Everyday We're shuffling...

One of the reasons I started blogging was to share the good the bad and the ugly parts of building. The hope was to help others and to highlight that none of this came easily. To build our dream home has been a huge sacrifice for our family, our finances, and sanity. The irony is that before this journey we have always been pretty conservative, careful about what we spent and how much we save. We knew going into this that it would be a huge risk but a big pay off. We also knew that this was a once in a lifetime opportunity and long term investment that we couldn't pass up even if the "timing" wasn't exactly right. Is there ever really a perfect time to do anything?

So you ask how do you GC the building of a custom home, keep your day job and run a household? The answer is simple, you don't (not simultaneously anyways). It's a constant balancing act and shift of focus. Honestly it's enough to give a person whip lash. There have been days where I'm surprised we don't need to wear a neck brace. You just have to take it a day at a time and sometimes even hour at a time. Even if everyday feels like groundhog day and you feel like a record spinning around and around.

From day to day we all wear different hats, wife, mother, father, co-worker, daughter, son, sister, brother, friend etc. To achieve our goal we had to throw one more hat to our pile the general contractor hat. This extra hat has required our time and focus every day for the last 9 months and counting. On the way to work, lunch breaks, on the way home from work, late at night and on weekends. Suffice to say it's been a significant commitment. My husband even extended his work week to 6 days and has spent every Saturday since we broke ground in December working a full day at our job site.  Our daughters have learned that weekends aren't just for ballet class and play dates. Weekends involve trips to the lumberyard and job site.

Even though it has been challenging to weave general contracting into our daily lives we have learned and continue to learn a great deal. The hands on skills my husband has learned by working on site are preparing us for the maintenance that comes with home ownership. Managing the sub contractors and the financials for this project have built up my management skill set. Dragging our girls to lumberyards and bath and appliance stores has given them more opportunities to learn to behave in public and to be patient. Most of all we have learned to appreciate what we have and what we are building.

Overchoice

The multitude of choices and how you make decisions is a huge part of a custom home build especially when you are GCing it yourself. Sometimes you have many choices but not much time to make a decision. Other times you may have limited choices but more time than you really need to make a decision. You can become completely paralyzed by all these choices. Sure it sounds like fun to have so much input, and sometimes it is but after a while it gets daunting and exhausting. No pressure, but many of the decisions you make are expensive and final. You are going to have to live with them for a long time so choose wisely.

We purchased our home plan a year before we bought our land and started to build. In that year we spent hours and hours researching and collecting infrastructure and finish ideas for our home online through Houzz and Pinterest. I like to joke that I had a Pinterest board for everything even the type of nails we would use to frame the house! The year of research was like a decision boot camp to prepare us for the building of our home!

When we were applying for the construction loan and I was on maternity leave running around trying to get a building permit. We were also making most of our finish decisions. We tried to build in as many of the upgrades we wanted upfront so we could set a realistic project analysis/building budget. Typically when you build with a builder or developer they set your finish budget for you and anything over that budget you are responsible to pay for out of pocket. A builder will try to maximize his/her profit so the budget they set is typically based on inexpensive finishes they can purchase in bulk. What you would call "builder grade"

The best advice I can give is not to get hung up on the little details. Everything can't be perfect. You have a 1000 different styles to choose from for every single item in your home. Do you really need to obsess over the perfect door knob or window trim? How often will you be starring at those things when you are living in your home? You have to be realistic about what you can you afford? You have to make wise choices about where you spend your money. You may find that you have champagne taste and a beer budget.

One day I spent 3 hours with an amazing local lighting designer developing a lighting plan and schedule. Interestingly enough there is an art to choosing light fixtures. I knew what style fixtures I wanted but I needed a professional to determine the size and to ensure that the fixture would illuminate the space appropriately. Ex: A barn light casts light down while a lantern casts light out.

Not only did we choose the actual fixtures themselves but we determined the placement of every light inside and outside the house. I was then able to use the lighting plan to get electrical bids. And when we chose an electrician he used the lighting plan to do all the rough electrical. Money well spent!

