The Design Center Decision: What to Upgrade Now at Barefoot — and What Can Wait
You get one shot at the design center, and the markups are real. Here's how I think about which upgrades are worth paying the builder premium for — and which ones are always cheaper after closing.
By Laura Owen
The appointment that quietly defines your build
Most buyers at Barefoot don't realize how much the design center appointment shapes the next ten years of their home. You'll sit in a showroom with a coordinator, page through binders of options, and make what feels like dozens of small decisions. Some of those decisions are easy to reverse later. A surprising number are not. And the builder's pricing sheet doesn't exactly tell you which is which.
I've walked every model at Barefoot — Brookfield's Canvas, Tealight, Artisan and Big Sky portfolios, Pulte's single-family plans in the Village, Richmond American's Duos and detached homes, American Legend's Lakes models. I don't sell for any of them. What I do is sit down with buyers before their design center appointment and help them figure out where the builder's upgrade menu is actually worth it — and where it's going to cost them two or three times what an independent contractor charges after closing.
Why the markups feel steep — because they are
Builders don't make most of their profit on the base-price home. They make it on upgrades. Industry estimates put typical design center markups anywhere from 30 to 80 percent above retail, with some categories — lighting, window treatments, interior paint, landscaping — running 100 to 400 percent over what you'd pay a contractor directly. That's not unique to Barefoot. It's how the model works across all four builders here.
The catch is that not every overpriced upgrade is actually avoidable. The walls only close up once. Anything built into the structure, the electrical system, or the plumbing is vastly more expensive — sometimes impossible — to add once the drywall goes up. That's the real trap: confusing the things you're overpaying for with the things that are genuinely cheaper to do now.
The list worth paying for: anything structural, electrical, or plumbing
If you remember nothing else from this article, remember this category. These are the upgrades where paying the builder's premium almost always pencils out, because the alternative is tearing into finished walls later:
Electrical rough-ins you'll want eventually. Ceiling fan boxes in every bedroom (even if you aren't installing fans day one), a pre-wire for pendants over the kitchen island, recessed lighting layouts in the living room and primary bedroom, 4-way switching where it makes sense, extra outlets anywhere you'll have a desk or a workbench.
EV charger rough-in. At minimum an EV-capable circuit: panel capacity, a dedicated breaker, and conduit from the panel to the garage wall where the charger will go. Running 1-inch conduit now means you can upgrade amperage later without opening walls.
Plumbing rough-ins. If you might ever finish the basement with a wet bar or a full bath, rough it in now. Same for an outdoor kitchen gas line, a hose bib you actually want in the right spot, or a utility sink in the laundry.
Structural options. Extended patios, bonus rooms, bedroom-instead-of-loft swaps, bump-outs on the primary suite. These aren't optional later — they're wall-moving projects.
Structured wiring and low-voltage. Cat6 runs to the office and media room, speaker wire if you want ceiling speakers, a central network location in a utility room. Pulling wire through finished walls is painful. Pulling it during framing is nothing.
Tankless water heater and electrical panel size. Fuel-source decisions and panel capacity are hard to change after the fact.
None of this is flashy. None of it shows up in photos. All of it matters once you're living in the house.
"Before you sign your design center contract, I'll sit down with you and walk line-by-line through what's worth the builder premium and what isn't. It's just the kind of thing I do for every buyer I work with at Barefoot." — Laura Owen | 720-300-4339 | owengroupco.com
The list to skip: cosmetic finishes you can almost always do better after closing
These are the categories where builders earn the biggest margins — and where independent contractors, local showrooms, or a weekend of your own effort almost always produce a better result for less:
Paint colors and accent walls. Builder paint upgrades are marked up heavily, and most Barefoot homes come in a neutral base that a local painter (or you) can repaint in a weekend for a fraction of the design center line item.
Decorative light fixtures. The boxes and wiring need to be right — the fixtures themselves are trivial to swap. Buy the chandelier you actually want from a showroom or online after closing.
Window treatments. Whole-home blinds packages from the builder are typically the single biggest line item buyers regret. Independent installers in Northern Colorado quote dramatically less for equal or better product.
Landscaping beyond what's included. Brookfield's master-developer scope in Barefoot handles baseline front landscaping. Anything beyond that — back-yard sod or xeriscape, fencing, trees — is almost always cheaper through a local landscaper, and you get design input you simply don't get from a builder package.
Appliances (where optional) and refrigerators. If the refrigerator isn't included, don't let the builder upsell one. Costco, local appliance dealers, and end-of-model-year sales will beat the design center every time.
Garage floor epoxy, mirrors, closet organizers, cabinet hardware. All easy, all aftermarket, all cheaper.
The middle category: know the rules before you decide
A few upgrades don't fit cleanly into either bucket. Flooring in main living areas is worth doing now if you're changing material types, because transitions between rooms get messy after install. Cabinets themselves are hard to swap — but cabinet hardware isn't. Tile backsplashes can usually be done later, but if the countertop choice depends on the backsplash, decide together. Counters are worth attention at the design center because replacing them means disconnecting plumbing and sometimes cabinets, and the labor eats the savings fast.
The rule I give buyers: if it involves opening up a wall, a pipe, a wire, or a slab, do it now. If it's surface-level — paint, fixtures, finishes, hardware — you have options.
One thing Barefoot buyers sometimes miss
Every builder here has different base-price inclusions. What Brookfield includes in an Artisan base price isn't what Pulte includes in a Village single-family base, and Richmond American's Duos are structured differently again. Part of what I do before a design center appointment is go through the specific portfolio's included-finishes list so you know what you're actually starting from — and what the "upgrade" is really an upgrade from. Without that, it's easy to pay for something you were already getting.
"If you're within a few weeks of your Barefoot design center appointment — or already thinking about one — let's talk before you sign anything. My job is to sit on your side of the table. The builder's sales rep works for the builder. I work for you, and the builder pays my commission, so it costs you nothing to have independent representation through the full process." — Laura Owen | 720-300-4339 | owengroupco.com
Laura Owen, The Owen Group at RE/MAX Momentum. Licensed in Colorado.