Hello! New Here

No offense intended: if you have the money to build a custom house, I would suggest you expect to send your children to attend private school.

If schools are important to you, you may need to pick the schools, then pick the area. I do not think good schools are abundantly distributed. If your children are naturally studious, you may be able to get away with one which allows online attendance.

My wife and I are partial to Las Terrenas, but have not visited Sosua or Cabarete. LT will test your patience if you are used to having exactly what you want, exactly when you want it. We found the town charming, even though the streets become highly congested super easily. If you plan to drive, learn how to drive such that folding in your mirrors so you don't hit another car is still within your comfort zone of passing. If not, you will not survive.

We bought a condo which was finished after we bought it. In retrospect, I should have been more picky about asking where exactly the outlets will be. I work at home and am used to USA standard spacing of outlets of 6' apart. Since the interior is entirely concrete, it's less convenient to run extra outlets without doing wall raceways, which I find ugly.

I would say our experience with the builder was mixed, so I won't recommend them to you. I hope you get a builder you enjoy.

If you need high speed wired internet as I did, you may also need to find out about whether you can get it before you buy. My wife and I lucked out and the condo association board took it upon themselves to negotiate and have fiber optic internet installed shortly after we bought. Previous to this, the wired internet was by all accounts unreliable and slow.

My wife and I plan to add a full house battery backup even though there are generators so that our power will be more reliable.

If you have more questions, feel free to follow up. Hopefully others can suggest things I could not.

Good luck