I had a plastic conduit drop on every wall in every room down to the basement (which is unfinished). Each had a simple box and wall plate with a rubber "slot" to stuff cable through. I also had one added from the wall above the fireplace (next to the electrical outlet for the TV) to a spot where I knew the AV stuff was going to go. The installer included a pull cord in that one because it's a bit longer.

This allowed me to not have to decide in advance where all my network cabling needed to go (or run miles of CAT6 to places it may never be used). After we moved in, I could decide where I wanted the other TVs to go so I could run RG6 for the satellite boxes and CAT6 for networking and end up with an ultra-clean setup.

For our living room TV, I ordered one extra-long HDMI cable from monoprice, run through the conduit to where all the electronics are. I used a speaker bar that takes the optical out from the TV, so no extra wire for that. Everything feeds to an HDMI swtcher in the "electronics cabinet".

If you prefer "real" speakers, add conduits for the likely speaker locations too.

Your builder likely has a "low-voltage guy" who'd be doing that sort of work, rather than the electrician. Our guy did the alarm -rewiring, the central vac, garage door opener and the conduits. I can't say what the cost was because I had it built into the original scope of work, but likely cheaper than having an electrician do it.

Make sure your builder adds 2x10 (or whatever) such that the entire space of wall above the fireplace is 2" lumber. Makes it a hell of a lot easier to mount the TV without having to look for joists. Here's what ours looked like before drywall (orange pipe is the conduit, cabinet went to the left).

We also got the option for our fireplace (propane) to have the heat vent near the ceiling to take it away from the TV more. You may or may not need/want that. We don't have a mantel (yet).

The only other electrical-related thing I can think of is that if you are, or may become, fond of under-counter lighting in the kitchen, get that pre-wired too. Even if you choose not to hook it up right away, better to have it before drywall/tiles.

I’m glad Brad explained it above because that’s what I did for my tv but couldn't describe it. I had a Zoom with the low voltage rep where he tried to sell me the moon (intercom system? I live alone). As for other electrical, I added under counter lighting, added outlets in my big walk-in closet and where I know I’ll have Christmas decorations to plug in. Made many outlets usb for easier device charging. My boyfriend is very tech-minded and helped tremendously.

@Brad Smith this may be a dumb question, but did you have the power cords go down into the basement or just the cable wires? I imagine I’ll have a few plugs to plug the power cords in but then what to do with the cable box and dvd player. Also, do you plan on finishing the basement? We plan on doing it in a few years so just trying to plan ahead

Never run power cords through conduits. That's just asking for trouble. I had a double outlet installed by the electrician where I was going to put the electronics, and a single outlet on the wall where the TV was going to go. Luckily, I had a pretty good "vision" of my end goals when I did the initial electrical walk-through, and I added extra outlets in a few spots where I thought I may need one eventually. You can't have too many outlets. ;-)

For us, we don't plan on finishing the basement any time soon. We know that if/when that time comes, the conduits from upstairs are going to be a consideration. We may have to go with ceiling tiles rather than drywall to maintain access, or we'll have to come up with a plan to "extend" the conduits to a central spot.

It is against building code to run A/C power cords (cordage) inside of or through walls. It is also against code to run 120volt AC power wiring inside the same conduit as low voltage wiring (Cat 5, speaker wire, thermostat wire, etc.). Electricians already know this, and you hope your low voltage or network wiring guy also knows it, but it never hurts to remind them.

Some areas also require you to use in-wall rated network cable and speaker wire if its inside the walls and ceiling, but other inspectors basically just ignore the low voltage wiring. YMMV.

Bruce

Brad covered this well.

I had a single duplex outlet installed above all of my fireplaces, as well as 1x coax and 1x cat6 in the another duplex box. True I don't want a TV in every single room over every fireplace, but I wanted the option to. A picture or a mirror over the fireplace covers these.

Something Brad posted (and most people miss) is the studs which a TV mount bolts in to. Most TV mounts are 16" wide, but you want the mount centered. If you have a telescoping arm on the mount, they almost never sit centered and are offset. This is why what Brad did is great, as it lets you put the mount wherever it needs to go without modifying anything. True they make very good toggle bolts that just grip the sheetrock, buy why not use wood studs if you can? Also, take good photos of every single one so you know what you working with once everything is done

I also ran extra conduit (smurf tube, flexible pvc, etc) from each of these to my unfinished basement. IMO all of my "over the fireplace TV's" will never have any boxes connected to them, but ya never know. You can also transfer HDMI signal over cat6 if you really need to (say for security cameras, not a 4k movie...) so some people run 2x cat6 cables everywhere just to future proof. I didn't

Plan an "IT rack" space somewhere in your house. Most use an unfinished basement room, the cabinets can be locked etc so that part is up to you. Yes everything is wifi today, but hardwired is always better and more reliable. Depending on the size of your house, most will do a WAP (wireless access point) system instead of a single bulky wifi router that sits on your basement IT rack or another bad spot. Planning a WAP puts your wifi router in the best possible location in your house, or you could do 2 or 3 WAPs to make sure there's no dead zones etc. Anyway, these need cat6 ran (from your rack) to their location (and sometimes 110v outlet so plan hardware now).

Same with security cameras. If you want them or to wire for them, that all needs to feed to your IT box

Put your IT box on its own circuit. It might not pull a ton of power on it's own, but you don't want a vacuum cleaner tripping a breaker on accident and killing your data signal for the entire house.

What is a DVD player?

It isn't just the future that is streaming, it is today.

Wired is always better - until it isn't. The Roku's with hard wired internet have a slower modem but cost more than WiFi. Why? Because volume wins out and most purchasers or Roku do not build houses or live in new houses.

Every single thing you do costs money. LV wiring companies tend to hit the well-healed and aren't as cheap as they should be. Spending money needlessly is not a good idea - "just in case"

Outlets in pantries and large closets. They aren't required by code and so won't be done if you don't ask. Since most everyone has cordless vacs of some kind nowadays, it needs a plug.

Plan a charging station for laptops/tablets/phones somewhere (although realize you might be wrong).

Put in EV charging wires at least.

Put in a big panel. EVs are hungry beasts.

Don't forget the garage and outdoors. Do you decorate the exterior for holidays? Use twinkle lights in the backyard? How about electric or battery-operated tools? Think you'll eventually have a freezer or extra refrigerator in the garage? I don't have easy access to power for these things and wish I did.

We put an outlet in our master bathroom toilet room so that we can have a night light in there which is great at night. If you have large spaces, think about floor outlets for lamps, christmas tree, etc. Our router/modem is in a closet under the stairs so we also put outlets in there. My best advice is to do a walk through and think about how you are going to be using each space.

Put the outlets in the kitchen under the cabinets instead of on the wall. It looks 1,000x better!