Update from Susan

According to the Inverness starting report, we are scheduled for the week of Jan. 12th. That is, if our appraisal comes back on time and at the right amount. We are still waiting for it, so it could delay us. 

They are starting to dig a "spec" house across from Cathy and Johns lot this week. A spec house is a home the company builds and sells on the market. This spec house will be a Pinehurst II. Cathy and John are building a Bentwood. Both houses are nothing similar to ours, which will keep our neighborhood from looking too "cookie cutter". 

Lot 9059, on the entrance road to the development, is slated to dig the week of January 5th. It's all coming along nicely now. I am looking forward to meeting our neighbors at some point. Hopefully they will forgive me for stalking their builds. Lol. I think I visit the site more than anyone. 

Cathy & Johns model, Bentwood

Spec house

Lot #9059, The Camden

Our house

Excitement and concern

Our new neighbors, Cathy and John, have finally begun their build. They are the first homeowners in the development.

Their build had been delayed due to a poor appraisal. They had to file a complaint against the VA appraiser to get it all worked out. I'm not sure how far behind they are now, but I'm scared the same thing will happen to us. We have a VA loan as well. Susan assures me that she's worked with several VA appraisers who were great. I'm crossing my fingers we don't get the bad one. 

I drove by two days before Christmas and saw a dump truck and giant equipment on their lot. So the boyfriend and I drove over on Christmas to see what they had done. 

It looks so tiny in this stage. I know it all works out in the end. I hope they aren't freaking over the size. 

Sold!!

Susan sent us this picture today. We finally have a lot sign and sold sticker. It must mean it's really official! Lol

Lender approval

We got a call from Joe, our lender, yesterday.  He received our final numbers and had gotten approval on them.  He is sending all the info to Susan. 

It's just another hurdle on our way to our DarbyII.  I'm hoping we hear some news the week after Christmas.  We are waiting to see blue prints and a lot plan.  That is something that will be covered at our pre-construction meeting.  Tick tock, tick tock!  Perhaps I'm not as patient as I once thought I was. 

Model Home, The Hammond, at the Bluffs

 We are very lucky to  live just a few blocks away from our development.  The only home that has been started is the model home on the front corner lot.  They are building The Hammond, which was originally what we had chosen to build, until we were able to tour one.  A great plan, just a little too small for our family.

I drive by at least twice a week to check on the progress of the development, and most especially, the model home.  I'm interested to see the timeline in which they complete it, just so I have a better idea of what to expect when our building starts.

November 26, 2014 - The pavement was poured this day.  the model home is on the right side of the road where all the piles of dirt are.  At this point is was just a hole in the ground with footers.  They couldn't get the molds for the basement walls delivered until they had pavement.  They ended up pouring another layer of pavement later in the week to smooth it all out.  This was the first time actually being able to get in to the development, so I'm not sure how long the process was to get to this point.

December 6th, 2014 - The basement walls are up and the molds are off.  From what I can tell, they didn't like to work on weekends at this point.

 

December 13th, 2014 - The floor joists are being installed.  Wow, working on a Saturday!!  I was impressed.  Susan told us that they were given rush orders on this model, as they want her on site to sell the lots.  Now I'm wondering if they are going to work weekends when it's our turn to be built.

December 16, 2014 - Large shipments of lumber were lying around the lot.  No one was on site working.  I assume because it was raining pretty good that day.

 December 17th, 2014 - What a difference a day makes!!  I turned the corner on to the development and my jaw dropped.  There was nothing here but floor joists just yesterday!!  This was at about 1pm, and there was no one on site, so it had all been done just that morning.  I assume they were at lunch?? I will be driving by again tomorrow to see what they accomplished.  All I can say is Wow!!  I am impressed.

3D Home Design and Lot Plan

I have been playing with this great APP, Home Design 3D, on my iPad.  Our Model home is a reverse of the floor plan we will be getting, which makes it very  hard for my boyfriend to picture where everything will be.  I was able to use the app to make a visual for him, as well as place our current furniture in, to figure out where it will all fit.  A great tool when deciding where outlets should go.

If you like playing with floor plans I would suggest this app.  I have played around with it long before we ever decided to build a house.  It's a fun tool.

Unfortunately, the furniture selection on the app isn't great, but you can put in your measurements and at least get a good idea.  You can also only do one floor per plan, and the ceiling height can't be changed, as in our great room.  There are color choices for wood flooring, tile, metal, paint, brick, etc.  

Here is the rendering I have been working on.

Home Design 3D app

 

 First floor floorplan

 

View of exterior

View from the foyer

View of Great Room, Kitchen and Nook

View from Nook into Kitchen

Then I started playing with  my lot plan.  After visiting the sight and walking the lot, as well as seeing the model home go up, I became concerned about it all.  Susan gave us a detailed lot plan, so we could get a good idea on just how big it was, and where the easements were.

I used this plan to measure out the lot on my app.  Then I placed the measurements of our home in it. We are lot 9043.  17,725 sq ft. or .41 of an acre.  The land at the back of our lot sloped down into the trees and a ravine separating us from the land beyond.  It's "green space" owned by our development and won't be built on!!  YAY!!

I based the location on what we were told.  Fairborn has an ordinance that requires homes to be 25ft from the curb.  Then, due to our 3rd car garage, we had to have the house pushed back another 9ft to make room for it.  Taking these measurements, I was able to make this rendering.  This makes me feel SO much better about my lot.  Our backyard is going to be huge.  We could probably fit another 2 of our houses in it!!  We will have a really tiny side yard.  Hopefully our neighbors build smaller houses, so they aren't right on top of us.  Luckily being 9ft further back than our neighbors will help with the privacy. 

