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Originally Posted by shakran
get hold of a prospective architect's and builder's clients and go talk to them. See if they're pissed.
Be prepared to go to the construction site EVERY DAY to check the work that was done that day. Inspect it VERY carefully. Try to find a friend that's already built a house - they'll have a better idea what to look for. Builders love to cut corners wherever possible, and you have to conduct daily inspections to make sure they don't get away with it.
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Unless you're a contractor or a certified inspector, this is probably a waste of time. You most likely won't know what to look for. For instance, do you know what a properly constructed joint should look like? What is the proper rise and run numbers for the HVAC plumbing? If the slab has pretension cables, what is the proper load and what did the contractor actually use? The local building inspector will be paying lots of visits to the site, and they should catch most of the major mistakes.
If you are worried about this, the I suggest hiring a construction consultant. It will cost you more, but they will be able to do inspect the home on a daily or weekly basis depending on what you want. As far as the builder being next door, it will make him a lot more accessable to you if there's something wrong. However, he will most likely refer major warranty work back to the subcontractor that did it, so in the end, I think that this is a neutral. As I stressed in my first post, I would be very careful about choosing a builder and make sure to talk to all of his references.