We must have clocked at least 20 hours choosing all of the bathtubs, cabinets, and fixtures for the bathrooms, kitchen and laundry rooms. I spent more hours than I can count at a local tile store obsessing over the tile for the laundry, mudroom, kitchen back splash and bathrooms. Finally we spent countless hours getting 3 different kitchen designs before we settled on one. We have learned to be confident in our choices. Once you start second guessing yourself it can spiral out of control.

The choices and decisions are daily sometimes hourly! Last weekend I had to meet with our electrician to chose the location of every light switch, outlet, cable internet and telephone jack for the entire house. We literally walked from room to room magic marker in hand and he marked the walls as we made decisions. I also had to make a decision on the number of switches for each room specifically how I wanted lights to turn on. Ex: In the bathroom you can have one switch for the fan, one switch for the light, one switch for the light and the fan to turn on.  And these are decisions that need to be made immediately so the electrician can finish his rough work and move on to his next job.

The pay off for all the planning, research and time spent making decisions is seeing it all come together!

Mistakes, Delays and Set Backs...

"It's ok it's just an accident" is what I tell my 4 year old when she spills her milk or trips and falls. After a few post accident hysterics she recovers, gets distracted and moves on. I wish building mistakes and delays could be so easily and quickly overcome. You try your best to plan for and avoid them but they find a way into your project one way or another.

As a GC you have to be like an air traffic controller. You have to manage a multitude of vendors and subcontractors who may or may not be onsite but are actively working on your project. Unfortunately when you are building a custom home there is bound to be a miscommunication, miscalculation, misunderstanding somewhere along the way. How you deal with the turbulence is what can make or break your project and possibly your bank account.

A few examples of where our flight plan got a bit rocky:

The day we realized the wrong size garage doors were ordered and delivered onsite. Garage doors that took 3.5 weeks to ship from a factory in Ohio. Garage doors that needed to be installed ASAP so the electrician could complete his rough electrical work. You really aren't supposed to leave exposed wires near an open doorway. Finally, garage doors that were not a standard size that could not be returned. Could you sell a giant garage door on craigslist?

I got the call at work. My dad was fuming, sawing something and asked me to call and deal with it. I calmly left my cubicle and walked outside my office building. I paced as I dialed the lumberyard. When I couldn't get a hold of our sales rep I left him a voicemail. Then I dialed the sales reps manager. When he picked up the phone with a shaky voice I expressed my frustration ( I yelled... a lot). We went back and forth on whose fault it was that the doors were wrong. At some point I think I may have screamed that child birth was easier than building this house. That made us both laugh and the yelling stopped and we put our heads together and came up with a solution. Keeping the doors and re-framing the garage was the most effective solution. The manager even comped the re-framing materials and promised to give us an additional discount on a future order.

When that call ended I dialed my dad. I shared the recommended solution. My dad's reaction involved more yelling, a handful of swears in both Greek and English and a huge sigh before he agreed. Re-framing the garage took 2 guys, 2 days, new LVL's (laminated veneer lumber), a giant cement cutter, and a lot of back breaking work.

The day we realized the foundation had been poured without a hole for the septic drain. The plumber had come in to start his roughs. While my dad was giving him a lay of the land the plumber casually mentioned that we needed to drill a 6 inch wide hole through all of the concrete and rebar. No biggie it's just 1 foot thick! The foundation had been done for months now. The company wouldn't come back out to drill the hole. So my dad had to rent a giant core drill. It took him hours to drill that one little hole.

The day we realized that the lumberyard completely miscalculated the amount of siding materials we needed to order. We had reached out to a few siding company's to get bids on exterior siding. We wanted to know if the cost would be in the same ballpark as the cost for my dad and his crew to do the work. If we could free up my dad he could focus on interior finishes and we could get the project moving faster. As the estimates rolled in we started to see a common trend. The siding companies had calculated a big difference in materials. Thousands and thousands of dollars off from what our lumberyard had calculated for us. We called our sales rep and he come out to the house and re-measured the siding. He confirmed that he had make a costly mistake. One that we would have to pay for.

