Showing today and tomorrow

Today we had a showing the seemed to go well. A couple from California, according to our neighbor. Adam called to say that they liked the place, but that it was the first one they looked at, and they want to see more. Frankly, I want someone who has looked at a lot of places, and likes the place. But whatever.

We have two showings in the afternoon tomorrow, which gives me time to rake the front lawn, which I mowed tonight, and to mow and rake the back yard. I don't normally rake clippings, but it is so long, because of the rain and humidity and the fact that I didn't mow last week, it is pretty long.

So, hopefully somed good news tomorrow, though at this point, I'd much prefer an offer 30 days from now rather than now. Funny how that works...

So, the plan that is in the images on a July 19 entry are little changed. The main changes are the addition of the porch and sunroom. The sunroom is off the back - the slider in the breakfast area is gone and replaced with a simple opening. The 12x12 sunroom is off there and has the slider on one side and quadruple windows on the other two sides. The porch will be from the edge of the garage on the right to the edge of the front entry on the left. That's five feet wide, which will be quite nice - our porch now is not much narrower, but it is narrow enough to make it quite unusable. Plus there will be no railing, which will make it seem much more open.

The key thing about adding these things now, because you can add any old porch and any old sunroom any old time, is that if they're in the plan before the foundation is poured, these pieces can be a part of the foundation. With foundation comes insulation and stability. Tom says that slab beats Sonotube any day. So there.

Whew!

OK, Karen and I both spoke to Adam, who said that Tom would be fine taking a $20,000 deposit in the 10% to get the ball rolling on all that needs to be done, with the understanding that the remaining $27,000 would be delivered after our house is reappraised and the loan waiting period is approved for the home equity loan. This is great news.

So, on Monday, we will go to our bank and sign some papers and pick up a check for $20,000. This money is in the form of a personal loan. Our first payment will be scheduled for beyond when the expected closing date on the home equity loan, so we will have to make no payments aside from a smallish interest payment. Then, an hour later, we will meet with Tom to sign papers and to give him the first half of the money. Adam said that they could break ground within the week, but it seems unlikely to me it will happen quite that fast... but either way, this is the last step of the first step.

It is exciting.

Money woes

Well, we visited the bank today and not all the news is good. None of the news is really bad, but it could be better. Basically, we have a home equity loan right now that we took out to pay for all our new flooring and for our sunroom. The amount we borrowed was not the most we could have, based on our equity. We thought that the amount we had in equity was enough to cover the roughly $47,000 we would need to put down on the house to get it started. But it is not - we can only borrow another $18,000 on that equity loan, because of the appraised value of our home at the time the loan was created.

To get more, we need the house to be reappraised, and that will take a minimum of 7 to 10 days. After that, assuming it appraises for at least $250,000 (which it should), then we'd get a check 3 days later. So 10 to 15 days is the soonest we could get the money. We wanted to be able to tell Tom to start. Now.

So we're looking at options. We don't know anyone we can borrow $47,000 from or even $30,000 from for no more than a month. A personal loan is probably out of the question (it can be done, but we would have to pay at least one payment, and based on the years to pay and the interest rate, it is a lot for one payment). The banker suggested a loan on a 401K, and I have that much, but I know from experience that it takes at least a couple of weeks to process the paperwork and get a check.

So, we called Tom and asked him if he would take $17,000 as seed money to get everything started that he needed to start, and then take the remaining $30,000 once the appraisal is done and the waiting period is over. Unfortunately, I had to leave him a message about this, so we don't know if it is something he can consider or not. $17,000 is a lot of money, but I don't know if it covers all of his costs that he would incur in the next few weeks, with the permitting, blueprints, and all whatever other crap he needs cash for.

So right now, we're waiting to hear from him, to see what his thoughts are.

