Our new home

Those are some great tips. (If everybody gave tips like you I'd go be a waiter.)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sandm

mike,
noticed the fascia trim at the peak of the garage door, and on the side of the house, but not on the second peak over the garage and over the bay window? builder forget? I noticed the same thing when looking at it after the pics were taken. I have to go out there again today to put in some nail stops by my wiring and im going to look into that.

noticed they haven't poured the driveway yet. if you can, get it done dead last. some sub will park on it and drip oil. never fails. Yes the Driveway goes in almost dead last. Then its also blocked from any vehicles.
don't have them seal the concrete on the back patio if you have the option. then go get yourself some coffee concrete stain and some sealant. looks pimp. I would do stamped/colored entryway and 2 2ft bands down the driveway if you can. colored concrete mixed is expensive. if you get it plain and unsealed, you can stain it yourself for less than $200.We have them doing the bands on the driveway, its aggregate i think its called. The rest is a broom finish so its not to slippery in all the rain we get. I will have to look into the concrete stain.
check ebay for inwall volumes and speakers. usually $29 for impedance matching controls and under $50 for a decent set of inwalls(i used phoenix gold in the last house. not the same as the automotive company in quality, but they work nice). if you buy the speakers now, you can bring them for the painters to colormatch, otherwise get some of the wall color loaded into a spray can. We get plenty of extra paint to match the interiors but i doubt i have any speakers or volume controls till after we move in. Claudia is starting to manic im spending to much on upgrades already so everything gets blank wall plates till we move in then i can spend a little more. I plan to use what would be the first mortgage payment to buy most of the stereo stuff.

make sure your landscaper knows the fence layout so they can plan around it. personally, i'm a curbing guy around the entire house 2-3.5ft out. keeping grass away from the actual foundation really helps with potential water in the crawlspace down the road, and much easier to mow. make sure when they pour the driveway/entry, you remember(measure and write it down) or mark where the sleeve is under the driveway and under the front walkway if you have a planter bed. you won't be sorry later. a small scratch in the side of the driveway does it when the concrete is fresh.I agree i like the 2 foot boarder we have them on the current house and we plan to add it to the new one. We have the front yard pre-landscaped as part of the deal but the back i didnt want to add to the house price so ill be doing that. I need to figure out where and how to buy sod.

spray texture or hand scraped?

---

I dont follow you on this one?

Wow lot of stuff there Sandm lol.

Kane, its a Lap siding and it overlaps from the bottom so its installed top down. In those pics they hadn't finished it all but yesterday i was there and its all done. I assume they left the man door undone because the proper door wasn't installed. Now the correct door is in place and the siding is complete.

just wondering if the interior texture on the walls is spray(typical of a tract home) or if it's hand-textured. might ask. if it's not too much, do the common areas(not bedrooms/laundry) in hand. it looks 100% better imo and will differentiate the house at resale time.

look into the concrete stain. head to a concrete supply house when you have some time off. they will fill you in. looks amazing and is easy to put up. only prob is if your concrete guy uses a sealer over the grey concrete, the stain won't take. needs to be unsealed. stain the bands on the driveway and front walk.

my .02 on inwall's and volumes. don't go nuts on prices. ebay is your friend. most of the time, that music is simply background. don't need a real expensive one. I used phoenix gold 8" 2-way's(ebay for under $60/pr) for most of them. your plant shelves in the living room would be an excellent way to get them in and out of the way. hidden sound is golden when you have peeps over :)

Ahh ok yes i follow you on the wall texture, you know i don't know if that's as option i get to use. Ill look into it and see. I agree on the hand texture walls. I know the models had spray in but they only put a few options in the models. Most of the model options were no cost upgrades, we have some of the no cost upgrades but we have spent about 30K in physical upgrades but most wouldn't see it as we have carpet, linoleum floors and Formica counters. We opted to take standard feature on this stuff so we have more time to shop and choose what we want. Plus i know enough guys who do those professionally i can have them help me for a little liquid compensation.

I will for sure look into the stained concrete. I ran that by Claudia this morning and she gave me the deer in the headlight look until i said we can make the porch blend in with the house better and then you could see the light bulb go off LOL

be careful on the upgrades that you have the builder do. often times you get into a position where you have too much invested into a house that won't bring the value at selling time. things like upgraded trim, crown, kohler vs moen fixtures won't bring extra cash at resale in the market you are probably going to be in.

Watching your house go up brings back memories of my our first house. i too had a boat (my first major purchase out of college, even before a car) And I remember like yesterday walking our house during each phase of construction. I have enjoyed watching your photo's being added. There is nothing quite like the satisfaction of opening the door on your own house after closing!!! Wishing you and your wife and puppy nothing but the best of luck. As to your nosey neighbor, we all have at least one, no matter where you live and I hope your stereo on your boat really annoys her lol.