A small mistake can wreak havoc to a building project. Unfortunately there are so many unknowns and variables when you are building. You just have to deal with issues head on as they arise. The plane has to keep flying. It may need to stop for a layover or two but it has to keep flying on until it reaches it's final destination....occupancy!!

Papa Don't Preach

What's that saying "money and blood don't mix"  Building a home with your dad/father in law can be difficult at times. You walk a fine line between a business relationship and your actual relationship.

From the moment my dad agreed to build our home we had an unsaid rule. Dad would have final say on all infrastructure and we would have final say on all finishes. In other words don't tell me how to build and I won't tell you how your house should look. For the most part we upheld this rule. Except for those few occasions where one party felt very strongly and crossed that line.

My husband had spent weeks researching windows. He had finally narrowed down his search to one specific brand, Oknas. They were simple in style, the most energy efficient and on budget. My dad wasn't sold and wanted to see the windows in person. Having built for many years he was loyal to the window titans, Anderson A series and Marvin. So my husband drove with my dad to the nearest distributor, about 40 minutes away from our home. That twenty minute appointment resulted in my dad refusing to put vinyl windows in our home or any home he ever builds. "They look cheap" he said. Respecting my dad's opinion and thinking we were going to prove him wrong we agreed to look at other window vendors. In the end we are glad my dad discouraged us from purchasing the Okna's. We ended up with Marvin windows and we love them!

My dad kept telling us that a house should breathe and it's not natural for a house to be air tight. More importantly he didn't agree we should invest in the more expensive insulation, close cell spray foam. The savings in doing a cheaper insulation like fiber glass would be huge but we were adamant. The long term cost savings to heat and cool our home outweighed the short term gain in our budget. Refusing to change our minds we finally convinced my dad closed cell is the way to go. We can't wait to show him our first heating bill in the new house.

The upstairs kids bathroom was designed with pocket doors to separate the vanity area from the tub/toilet area. As my dad was framing this room he tried to convince us to remove the pocket doors and leave the space open. After I reminded my dad of the days when my sister and I used to share a bathroom, the pocket doors were framed in!

I believe that during the building of this house my dad and I have been building on our relationship. It has grown and changed in ways I didn't expect. We still argue, butt heads, swear in Greek but now I think we respect each other's opinions and experience in a different way then we did before.

Diss-bursement

With the foundation built and the framing underway we were finally able to request a reimbursement from the bank for the materials, labor and work completed. The relief I felt quickly faded when I learned how complicated the bank disbursement process was.

The process goes a little something like this. Twenty-four to forty-eight hours prior to submitting a disbursement request the construction management company requires that you post a notice of anticipated funds at the job site. This document states the name of the bank, the owners names and how much money you are requesting. It's a fun way to advertise how much money you are spending to build your house to your whole neighborhood. :)

Once the disbursement request is electronically submitted to the construction management company they send someone out to the job site to take pictures within 24 hours. They take the notice of anticipated funds paperwork.

Every time I request a disbursement from the bank I have to submit the following:

1). Owners Affidavit- a signed and notarized document outlining the total dollar amount being requested for the disbursement.

2). General Contractors Lien Waiver- a signed and notarized document outlining the total dollar amount for the work completed. *A lien waiver proves that payment was made, received and waives any future lien rights against the property.

3). Subcontractor Lien Waiver- a signed and notarized document outlining the total dollar amount for the work completed. In this case the foundation.

4). An invoice from my dad for his GC work. In this case the framing.

5). A draw request. This is another document that breaks out of all of the individual line items that will make up your total projected budget to build.

6). All receipts, statements and invoices for materials paid and delivered.