Got the number

We got our number today - $444,800. So, now we know. It is over where we wanted to be, but not by too much. There are a few larger options that are not included that we want: a front porch, central A/C, and 9' ceilings (instead of the standard 8'). That raises the price to $459,850. This number is significantly higher than our original budget, basically $35,000. That's not a lot in terms of percentage of total, but when we look at the monthly cost, it raises it to almost $500 more per month than we pay now, and that's if we pay our taxes and insurance ourselves (rather than include them in an escrow account).

This is crunch time, time to hunker down and decide if we want to move forward. I feel confident about our house selling, but every $1000 we take off the price adds $1000 we have to finance. We can afford it, even at 460K, but can we afford it comfortably?

We need to decide pretty soon. Every day we delay, we delay breaking ground, and we don't want to do that. It takes about 15 days after we put down our 10% to get started, after the plans are approved by the town and such. It takes about 12 to 17 weeks to build - which puts us into December if we started now. So - do we start, or do we not?

Yes, this is crunch time.

Meeting set

So we went to Maine this weekend to drop Brittany off to Whale Camp, and hoped that while we were away, our house would be shown at least a couple of times. But it wasn't. No biggie, but it is nice to know it is being seen. Adam had not heard feedback yet from the other realtors who has shown the house, so we have no new information about that. The one who showed it on Friday apparently had not contacted him first, and we threw away the card they left behind on the counter, so we don't know who that was at all.

We have a meeting with Tom tomorrow in his office, to go over the plans and the cost. That will be a pivotal meeting.

We showed Karen's brother Rick the plans, and from what I could tell (I arrived late), he liked them but had several comments. He especially didn't like how the doors were designated. He thought most should be 3' doors, but many of the interior doors are 2'8" or 2'4". We worried about that until we got home and measured the doors we have now. We only have one 3' door, and most of the rest are 2'8", with a few 2'4". So we'll ask Tom about that, but I think they're OK the way they are. Our only real concern is handicap accessibility on the first floor bathroom. We may want to make some changes to ensure that room is accessible, but we'll have to see what has to be done to do that. One of the other rooms (office or guest bedroom) will have to be made smaller to make the bathroom bigger and still keep the same footprint.

At the site, the house next door now has a roof, so most of it is protected from weather (though the roof cap was no on yet, so rain could still get in). They probably finished the roof today. Across the way Adam's house in in progress (yes, in case I haven't mentioned it before, our Realtor will have a house in Raven Circle, too, as will his brother) - they have levelling the ground and last we spoke he expetected the foundation would be poured this week. All this activity is good - because when we put our "real" money down, we want work to start right away.

Ah, the end of the week...

We have word that Tom the builder has a dollar figure for us to build the house shown in the plans below. Adam wouldn't tell us the amount, saying that his father likes to divulge all that in person. I understand, he's been working on this a lot, we shouldn't diminish his thunder. However, Adam did say that he thought we would be pleased. I'm not sure if that means he stayed in the budget, or that he did not go too far over the budget. We won't be able to find out until Monday, because we're so busy today and we're out of town this weekend to bring Brittany to whale camp.

We told Adam we would be gone most of the weekend, and so the house is open for showing to whomever, whenever. Karen had to scoot out of the house today for a showing. The weather is supposed to be mild, relatively speaking, this weekend so I hope we have some more showings on Saturday and Sunday, and many more at the beginning of next week.

Spammed!

Leaving your house to let some stranger inside is very inconvenient. If they weren't potential buyers, I'd tell them to take a hike ... but you gotta be nice to the buyers.

No word yet on how the various showings went, except for the first. As noted, they did not like our road, and I hear they did not even want to see inside once they saw the road. Oh well - that's their perogative. If you're going to spend a third of a million dollars on a house, you get to exercize your personal foibles. I can't disparage them for that. Too much.

On a side note, this blog got comment-spammed for the first time today. All front-page postings had a comment that read "Nice use of color on your site!" or "Great information on this site, I learned a lot!" And, this being spam, a link to a gambling site and to an male enhancement site were included. I've deleted these comments. Damn spammers.

