Scheduling Nightmare!

Since winter is approaching, our schedule to get this house closed in is quite tight. So this does have the potential to be a "scheduling nightmare".

Whenever someone asks when we plan to move into the new house by, they're always shocked to hear that it's only 4 months away (February 2015!). 4 months may be pushing it a bit, but I'm determined, and I'm a bit of a schedule/control nut when it comes to this stuff. If our drywaller called us tomorrow and asked when he's expected to start, I can give him an exact date and we don't even have footings in!

Now we could just be incredibly naive, but if contractors can build multiple houses concurrently and all in 4 months time, then surely we can build one!  

One of the questions I asked every trade/supplier is lead time. Timing is very important when it comes to building a house. I want to know how much time they need to do their job and how far in advance I need to order materials so they arrive in time. I don't want to keep anyone waiting for 2 reasons, 

1) it delays the whole project. 

2) it can, and likely will, cost you more money. If you're delaying contractors on your job, that means you're delaying them on other jobs as well. They will charge you more to make up for their lost time. 

I found the best way to stay organized was with a good old fashioned calendar. I've marked down when things need to be ordered by, delivered by, paid for and when people should be starting or ending their jobs. All this information is based on the questions I asked trades and suppliers about timing and lead times. 

There are 2 things you'll need to have by your scheduled start date that could easily be forgotten! 

Builder's Risk Insurance

This was about $1900 for 7 months of coverage. This will protect us in cases of theft, fire, injury or other damages. We also got an extra $2 million in liability insurance included in that price. You do need to make sure that your trades have their own liability insurance too. 

Portable Toilet

This is a must! And it must flush, who knew?! This is a Ministry of Labour standard. It costs about $180/month and we figure we'll need it for 3-4 months. 

Other things to consider are getting your  bigger things in before all the framing is done and roof is on. These would be things like bath tubs and fireplaces. Ask your framer when the best time would be to have them delivered and make sure your items arrive on time. 

We chose our fireplace and main bathroom tub from our mechanical/electrical contractor so he knows the importance of getting them in time. We did however order our freestanding tub from Costco. It has a 2-3 week delivery schedule so we ordered it based on 3 weeks and are hoping for the best. We don't want too many things left out in the house in case of theft. 

We should be able to lock the doors by mid-November before most things go in. 

Something else we did to help with scheduling is we hired one company that does Electrical, Plumbing and HVAC. That's a bit of a relief in terms of scheduling. It should also work to our benefit for sharing space. You always hear stories of trades taking up the space that the other needs and then things like duct work or plumbing have to be moved or run in weird spots to accommodate. Since these guys work together all the time, we should hopefully eliminate a lot of that!

We realize that our schedule isn't going to be perfect, but it gives us something to strive for. It can also make things incredibly stressful when we see a forecast like this for this coming week. :(

You've seen the dirt, now here's the dream!

I guess we should probably post a few elevation drawings and the floor plan so you can see what we're working towards!

This plan only took our poor designer 54.5 hours to complete. The floor plan was pretty easy, it was the front elevation we struggled with. The initial drawings just didn't do it for us. It looked boring, and like something we've seen 1000 times in subdivisions in every city. 

See for yourself...

Boring! Plus we like a nice front entrance and this house just didn't have that. 

So we made some changes, added a front porch and are thrilled with how it looks on paper. Hopefully we'll be even more thrilled in real life!

Front Elevation

Left & Right Elevations

And our favourite part of the house...

Rear Elevation

Our house backs onto mature trees and the Little Ausauble River. I can imagine us sitting out on the back deck enjoying the view for hours and hours.

We are quite happy with the floor plan. We like the open concept with the kitchen, dining and great rooms. The great room has a cathedral ceiling that will one day have reclaimed beams and a rustic chandelier and cozy fireplace. Main floor laundry will be roughed-in, but it will actually be in the basement for now as mudroom space takes priority. The girls' bedrooms are the exact same size, so no fighting! A large walk-in shower and freestanding tub are also highlights for us! 

