I looked at other planes, especially the Velocity, but in the shop space I have a fiberglass aircraft was just not going to work. Van's planes, being assembled in pieces, make working in smaller shops much more doable.
There are lots of certified planes out there for sale and seemingly great prices. The problem with them is that they are heavily restricted on what modifications you can make to them and who can do the maintenance. There's lots of complaints by certified aircraft owners of light bulbs, trim pieces and simple hoses costing hundreds of dollars. Avionics are similar, you are mostly stuck with round analog gauges. Being an avionics guy, I want to look at glass. I've been working on advanced cockpits for my whole career, I won't accept flying something that was cool in 1960.
Here is Dynon's latest display. Rivals the stuff we put on $50M jets for the top 0.1% 
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.Another factor is builder support. Its hard to argue VansAirForce isn't the best home builder community on the net. You ask a question and within hours (sometimes minutes) a slew of experience builders are there to help. Plus the factory is a phone call away.
My main mission is long range cruise. I don't do aerobatics or crazy stuff. Boring, safe flights are just the way I like to fly. I want to take my family on trips to see the USA, its a big country with tons of awesome stuff to see. So cruise efficiency and speed are important. The RV-10 will conservatively go 160-165 knots (190mph) while burning 10-12gph. There are better cruisers out there, but none of them land as slow.
Here is Van's RV-10 page.
Here is Tim Olson's excellent flying example:
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