Okay, okay... so I'm a litlle bit late to the party!
Truth is, I was on prac teaching at a local school when the game came out, so I had to wait a week until I could play it. And even then, I think I played with a family for all of two days (in between study, of course) before I dived straight into build mode. Since then, I've been constucting houses in between every lecture and assignment, so you'll be seeing a fair bit from me in the next few weeks!

So far, I'm liking the new build mode. The tools were kinda clunky at first, but I'm getting used to them now and they're almost convenient. I am DEEPLY missing a few things, though. Not having pools or garages is making it difficult - these are things I used to incorporate into nearly every house! I'm a little disappointed to not have create-a-style anymore, and I feel like it makes decorating very boring; all of my interiors look the same (I apologise for that, I'm not very imaginative when it comes to the inside of houses... exteriors are where it's at). And the lack of building cheats is super frustrating! I never realised how much I relied on "constrainfloorelevation" and "moveobjects" until they were gone...

I am currently working through my sketchbook of old house designs from the Sims 3, trying to see what I can recreate in the new game. However, I keep getting distracted by new ideas, so it might be a while before I get a lot of those out.

That's all from me for now, folks. If you have any requests, feel free to PM me and I'll give it my best shot.
Happy simming!
Jaws.