We know it's not the best quality... We'll work on it! :)

Trade ya!

We spent a lot of time researching, calling, emailing and asking around about trades.  This has been taking up the bulk of our time up until this point. I have used my phone (as a phone) more in the last 2 months than I have in the last 10 years!

We got a minimum of 3 quotes from every trade/subcontractor we would be using. There were a few exceptions for friends or family in the biz. 

I had seen a quote (haha) by Benjamin Franklin that rang true while comparing quote after quote,

We were (and are) on a fairly strict budget, but we wanted to work with reputable companies to get high quality work we would be proud of. 

Sometimes we went with the lower price, sometimes we went with the person we felt most confident with, but most times we went based on recommendations and referrals from others. 

Another thing we tried to do was use local companies. I find the service to be exceptional compared to some larger companies in larger cities. 

Here's a list of the trades/contractors we got quotes from:

-house designer/engineer

-insurance broker

-excavating/foundation/septic/driveway

-framer

-plumber

-electrician

-roofer

-mason

-siding/fascia/eaves installer

-HVAC

-cabinet maker

-stair manufacturer

-finish carpentry

-drywall/insulation

-glass shower door installer

-garage doors + installation

-timber construction/install

And material quotes:

-lumber

-roof/floor trusses

-roofing materials

-siding/soffits/fascia/eaves

-stone

-windows/doors

-trim/interior doors

-flooring 

And then there are lots of other things we needed to shop for like lighting and plumbing fixtures and a fireplace. 

We tried staying organized with a binder and tabs for each sub-contractor like this:

It made it easy to compare quotes and find them in a hurry. Remember to be specific when you're sending out for quotes. Provide as much detail as possible to allow for less guessing on their part which will get you a more accurate quote. 

We learned this the hard way after getting a few quotes back that had thousands of dollars difference for what appeared to be the same thing. At first glance we dismissed them right away based on price alone. Then we realized that they had quoted a finished basement too, which we're not doing right away. Never assume they know what you want, because chances are good they have no idea!

We have now chosen all of our sub-contractors... Here's hoping we chose well! 

Bye Bye Weeds!

Our neighbours will likely be pleased... After a spring and summer of letting our lot grow wild and free, it was finally being taken care of.  Well that's not entirely true... A local farmer bailed it a few times over the summer :)

The excavating contractors started by stripping the top soil off the lot on Wednesday. Thankfully this step could be done while we waited for the engineer to come out and figure out what to do about the current elevation plan. No delays!

Once the engineer came out it was decided that we could dig the house down another 1.1m and this would solve the issue with the SW corner's footings. Not only were the footings going to be out of the ground before, but the house would have been sitting up so high! It would have looked ridiculous and completely defeated the purpose of a bungalow. I don't even want to know how many steps it would have needed just to get in!

The engineer had planned the house this way originally because of the walk-out basement and we also wanted a gravity-fed septic system. Something had to go, so we opted for an additional pump to pump the waste out of the house. 

Once that issue was resolved they could start digging out the basement and septic bed area. The septic bed area ended up being A LOT bigger than we had anticipated... 32 meters wide!

This meant we lost about 7 or 8 8-10 year old trees. We were a little bit disappointed, but what could we do? We offered them to our neighbours, and they now have 7 or 8 beautiful new trees in their yard! I'm happy that they didn't go to waste, and I'm hoping it's a good start to great neighbours!

Here are R and T checking out where their rooms will be! They didn't want to sleep in them just yet. 

*UPDATE: We were able to sink the septic bed another 90cm so now this means we're back to a gravity-fed septic system! Yay! $2500 back into the budget!

It's really happening!!

After what felt like forever, we were finally starting the actual construction of the house!! 

On Tuesday October 7th we got a phone call from our excavating contractor that they had dropped the excavator off and would be back the next morning to start. We were so excited we hopped in the car and drove out to see!

