OK, so its been ten weeks from the time we first submitted for permit until we finally got approved this week. What gives? First of all, let me say before I go into any other details, that Inspector K has been uniformly friendly, responsive, and endlessly patient in working through all of this with me. I really couldn’t ask for much better. But that said, this friendly patient man is enforcing some really tight rules. I have heard from many…
The permit is approved!!! We are happy and overwhelmed and ready. So very ready. I’m hoping the pace is less like the crawl it’s been and more like an on-ramp to the highway. My fear is we’ve just been launched out of a cannon. It’ll be alright, though- right friends? That was 2.5 months for those who were counting at home. Were you counting along with us? No? Just us then? ‘kay, that’s cool.
Did we say that already? That waiting for permits and work to begin is a lot like that scene in Zootopia where they visit the DMV? That was HILARIOUS to watch initially, but now if feels so painful. So the status of this dream of ours? On hold. It’s a sensitive subject. And I promise I haven’t been not-blogging because we’re just so frustrated and giving up. WE’RE NOT FLIPPING GIVING UP. It’s because we literally have no update to…
Demolition is very exciting and it certainly looks like visible progress. But you may be wondering what else we’ve been up to for the last month and what comes next. Well, as we said in our last few posts, we finished salvaging anything worth keeping and we filed mountains of paperwork for permitting. Then things got a bit stalled (which I’ll get into in a moment) and so in the meantime we did some finishing work on the new garage….
Last Wednesday night (June 20th) we were alerted by our demo contractor that demolition would start between 8 and 9 the next morning. Nothing like the first day of summer and a forecast of 2 inches of rain to kick off the fun! We let work know we’d be in late and chilled the sparkling grape juice to celebrate to destruction of the only home our children have ever known. Demo began before we got there- I guess they were…
It looks very convincing that the house will be demolished tomorrow morning between 8 and 9. At least that’s what they told us. We plan to be there (they said it would come down in about an hour) to Facebook Live it for those who are not local. So tune in there. I guess they will start with the garage and then push the house into the basement. There’s no real turning back now. We’ll probably have a post up…
I must say, when we started in on all this, mountains of paperwork were not a part of our dream. I finally got all the documents for submitting the permit (I think). Its 25 documents in all, and still I’m sure that some of it will be inadequate or missing. Multiple floor plan views, framing diagrams, wall cross-sections and other visuals, combined with pages of written specifications and spreadsheet-style schedules of materials. Lot diagrams showing proposed construction, grading and drainage,…
Over the last week we’ve been clearing out the last of the items from the old house (really glad we made the garage a generous 2 car instead of a minimum 2 car) and getting the permit paperwork ready. This is all very not-glamorous stuff here. But it’s still moving us in the right direction. All the utilities were turned off as of today and once the demolition permit is paid for we are A-GO for a wrecking ball. Actually,…
Yes, it’s been over a month in the new rental house. Yes, we’re still moving stuff out of the old house. My mom said pretty aptly that we have a lot of stuff for people who think they are minimalists. We also lost two weekends to an out-of-town funeral and a year-in-the-making girls weekend. So that has slowed our roll. But we are making progress clearing out the house. Today we moved the last of the tools and the massive…
Last weekend we moved into our rental house, and we’ve been here just a week now. Experiencing this place has served as a clear reminder of why we are doing this build in the first place. Mind you, this is a nice rental property. Its a good sized ranch home in a nice neighborhood of varied houses. But there are subtle and not-so-subtle annoyances to be found. The furnace is absurdly loud. It sounds like someone is idling an old…