My Dream Kitchen Design

I think my favorite part of our house will be my new kitchen.  My DREAM kitchen.  Having the chance to put in just what I want has been the most exciting part. 

My Kitchen Inspirations:

 

I love the look of a canopy hood.  White cabinets, dark counters, rich wood flooring. My backsplash will be just a bit darker.

Here is caledonia granite next to white cabinets, and hardware very similar to what I chose

But with this color / style of a backsplash.

Here is the kitchen in the model home of the Darby II.  We have made quite a few changes to it.

For the wall with the range on it, we have changed all the cabinetry to 42", we removed the microwave and put a canopy hood in it's place.  I also changed out the backsplash to a subway tile backsplash, at half the cost I might add.  We also chose a slide in range to really showcase a seamless backsplash at the back. 

 The cabinets are white, the granite is a gray, black and taupe mix.  The doorway in this model will be gone.  The refrigerator will be moved over next to the pantry.  I had to request my pantry door swing the opposite way so they don't interfere with one another.  We also bumped the cabinetry over the fridge to 24" so it's easily accessible.  I will put my microwave on the counter next to the fridge, hidden away in it's own little cove.

The granite backsplash and bar will remain the same as the model, just the color choices will be different.  I hate how the white outlet covers stick out.  After our visit to the granite yard, once we have a sample of our granite, we will start shopping for outlets covers that blend in better.

 

 These are the color choices for our kitchen.  Caledonia granite on the right.  Our dark laminate wood flooring above it.  The grey subway tile in the middle for our backsplash.  The Landen white cabinetry.  To the right of that is the sort of "greige" carpeting in the great room.

My hardware choices.

Lady in Waiting...

  Here she is... our little plot of land.  Patiently waiting for someone to build on her.  (You may have noticed, it's ALWAYS raining when I make a trip to see her)

I found the spot on the curb where I will be taking pictures as the project moves along.  Speaking of the project moving along...

We stopped by to see Susan this weekend, as we intend on pestering her for the next 6 months or so.  Luckily she's great, and we all really enjoy each others company.

While there we signed our last document, accepting the new price with the Guardian package rolled in to it. 

She informed us that we have moved to the "1st Page", as they call it.  Basically, we are lined up on their construction runway, of sorts.  We have a tentative start date for the first week of January.  That is, IF they can get the city of Fairborn to get anything accomplished over this holiday season.  She said to expect a delay of a week or two, just for that fact. 

Ever given much thought to a mailbox?

While driving through Inverness developments we've seen some beautiful brick mailboxes.  We even started pricing them out.  

It turns out they had to make a deal with the city of Fairborn over the mailboxes, and they are giving everyone the same one.  We don't get to change it.  Bummer deal.

Our Meeting with Guardian

After reading many Ryan Homes blogs, I was a bit apprehensive about our meeting with Guardian.  Though, from those blogs we had given ourselves a $5000 budget to get what we wanted for our home.

We met with Ron, who was personable and well educated in his field.  He was able to explain everything very clearly which made our decisions a lot easier.

Our home comes with 6 lines.  We added a package of 6 more.  He used the floorplan of our house to map out where they would go.  Something we will go over, once again, when the framing is up.

We added on a security system.  Inverness has a contract with Guardian that makes the installation free of charge, and we signed up for a $40 a month / 5 yr. contract that includes their mobile APP to control the system.  It came with contacts on all of our doors as well as one motion detector.  Due to the fact that our home has 5 levels, we added an additional motion detector.

We added on the fire and carbon monoxide detection.

Finally we added on an intercom system.  It came with the door panel, and 4 additional panels within the house.  One for the kitchen, office, master and loft.  We added an additional panel for the basement.  

As I said, we budgeted $5k for this meeting and we were able to sneak away at $4k.  It was a productive meeting.  Ron will pass on our paperwork to Susan and she'll get it rolled in to our Mortgage.

Then we stopped over at the model, to really visualize where our cable lines and intercom panels will go.  Luckily, Susan had just received an email about some pages we missed signing.  We "finalized" our paperwork, but due to the fact that we missed a couple of things, we had to resubmit.  My boyfriend took advantage of this and added on a 10' * 10' concrete pad behind his 3rd car garage.  ($800)  Adding on after finalizing is a no-no, but Susan thinks we can sneak it in on the re-submission of our paperwork.  Lets hope so.

We are told it will be 2-3wks to get our blue prints and lot plan done.  Then we stake out the lot!!  It is the holidays so I'm hoping they decide to rush it along before Christmas, rather than wait until after. 

The Shopping has Begun!

So, while we were wandering the stores of FarmVille Indiana, I started to get a really good idea of what I wanted to do with the house.  We agreed that we would make purchases in May or June... BUT, I just can't help myself.  

From Bed Bath and Beyond

And the items from ETSY... oh my, I do love ETSY

This one in black with ivory lettering, with my own sayings on it.  Special ordered.

Final Selections at Design Center

We met with Maura at the design center to finalize our selections. She was very organized and thorough. 

Standard Bath fixtures

Deluxe shower door

Insulated garage panel

Standard light fixtures 

Standard exterior lights

Kingsley fixture for owners bath

Upgraded deadbolt

Upgraded lever handles 

Cabinet hardware

Upgraded Kitchen faucet 

Under mount sink

Wrought iron balusters

Interior paints. White trim. City loft walls

Gray subway tile backsplash with white grout

Fireplace marble next to kitchen / carpeting 

White fireplace marble

Master bath choices 

Hall bath, powder room and basement bath

Kitchen choices

Exterior choices