Jake and I were both working nights this night, but I knew I'd be out there first thing when they started. I actually love this type of work. I love watching and learning how things are done and why. I'm sure I'm a contractor's worst nightmare with my 1000 questions. 

Just as I was heading out the door for work that night, my phone rang. It was our excavating contractor, Blair.  He was at the lot marking out our house when he discovered that our lot elevations differed from the plan we had drawn up by an engineer. So much so that the South West corner of the house wouldn't even have footings in the ground. Great... We haven't even started digging and we've already run into issues. 

I called my dad right away to vent and to get some reassurance.  Then I called the engineer, but no answer. I REALLY did not want to have to delay the start of our house for 2 reasons. 

1) I'm super impatient and I felt like I had already waited an eternity to start building. 

2) It's going to be cold and crappy out soon. I want the house completely closed in before winter really hits. 

So I went to work and I tried not to stress about it and tried not to stress Jake out about it either. We found ourselves waiting again... This time to hear from the engineer about what to do and how to fix this issue. 

Started from the bottom now we're here!

Hey!  Thanks for stopping in!  Jake and I decided to keep a blog/journal of our self-contracting adventure.  When we were researching building our own house, we found that there was a lack of real information from people who have done it... so hopefully this will help someone else in the future!  And if not, it will be a good spot to keep a record of what we've done and how we went about doing it.  Although I'm sure there will be things we'd rather forget!

Since our house building is technically 3 days in at this point, I'll give you the Cole's Notes version on how we got to this point, and then hopefully we'll be able to keep up as we move along.

March 2014 - We purchased our building lot. Yay! Just over an acre, 2.5km from the town of Lucan, Ontario.

April 2014- Our lot closed on April 25th and it was officially ours!  We had started looking at floor plans in March but knew we wouldn't be starting to build until Jake's house had sold and closed.

May 2014 - Jake sold his house!  Now to start pricing plans!  We found a floor plan we liked on the Beaver Homes and Cottages website, and made some modifications with our house designer to spruce up the exterior.  By the time we had finished "sprucing up" the floor plan, we had a 2400 square foot bungalow... which we were told was a "large" bungalow.  On paper, it looked fantastic!  Until we found out how much paper it was going to cost.  Back to square one!

July 31 2014 - Jake's house closed!  And we had picked out a new, smaller floor plan to work with!

But eventually over time, it too grew from about 1900 square feet to 2050 square feet. We tried!

My dad suggested taking our plans to builders for quotes so we had an idea on budget, so we did. 

The majority of builders in our area charge $160-175 per square foot. We disagree with this method of pricing a house, but a lot of builders go that route. Our thought is that every house no matter how big or small still has 1 kitchen, 1 furnace, 2 or 3 bathrooms... So why does adding 500 square feet, of let's say a living room, equate $85,000? It shouldn't. 

Anyway, moving on! After speaking to a few builders, we decided our best option was to contract the house ourselves to save a bit of money, which brings us here! My dad has done this a few times, so we knew we'd have him to help guide us along. 

September 2014 - We did a lot of waiting. Waiting on engineers to stamp drawings, waiting on roof truss designs, waiting for trades to get back to us with quotes and availability and then waiting on our house designer to modify the plans after the engineers had a look at everything. 

We ran into a few snags, but all in all it went pretty smoothly. 

September 19th, 2014 - We finally had everything we needed to apply for our building permit. We need a septic system as well, so we applied for this permit at the same time. According to the Ontario Building Code, the municipality has 10 days to respond to your permit application. Lucan Biddulph used all 10 days... And even a couple of extras before we could physically pick up the permit. They did tell us everything was fine and they were issuing a permit on day 10. If you're as impatient as we are, don't be afraid to call them and ask for status checks on your application. Squeaky wheel gets the grease! 

Finally, we had the permits in our hands! Now to begin the physical work of building a house...