Showing info

The house was shown at 10 this morning, but we heard that the buyers did not like the street - too busy. We cannot disagree with them, that is one of the few things we don't like about where we live.

Two other showings were added today, one just about now (2pm), and one at about 4:30; plus the one already scheduled at 7:00 tonight. Adam said he talked to the husband of the neighbor who made the low-ball offer, and faced with the evidence for our asking price, he agreed that the offer was far too low. He and his wife were going to discuss it further and let him know.

Karen sent a list of questions we'd like the builder to answer, and we will meet with him tomorrow to get a price for the plans.

Plans!

Adam came over to show us the plans - they were done, even the second floor. Basically, everything we want is in the plan, but with fewer angles and expensive parts ... or at least we hope that's the case. We have a few questions and a few suggestions and comments, but basically we like it just the way it is laid out. Next step is to get a price. From there, we will decide if we need to cut anything, if we can add anything, and then if we want to go ahead. My own thought is that if the numbers work, we go for it - put down the 10% and start digging, even without a contract to sell our house. We'll see.

Here are the plans, first floor then second:

Offers and showings

We had someone look at our house yesterday, a neighbor actually, and our Realtor called to say she made an offer - but it was laughably low. It was as if, he said, she pulled a number out of the air. We're asking $324,900 and he said she offered in the 280's. That's a 50K lowball! I guess if you're going to offer, offer low ... but our counter would be 324,800. The Realtor said that unless she came up with a real offer, he was not even going to draw up paperwork to present to us. We concurred.

Meanwhile, we got calls from two other agents looking to show the house - one tomorrow morning and one tomorrow night. Good signs all, and good ammunition against a 50K lowball offer. We did not peg our asking price high so we could come down. We pegged it where we thought it should be based on comparible properties that have sold recently (well, actually, Adam pegged it there, but we understood how he did it and why).

Adam is coming over tonight to show us our plans - he may even have a second floor plan ready, that was more up in the air. Let's break ground!

Weekend update

Our house was in the big local paper this weekend, which was nice to see. Karen emailed the Realtor, and he said that he got more calls about our home than any other listing he has. That's nice to hear, but I'd like to see those calls translate to showings and a contract! We didn't do too much work on the house this weekend, it was just too damn hot. After I mowed the lawn and raked the clippings, I was pretty well beat. We set up our camper on the lawn and let the kids sleep in it last night - but I had to close it up this morning before I left for work because I didn't want it to hide the house from the road. It is still on the lawn, but folded up, it has a much lower profile and it won't keep anyone from visiting today.

The only major project we have left is one I'm sure I've mentioned before: the master bathroom. I want to fill a few screw holes and pound in a few protruding nails (why did they use both nails and screws in there? I have no idea...). Then I want to scrape off the strip of wallpaper and remove all the caulking from atop the bathtub. Then paint the walls, and put a nice strip of some sort of rubber/plastic stuff you can buy at Home Depot to replace the caulk. It is probably a five or six hour job, and maybe I can do it in parts: screws and nails; strip wallpaper; tape; paint; touch-up. Five tasks, five nights? We'll see.

As for the plans, I called Tom on Friday to see how things were going and he said he was working on the plans right then. Today Adam emailed us to let us know the 1st floor is done, and he is going to drop off the plan for us to look at.

Thursday update

No word yet from the builder, though his son, our Realtor, says that he is working on it to match our needs and desires with our budget. Karen is getting very anxious to see it. As am I, but there are so many other things going on, I keep busy enough not to fret too much.

Not much is new. We've only had the one visitor, who made two visits. But the ball is rolling now. We have been listed in a popular weekly newspaper. Here is the on-line version of the ad:

7Days Ad

We are listed with a Williston condo for $199,900, and with a four-bedroom in an expensive community for $619,500.