Based on the pictures taken the construction management company will assess the percentage completed against the money you are requesting to draw. Ex: I request the full amount for the foundation. The construction management company always sides with the bank so if they don't believe the foundation is 100% complete they will only grant you a dollar amount based on what they believe has been completed.

A few more hoops the bank makes you jump through to get your loan money. You are not allowed to request money on deposits paid to subcontractors. Good thing no one will step foot on your job site unless they get a signed contract and deposit. You can only get reimbursed after the subs work has been completed. You cannot get a disbursement of funds on materials unless they are delivered on site or fall under a custom order like engineered trusses, windows or cabinetry. Custom ordered materials still require a 50% deposit upfront to order.

Once the construction management company reviews all of your paperwork and approves the request it is then sent to the loan servicing department at the bank. They can take up to 5 business days to make the funds available via a check or direct deposit to the GC.

It's that easy we only have to do this process a total of 9 times! Finally the bank only pays for the first 5 times that the construction management company comes out to your site. After the 5th time you have to pay them $150 every time they come out to take pictures.

Now that I have been through this process several times I feel like a pro. I have a new found respect for what a GC is responsible for!

F stands for Family, Foundation, Framing and Frustration!

After overcoming yet another hurdle (finding even more capital to pay for the foundation and labor ourselves) we were finally able to move forward and take the first step in building our home. Our misfit building crew included my dad, uncle, father in law, (husband on weekends), a master carpenter who is a family friend and my dad even recruited our new neighbor who happened to also be a master carpenter/cabinet maker.

It was thrilling to see progress. The thrill out weighed the extreme stress and anxiety. Excavation took a week. We breathed a huge sigh of relief that we didn't hit any ledge. You never know what you may find underground. Blasting ledge can get costly. 

Before we we knew it the foundation footing, rebar and walls were poured and we could see the outline of our home. Within two weeks we had a fully completed and inspector approved foundation. Just in time for the holidays and the snowiest winter on record.

We knew it would be tough building through the winter but we weren't prepared for how much snow we would get in the month of February alone. My dad and his crew lost at least a month of framing progress between mid January on because they were shoveling more often than actually framing.

Progress had moved so quickly when we started and it was frustrating to see it slow down to almost a screeching halt. There are so many unknown's during building, weather one of the largest. Until your house is fully framed and "winterized" (roof, windows, and exterior doors are on) you are at the mercy of mother nature. 

Living in New England most of our lives we were used to crazy weather. One day it may be 80 degrees and the next 30. There is a local saying "if you don't like the weather wait a few minutes" True New Englander's are the one you see wearing shorts and flip flops when it hits 50 degrees! 

Not only was the winter snowy but it was bitterly cold. There were many weeks where my dad and the crew were working in below 0 degree temps. Covered from head to toe all you could see were their eyes. My dad borrowed a friends wood burning stove and dragged it into the now basement of our house. The stove served three purposes; it ensured that the foundation didn't crack, it kept at least one area of the house warm for the crew to take breaks and it was used as a stove to cook on. My father in law became the head chef and he cooked everything from pork chops to omelettes on that stove! It was clear from the beginning that our family was making this our home. 

Framing dragged on and on and on. We thought it would never end! What was supposed to take a couple of months ended up taking 4.5 months! The second floor of our home consisted of engineered trusses. We had to spend an insane amount of money (out of pocket of course) to rent the largest crane I had ever seen. At the time we were very fortunate we were able to rent it. With all the snow every crane within 60 miles was booked for commercial roof snow removal. 

To watch the crew work together to stabilize and nail on the trusses was amazing. The crew demonstrated great team work and focus. I was very proud! I am also happy no one was hurt. It's scary to watch your family members dangling 40 feet from the ground.

Once the trusses were on the real building happened. My dad and the crew framed 9 different pitches around the house. These pitches consisted of custom ski slopes that our new neighbor designed and crafted in his workshop. All this effort did not go unnoticed. Many people would drive by and stop and stare. My dad even had another builder come by and ask him how he built the pitches. To this day my dad will still drive all the way down the street so he can see every angle of the house when he leaves for the day! 

