space to allow you to splurge in a key area such as the dining room or master bedroom.

Style: Do you want all of your lighting fixtures to coordinate throughout your home? If other elements have a consistent style and approach, continue that pattern with your lighting. If your rooms have different styles, you can be more flexible with your lighting choices. Notice how well this chandelier fits with the style and architecture of the room in this photo.

Need: Do your light fixtures serve a specific need? For example, do you need lighting for make-up in your bathroom? Would you like a ceiling fan in your family room? Don’t let style – no matter how appealing – distract you from the room’s lighting requirements.

Personal preference: When choosing a light fixture, remember that you will be looking at it for years. Be sure to shop until you find fixtures that you like. This may include making choices such as waiting to replace some fixtures so you can purchase a more expensive option that you love.

Remember that your fixtures are more than a source of light – they’re a statement of your style and taste. Make choices that work for you. What are your experiences with updating your lighting?

Last week, we posted a post about how you can use our website tools to help you find your perfect home, specifically our community section. This week, we want to talk about other sections of our website, like the “Find Your Home” section.

In this section, you can sort by Floorplan, neighborhood, city, number of square feet, price, number of bedrooms and number of bathrooms.

When you find something you like, you can even share this information with a friend to get another opinion!

When you click on a particular floor plan you will then be able to:

• View available and quick move in home options
• Exterior elevations and detailed floor plans
• Mortgage calculator
• Interactive Floor Plan
• Online Design Center
• Other similar neighborhoods

We try our best to make it easy for you to look, learn and plan on your time. Stay tuned for more posts on other website tools to help you find your perfect home!