There was some real estate news in our town recently: a new development is being proposed for a former horse farm. The horses were moved to a more rural setting as development went up around them. The owners said that the traffic, dust, and noise, were upsetting to the horses. The plot is about 110 acres, and they are proposing over 300 units of condo, duplex, and single-family homes as well as commercial lots. Now, this is significant because in my opinion, if the project goes through, it will be hard to sell a "used" home when there are lots of choices for brand new homes. The development is far from certain, but it reassures me that we picked the right time to do this. One thing is for sure - if it does go through, our schools will need to be expanded. 300 units means at least 300 new kids, and there's no way we could take them all now. Therein lies the wisdom of our town's desire to keep new development slow. That, and sewer capacity.

Anyway, we have a little more work to do on the house this weekend. I may paint the master bath (as well as fill nail holes and remove the small strip of decorative wallpaper that's been there for forever). That's really the last big project we have to do to get the house to 100% perfect salability.

Can't think of much else that's new. I drove by the land yesterday, in the middle of a downpour, and not much has changed. The new house next to us had a little more work done, and there was a backhoe on site. They may be ready to start leveling out the entire inner circle.

Here is a link to a Google Map of where the piece of land is. As of this date, in this satellite shot, Raven Circle does not yet exist. In the map, which is a little out of date, Raven Circle goes off Coyote Lane to the left. It is the entire green field between Metcalf Drive to the south and the golf course to the north.

Google Map

Good news from the bank

Karen called the bank today, and asked about several things. First, she wanted to find out what we could be pre-approved for, and based on our credit scores, our incomes, and our history with the bank, we were told we could qualify for a $500,000 loan. Now, we've run the numbers, and we know what a $500,000 loan would cost us monthly, and we're not sure they know how hand-to-mouth we are willing to go (or not go) ... but suffive it to say, we are not looking for a loan anywhere near that amount. It will still be a sizeable loan, but more on the order of $300,000. But it is nice to know.

Next, she asked about a bridge loan - the builder will require a 10% down-payment to break ground, and that is non-refundable. They said it would be pretty simple: we already have a home equity loan, which we used to pay for the sunroom and new flooring, and we would just increase the size of that loan. When time came to close on the new mortgage, we would just decrease the size of the loan by that much (of course, the money to pay off that loan would come from our principal, but it all washes out in the end).

So that was good news. The buyers/lookers came to see the house and, the Realtor said, took a long look at it and had lots of questions, which is good. No more word than that, but it is good to have our first prospect under our belts.

First showing

We got word that our Realtor brought someone to our house for its first showing. It seems unlikely to me that we will have a buyer out of our first showing, but it is heady anyway. It makes things real, and starts to make thoughts churn in your head that you've never had to think about before. For example, if it takes three months to build out house, and they want to close in two, then where do we go for a month? Do we move our stuff into a trailer and have it stored somewhere and stay in a Residence Inn? I know people have to deal with this sort of thing all the time - our friends in South Carolina had to stay in an apartment for months before they could move - and the apartment wasn't even in the same state!

Anyway, as I noted, it seems unlikely they will buy. They are a trio of roommates looking to move into something bigger while renting out what they own now. That's a good financial plan - keeping an old property as a rental. They say that a situation like that can pay for a mortgage in just the rental fees. It is a good racket if you can get into it. One roommate saw our house and they are returning later tonight so that they can all see it. The one liked the sunroom and the backyard for their dogs, things we have known are selling points.

So, we are keeping our fingers crossed and we're thankful we cleaned out the garage this weekend!

Meeting the Neighbors

Yesterday, Karen and I went out for a kidless dinner (Brittany has really taken to babysitting) and after wards, we, of course, went to see our lot. It still doesn't have a house on it ... heck, it is still just a plot of mud and bulldozer tracks. But who cares, it is ours.... sort of.

