Pre-Pre-Construction Meeting

The email we've been waiting for since Christmas finally came through! Permits are approved and our Pre-Construction meeting will take place on Monday 1/29! With that, my mind is racing with questions to ask the builder. Here's a tasting of what I have in mind so far...

• Lawn Irrigation - when can we identify the cost of this? If not in the budget now, can we have a chase run beneath the driveway for future install?
• Property setback? Neighbors fences okay? Where are the survey pins for future fence install?
• When can we visit the home during construction? How can we contact the PM?
• Hose bib locations?
• What kind of insulation is in the garage? What is finish of garage? Lighting in garage?
• Lighting in walk in closets?
• Location of AC Condenser? Garage side of house preferred
• Update to the construction schedule/closing date? Pre-drywall inspection? Other milestone inspections?
• What kind of updates/communication do we receive during construction? Weekly progress reports/emails?

• Flooring - we have a minor discrepancy between what the floor contractor is telling us and what we have in our agreements with the builder. The rest of our floor questions are handled directly with the floor contractor. (Crossing my fingers that a wider plank hardwood doesn't break the bank!)
• Electrical - these questions will be handled directly with the electrical contractor. Very curious about them installing ceiling fan boxes but leaving the fans for me to install after closing! I also have a thousand questions about outlets and recessed lighting.
• Home Wiring - these questions are handled directly with the home wiring contractor. I want to add a lot of extra cable outlets for sure!

That being said, I'd love to hear some feedback from others who have built a home! I do renovation and construction for a living, but I'm the client, not the customer! Being on this side of the table is stressful!

Final Kitchen & Flooring

If you're wondering, "why has it been a month since the last update?" don't worry, we've been wondering the same thing! Since sitting down for our meeting with the Kitchen & Bath company more than a month ago, we've been waiting patiently for some sort of sketch and/or pricing update on the custom ideas that we presented. Finally, last week we received a concept drawing. Unfortunately, the island they designed was WAY bigger than we thought was appropriate for the area. The cabinet guy took our idea of a "large eat-in island" to the extreme and what he originally suggested would barely fit within the kitchen/dining room limits. So after some healthy back and forth, we locked in the following kitchen island:

We love it! The island was the biggest challenge and fortunately the third design was the winner! It's the perfect balance of massive size without sacrificing the rest of the living space. Eating and gathering space is settled!

Unfortunately, figuring out the kitchen situation has created a bit of a new problem: Flooring. It's been our intention all along to keep a carpeted living room with the rest of the downstairs being hardwood. While we were trying to figure out the kitchen layout, we learned that the standard living room carpet would have ran all the way to the foyer. That would have left an approx 5'x8' area of carpet that would have been the prime path from entry into the kitchen. In my mind, this high traffic area was guaranteed to lead to dingy and matted carpet. While we don't meet with the carpet guys for a few more weeks, it seems like the easy solution is to notch out an extra little area of hardwood for a walkway into the kitchen/dining. After a little bit of facebook feedback (thank you to everyone who agreed with me and helped me convince Jen!), this is what we came up with:

The 2nd floor and basement would each be carpet with the exception of wet areas. We're holding out hope that we can do a few upgrades to the bathroom tile work in the master but that will be budget dependent. We'll be scheduling that meeting next so cross your fingers!