Breaking your bank and the ground....

You did it. You went through the 5 rings of hell to find your land, get a building permit and finally close on your construction loan. Now you can break ground, build your house and live happily ever after! Not so fast!

Welcome to the highs and lows of building. One moment you are on cloud 9 and the next you are plummeting off cloud 9 heading for earth at warp speed.

The jokes on you, this loan that you just got, that you just put an ungodly amount of money down to get, that you are now expected to start paying for monthly. Well you can't touch any of that loan money until work is completed or materials are onsite. Surprise your loan is a reimbursement account. You better pray you have a rich uncle, a winning lottery ticket or a hell of a lot of coins in your couch cushions. This is where the rubber meets the road. Where you show your true grit to get it done!

This is the bank's best kept secret. The bank wants to mitigate as much risk as they can so they make the borrower pay upfront and they make the builder pay upfront in the absence of a structure. Since our builder (my dad) wasn't building our home for a profit. We were on the hook to come up with the capital to get the project going and to keep it going!

This all occurred the week I went back to work full time with an 11 week old baby right before the holidays! Merry Christmas! Dear Santa all I want for Christmas is a giant blank check!

Can I have Permit-ssion to build??

We had the land, home plan, builder and the new baby. Getting the building permit to complete the construction application should be no problem right?? Wrong!!!

First I would never recommend you embark on this task with a newborn on little to no sleep. That is torture in itself. The silver lining was that I was home on maternity leave and available to do all of the necessary running around. Building a house is a marathon not a sprint!

Every town has their own building construction codes that are enforced by the town building inspector. Ex: If you are in an inland town the snow weight load requirements for you roof will be higher than if you are closer to the coast.

What did I have to do and what did we have to spend to get one residential building permit??
Note: (Normally your builder would do all of this):

-Get an approved septic system design from your state. This will be at a cost and requires time for review and approval.

-Apply and pay for a Septic Install Permit

-Get your land surveyed to determine boundaries -this will be at a cost

-Get a foundation plan (this will be at a cost to have an architect draw this up)

-Get an approved EC-1 Home Energy Code (this is based on how you will insulate your home). The approved code has to be on your permit application.

-Get a structural engineering plan that states the seismic and wind loads that your structure can handle (this will be at a cost through an engineering firm). Note: Our house has now been built to withstand a hurricane, earthquake and the end of days.

-Get a Truss Plan (if you are doing engineered trusses you can get this through your lumber yard)

-If there is anything on your plan that the building inspector questions like if your windows meet egress requirements (which is the height/width of your windows so a fireman can crash through them in case your house is on fire). You will need to go back to your architect and have him adjust your plan. This will be at a cost.

-Get a dig safe number. Call and get a number that allows all of the utility company's in your area to mark out where there are power lines so your builder/dad doesn't dig there and electrocute himself.

-Finally pay for the building permit and submit your application with all of the above. Take your total sq footage and multiple that by .25 cents per sq foot. This cost will vary depending on your town.

A bit of advice definitely budget in soft costs in your project analysis so you can recoup the thousands and thousands of dollars you will spend trying to get your building permit.

Once you have your building permit. Dance a jig, drink wine, post on FB and thank god the building inspector finally stopped asking questions and approved your permit! Oh and then submit it to the bank. :)

Project Paralysis

When you start the application process for a construction loan your builder (in our case the builder is my dad) has to complete a project analysis. This is a rough estimate and break down on the total cost to build your home. If this is a custom home that a builder hasn't built 50 times over then be prepared that your numbers will be off. When a builder has built something over and over again he has fixed costs, can buy in bulk etc.

You project analysis is submitted to the bank and a construction management company that works with your bank will review and verify that the numbers meet market value. Ex: If your builder gets hit by the mega bucks bus anyone else can build your house for the same cost. You can figure out the per sq footage cost to build in your area by taking the total cost of a house and dividing it by the number of sq feet.