Anyway, we went for a walk around the circle and waved at a few people. Then, just before we rounded the bend for the homestretch back to the car, our neighbors-to-be came out of their house to see the sunset (too late, it had already dipped below the cloudline). So we said hi and introduced ourselves.

They've live there about 18 months now, the second of 16 families that will eventually be in Raven Circle. They can tell stories about every house that has gone up in the development, and know how many kids are in each house. Lois went around pointing to each house: "two there, three there, none there, seven there..." She has a good memory, I couldn't recite that about our neighbors and I've been here ten years (I'm joking, I know how many kids our neighbors have, jeez).

Mark (or Marc, couldn't tell) talked about the joys of watching your own house get built. HE said it is good to keep tabs on things - one wall in his bedroom had one too many angles in it, making it so that neither a bed nor a nightstand could have fit there. When he told the builder, they had it fixed the next morning. It is easy to fix walls when there's no drywall up yet. They also told us to beware of the "flooring guy," that he was hard to work with. But they had praise for the lighting guy and the kitchen guy. And for the builder, which was good.

So they are our back-door neighbors. We also happened to meet our front-door neighbor, who was gathering up his kids and their various toys. Bob works for Burton snowboards. We also met his kids, one a baby in a stroller, the other two old enough to ride bikes (and well - they both were showing off riding with their feet on the seat - and there was only one case of skinned elbows while we watched).

So, we spoke for about 30 minutes, longer than we expected, but it was nice. "Everyone's nice here," Lois said, and that's good. We also are seeing a lot of diversity here, which I think is great. Vermont is a white state, no doubt about that, but on our circle there are at least two and a half houses inhabited by "people of color." All the better for our kids to grow up knowing that their world is populated by people who look different from them, but who at the same time are exactly the same.

As we headed home, we were smiling the whole way. We can't wait.

Photo, and more updates

Karen emailed Adam to get a few details. She worried about Tom cutting corners to build the house in our budget. But he said that the quality of the construction, and the materials used, will not be compromised. What might have to be are the luxuries. A standard tub or garden tub instead of whirlpool tub, for example. Formica counters instead of granite. Most of these sorts of things we're OK with. I have simple tastes; Karen's not quite as simple as I, but she sees the big picture, too. Notably, she's not a granite counter-top booster either.

So by using the space more efficiently, and literally cutting corners (eliminating the "jut-outs", for example), costs start to come down. Imagine a bit of a house that sticks out two feet from the rest. There are corners there that must be framed - wood has to be cut, workers have to cut it. Plus the foundation might have to conform to that line, meaning a more complicated form, more time, more people, more concrete even. Then the house is sided, and all the siding has more cuts, more waste, more corners to deal with. The roofline is more complicated. The interior has more corners to tape and mud and clean. It adds up.

Adam also said that $25K can some times make a big difference in the home's appearance, and it might be worth spending. We want to keep it to $400,000 to $425,000 but if we have to go to $450,000, we probably can, and we would if it did make a big difference.

We went to the GE employee website today to look at products and discounts. We will have to fill a kitchen and laundry room with appliances - we're not taking any of it with us, with the probable exception of a microwave oven. I can't say how much we would save by buying in the company, but it is a goodly share. We're going to shop around at area stores, however, to see if we can puruse the GE models in real life. Shopping online for a refrigerator is tough.

I plan to take a photo of the site everyday once they break ground, but I do need a "baseline" photo of the site before any major work has been done. I'll take the photo from the same place each time and hope to center it on the same tree each time, too. I'll hedge my bets by taking two: one at 17mm and one at 30mm. Here is the one from 17mm:



I'm not sure how long this link will work, but here is the MLS listing for our house:

MLS

A few more details

So here are a few details about the plan we chose. It has two floors and a basement, which is pretty standard here in the Northeast. It has four bedrooms on the second floor, with a the rooms for the boys sharing one bathroom. Brittany's room has its own bathroom as does the master bedroom. The laundry room is on the second floor. The boys' rooms have sizeable closets and Brittany's has a walk-in. The master has a sitting area in addition to the "regular" bedroom, and a large walk-in closet.