Mark

Latest updates we went to the house on Sunday and the new fire sprinkler system is installed, all electrical inspections are passed and I expect tomorrow when i go out that it will have insulation and drywall. Heres what it looks like right now.

Sprinkler system main valve and pressure control. In the garage.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture140.jpg

Couple shots of it in the ceiling in the different rooms.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture139.jpg
http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture138.jpg
http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture137.jpg

This is the house, shes all sided and waiting for paint The greay section on the front of the garage is where the rock will be placed.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture142.jpg
http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture141.jpg
http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture143.jpg

House is looking good. Question, is the fire sprinkler system code or was that an option?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by zabooda

House is looking good. Question, is the fire sprinkler system code or was that an option?

---

Its an option, since we are rual and the only fire department is volunteer only we felt it was better to have an automatic system. It really helps the home insurance but mostly it gives us both peace of mind.

We weighed the option of insurance covers fire but it also covered damage by water from the system is there was a fire. So eighter way we are covered but with the system installed our rate is much lower, so much so they this system will pay for its self in less then three years from the insurance savgins.

interesting that they put up gutters prior to paint. that's usually one of the last to go up as gutters come in a mirad of colors to match. downspouts are a dying thing here. everyone has rainchains. they look amazing as they start to rust, but I'm guessing not too many of them there with the amount of precip each year?

if your cabinets have crown moulding on them and the wifey is going to put shiot up on top of them, grab some of that scrap wood to put on top of the cabinets. helps space your stuff to the level of the crown. 2x4 or 2x6 work awesome for that.

Awesome idea Sandm on the cabinets. I hadn't thought ov that lol. I was surprised to see the gutters up too, i know they paint them to match the house so i assume that's why there up but i wonder if that means now i wont have pain on the trim behind them. I guess it doesn't matter as long as i cant see it. I know the siding is primered < yellow > but the trim is that grey color and im not sure if thats primmer or not.

find that very interesting that they paint the gutters. those come in soo many colors, and most are formed on-site that getting them made in a close match is pretty easy. I usually tried to get the exterior painted before the roof goes on as the d-metal that hangs over the edge of the fascia covers part of it as well. if your d-metal lifts at all, it will show the unpainted fascia. it's also a whole lot less the exterior painter has to tape up, saving them money. once you have a dryroof on, that's all you need for some time. and it's usually required to be on prior to electrical roughin.

Sandm, I thought the same thing when I moved here from Az. I used to hang gutters and we used to order the material by color. When I got here you had a choice of brown or white. They get painted with the house. Pretty standard here.

Looking good Mikey!

Went tot he house yesterday and they got a lot done since last trip.

We have stone on the front of the house, we have drywall in the house. There is a few mistakes so i have to contact them on that but here ya go.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture148.jpg

They forgot a couple stones here. I think they might have not had the right size or something.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture149.jpg

Garage you can see the garage door opener wires, and my ceiling speaker wires. Back wall has the 2 volume controls for the garage. Front and rear.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture150.jpg

Standing in the entry looking threw to kitchen

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture151.jpg

Kitchen Pantry

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture152.jpg

Kitchen to living room view

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture153.jpg

Main hall and main bathroom, towel closet

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture154.jpg

Ledge built above the living room and dinning room. There is electrical power up there, also prewired some speakers but they forgot to pull 1 wire.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture155.jpg

Closer look at the wires they forgot to pull lol.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture156.jpg

Main bathroom

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture157.jpg

Laundry room in hall

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture158.jpg

Bedroom / office. Forgot to pull wires here also, you can see the volume control box, and near the floor is the Cat5, Cable, Phone

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture159.jpg

Bad picture lol. Its the second bedroom closet LOL. They also forgot to pull my speaker wires in this room.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture160.jpg

Master bedroom, they forgot 1 wire here. They pulled the left out but not the right LOL. You can see the volume control on the wall here too.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture161.jpg

Ledge in the master bedroom, it also has electrical power on it.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture162.jpg

Entry to the house Ledge from living room to dinning room carries around, we plan to have a table and a coat rack or something here. Also that wall is the coat closet and you access it from the entry where the garage door is.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture164.jpg

Last pic today is the Masterbath

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture163.jpg

As you can see this is a modest home. Bedroom arnt really big, bathrooms arnt really big but we sacrificed some of those comforts to build a new home that we can call ours. What we did gain is the open living concept, they area we wanted to build in, and the garage/rv pad we desperately needed. Ok i needed LOL.

Next couple weeks is all drywall mud and sanding.

Then the driveway gets installed and that is custom also, we are having standard concrete with aggregate boarders.

They will install the over sized front porch, rear patio, Garage door, paint the house, install all the interior fixtures, and lastly the carpet and flooring.