A typical construction project will run over 10-15%. Instinctively you want to pad all of your numbers to include this overage. Unfortunately before the construction management company and bank can sign off on your project analysis it is then reviewed by a third party assessor and appraised based on comparable homes sold in the last year in your area.

On average the initial assessed value of a home will come in under what you are projecting it will cost to build it. If this occurs you will be asked to come up with the difference or find a cheaper way to build your house. This is one of the many ways banks mitigate risk. You can say you are going to build the Taj ma hal but you may end up building a hut with sticks and stones. A lot can happen during the building process.

We lucked out and our project was assessed at the amount we requested. Our loan officer said we were an anomaly.

Before we even started the application process my dad and I went to two different lumber yards in our area and had them price out all of the materials (sans labor) to build our home. Surprisingly there was a $10,000 cost variance between the two based on location.

Then my dad and I spent 3+ hours crunching all of the numbers to factor in labor. Depending on the line item labor can vary greatly. It can sometimes run 2 x more than the materials or sometimes the materials are 2 x more than the labor.

My dad had been out of the building game for 10 years so he did not have a crew of sub-contractors that he could recommend for our project. So we used Angie's List and referrals from friends to get bids for all of our major subs (HVAC, Electrical, Plumbing, Gas, Insulation).

Getting bids from sub-contractors is like seeing Halley's comet, petting a unicorn, finding a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. Be prepared to be frustrated and shocked when no one calls you back or can provide you with a bid within a normal time frame. Yes I actually had to call one plumber 20 times before he provided me with a price. Note; We did not sign a contractor with said plumber.

Also be prepared to get bids that range in price from the reasonable to the astronomical. There is no rhyme or reason and paying more doesn't always mean the job will be done better. And sometimes a contractor will give you a bid based on your home plan but then when they find out you are building in an affluent town or they come out to "measure" they may double and triple the price. We have found that getting at least 4-5 bids on everything you need to sub out will give you options.

Don't be afraid of the numbers. If you build in some padding you can move around money if something runs over in one area. At the end of the day it really is all a numbers game!

How to find and buy land like a builder....

Three is the number of years, the number of realtors and the number of family members who told us finding and buying land to build a custom home was impossible in our desired location. We were determined and pregnant with our second child. Coming up on our eighth year in a small condo where we had utilized every inch of space possible. We knew we couldn't give up. This was our dream. This would be the forever house where our children would grow and we would make our most important memories.

So we got creative. We asked how do builders find and buy land? We learned of an online assessors database. The database allowed us to look up the assessed value and property information (owners name, address, sq footage, lot size, and assessed home value) by town and street name. Every weekend for months we drove around our top towns. We drove down streets and neighborhoods we admired and took down street names and numbers.

Then we took that information and spent many hours looking up addresses in the database. Any house with a lot size of 5 acres or more was documented in a spreadsheet. I was not sleeping well at the time so I did most of this analysis in the early morning hours. I spent every lunch break typing, printing and mailing letters to home owners. The letter introduced us and what we were looking for...land. The letter asked the homeowner if they were interested in subdividing? Did they know of anyone who owned land and would be interested in a private sale?

Many people responded even if they couldn't subdivide their land they offered us well wishes, applauded our clever effort and gushed about why their town was a wonderful place to live. This went on for months right up to my seventh month of pregnancy. When we had sent hundred of letters and worried we may get served with a cease and desist. Someone from the town building and planning board called me. They had received one of our letters and knew of a recently retired planning board member who owned land and was looking to sell it privately.

We didn't want to get our hopes up. We reached out to the owner and within 2 months we were signing a purchase and sales agreement in our lawyers office. The land was ours! We were one step closer to reaching our dream!

Looking back now 5 months into the building of our dream home we realize that finding and buying the land was the easy part!

“Nothing in the world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, difficulty… I have never in my life envied a human being who led an easy life. I have envied a great many people who led difficult lives and led them well.”

-Theodore Roosevelt