The first floor has a two-car garage with a bit of extra storage space. It has a dining room and study, and a fifth bedroom for guests. There is a breakfast area, a U-shaped kitchen with an island, and a sizeable family room. The family room in the plan is two-stories high, but our plan was to put in a normal ceiling and turn the space above into a bonus/play area.

Now, when we met with the builder, we had no idea what to expect. This was our dream plan, and we knew modifications would be needed. He said that it would take $500,000 to $600,000 to build that house - which is way over our budget. He knows our approximate budget (our realtor, Adam, is the builder's son, and Adam had filled Tom in on our requirements).

So, to reduce cost, we agreed at the outset that we should minimize angles and corners on the exterior (Karen calls them "jut-outs" and I can't think of a better term, though I feel silly saying it). He also suggested that he could eliminate a bathroom on the second floor - though the kids would much prefer two for the three of them, if the choice is one bathroom or no new house, we'll take the house. He also didn't like that the master closet was accessed through the master bath - he said it is an invitation for trouble. He suggested we could save money by making things a bit smaller (shaving a few feet off the dining room and study on the first floor) and rearranging the second floor, particularly moving the master suite from the right side of the house to the back, using the bonus room we had set aside for some of the master.

Tom said he would go over our plan and adjust things around and come up with a new plan. If he can get the major things we want (five bedrooms, large family room, 2nd floor laundry, for example) and come in on budget, we will be very happy. Karen says she's worried, but I have a good feeling from Tom. Hopefully his experience can really come into play here. Adam says we can expect something by late next week.

As for extras, we only really want a few things. We want central A/C, which is relatively rare in Vermont, but he says he likes to put it in. We want phone, cable, and ethernet in almost every room. We want a driveway large enough to play basketball in. And that's really about it.

Meanwhile, today our house will hit MLS, and hopefully we'll get some interest.

Here starts the journey

We are taking the biggest step one takes - building a new home. Or, at least, that's the plan. My hope is that in this blog, I will chronicle the selling of our home, the planning of our new home, the building of that new home, and our eventual habitation of that home.

For the past ten years, we have called Williston, Vermont our home town, and our house on North Brownell our home. We have done a lot here. We became real, actual homeowners here. We raised our daughter here. We conceived and had our twins boys here (well, OK, they were not born here, but near by). We've had a half-dozen cars here. We've had three cats and two birds here.

We've changed the house a lot over those years. My office became the babies' room, then Brittany's room. Brittany's room became the boys' room. The living room became the family room. The family room became the dining room. The dining room became the family room extension. The deck was dismantled and was replaced with a sun room and a bigger deck. The basement was finished. The only rooms that never changed much were the kitchen, the master bedroom (which we never even painted), and the bathrooms.

This house could be our home for a long time. But we have found that there are too many things lacking that we want. More than anything else, we want a neighborhood.

That's not to say we don't have good neighbors, because we do. To our left are the McManns, an older couple with a hulking dog as their pet and child. To our right are the Normands, a younger couple who live in a sibling home. What's missing? Kids. Our kids have no kids to play with. The friends our kids did have in a neighborhood across the street from us moved away. Though the town ripped the paved sidewalk and replaced it with a concrete sidewalk, the road is still too busy to allow us to comfortably allow the kids to cross the street by themselves.

So when we found a few undeveloped lots in a neighborhood nearby, and a sign with a number to call, we started thinking that it might be time to move, if the price was right. The cost of a new house would have to be low enough, and the price we could get for our house would have to be high enough, to make it fit in a budget.

So now, we have put down a deposit on a piece of land, we have an agent to sell our house, and a builder to build our new house. I'll put pictures of our bit of land here, copies of our plans, and if all works out, photos of our house as it grows from a muddy place to a hole in the ground to a concrete pit to a shell of a house to a home.