They pushed out the finish date till mid June now grrrr but im gonna hold the hop of First week of June, right after Memorial weekend lol.

I see you're placing speakers up on the plant shelf. if you are just using them for background noise and not a true 5.1/7.1, drop the cables down to the bottom of the plant shelf. claudia can put bric-a-brack in front of them, you still get the sound, and you don't have to look at them. done that in several houses and it will fill that area with sound nicely and discretely :)

still find it interesting all the work they are doing to the exterior without it being painted. painter now has to tape up rock.

Yes those are ambient speakers the surround sound are on the lower walls, and yea they end up taping a lot of the house when its time to paint. I hope to catch them the day they paint it to get some shots of it.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by mmandley

Went tot he house yesterday and Standing in the entry looking threw to kitchen

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...Picture151.jpg

---

Is Claudia doing the elevator or the canoe? Maybe the escalator?:p

Looks great man! moving right along.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by newty

Is Claudia doing the elevator or the canoe? Maybe the escalator?:p

.

---

Only you would see that--lmao.

Mike, man if I'm ever back up there I will feel right at home stopping by for a cold one and some Moomba chatting.

Looking good

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by moombadaze

Only you would see that--lmao.

Mike, man if I'm ever back up there I will feel right at home stopping by for a cold one and some Moomba chatting.

Looking good

---

HAHA well ill let Claudia and Ryan hash that out.

Hey anyone comming out this way are more then welcome to my home for a few beers and a free boat ride.

wait a minute. iirc, it's just you and claudia and a 3bedroom house?

I see that Hotel Mike is just about ready to open..
is there room service as well or just a turn-down mint at night???

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sandm

wait a minute. iirc, it's just you and claudia and a 3bedroom house?

I see that Hotel Mike is just about ready to open..
is there room service as well or just a turn-down mint at night???

---

Ahh man I'm with. Mexican woman, you get dinner at night, beer brought to you at night and in the morning Mexican breakfast with a shot of 1800 Gold for the hang over and them another couple pulls behind the boat it's an endless cycle lol

There's a reason I have extra ballast to lose every season because I'm well feed on home made Mexican food and nothing goes better with Mexican food then chilled brewski lol

I don't always drink beer, but when I do I prefer Dos Equis. Stay thirsty my friends.

rd is the most interesting man on the forum :)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sandm

rd is the most interesting man on the forum :)

---

Why thank you but I have a confesssion....I stole that quote from a popular TV commercial, you may have seen it. At the end the narrator states "He is the most interesting man in the world"

I actually prefer Shiner Bock. However Dos Equis is a great import and way tastier than corona

I was being sarcastic :)

I'd fit right in at mikes house. the widmer brothers brewery is just a short jaunt away :)
my taste buds love their hef, but my gut says stay far far away...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by sandm

I was being sarcastic :)

I'd fit right in at mikes house. the widmer brothers brewery is just a short jaunt away :)
my taste buds love their hef, but my gut says stay far far away...

---

yeah i caught your sarcasm, apparently mine was missed however lol

as they say..

above my head and below my knees.

missed it all..

Got new pictures yay. We went out last weekend and they were sealing the house and had everything taped and locked so no updates.

This weekend we were out there and heres the updates. House is painted inside and out.

Today the cabnets go in, tomorrow is counter tops, and Friday is final electrical inspection.

Then fixtures and flooring, lots of cleaning as i walked around and pointed out all the paint on the window frames and such.

The house is painted a medium type of brown, trimed in black, and accent with a cream. I think the black really makes the features of the home pop out at you, such as the bay window, solid walnut front door, rock treatments. The cream i think is a nice contrast to break up the darker colors. Several home sin the area have lots of the same colors and look plain or dark to me and i really wanted the house to pop.

I think after the landscaping goes in and the drive way is laid it will tone it down and really pull it all together.

Like i said before we were looking for a garage for Fierah with a house attached, and i chose colors to really tie into the boat lol.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6177.jpg
http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6178.jpg
http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6179.jpg
http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6180.jpg

More of the outside

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6182.jpg
http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6181.jpg
http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6183.jpg
http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6184.jpg

On to the inside

Garage entrance to the house
http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6185.jpg

In the house to the garage

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6191.jpg

Front entry door

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6190.jpg

These get dark as the flash and the clouds outside just made the pictures appear dark.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6189.jpg

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6186.jpg

Kitchen pantry

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6192.jpg

Shelf in the master bedroom above the closet

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6193.jpg

You can almost see the shelves we have in the closet.

http://i639.photobucket.com/albums/u...y/HPIM6194.jpg

Looking VERY nice. I really like those interior doors too.

Dang, Mike, that thing is really starting to look like something. Love the exterior and that's the part I was worried about. Looks great!

Man, its really coming together. You and the Mrs. are getting close!!

BEEEEUTIFUL!

Getting close!