Bateman in Central New York - Building Blog: June 2015

Tuesday, June 30, 2015

A Couple New Houses

Two additional houses were framed up last week in our community. There looks to be another 4 poured foundations ready for framing as well. We're filling up rather quickly!

Venice Falls plan with a 3-car side entry garage. They also finished off the space above the morning room which I didn't know was even an option - maybe a non-standard?

Not sure right off the bat which plan this is. The staircase on the right leads me to believe it is a Venice.

Sunday, June 28, 2015

I drove by the house after lunch today and was greeted by my neighbor and his son. His son told me all about how he had been checking things out over the last week and that our basement had flooded. I let him know I knew, so he went into detail about how they finally resolved the issue with the sump pump and that the pump ran for two solid days thereafter.

The last 24 hours have been filled with rain and Tuesday/Wednesday are forecast to bring even more. We can't catch a break from this miserable weather!

The siding on the back of the house is finished, along with the left side of the house. The front is started and the right side has a bit done as well.

I've been told they are almost done mudding and should be sanding early this week before starting flooring work.

The rear basement hopper window is still missing and the grading is still awful, so there is plenty of opportunity for water to continue to enter the basement. The PM told us that a high-power commercial dehumidifier would be in use for 30 days prior to them putting in the standard dehumidifier and then closing - so they'd need to put that in tomorrow to make good on that statement as we are 30 days out as of 6/29.

That said - we haven't locked our rate yet. The contract stipulates that we must lock 30-days in advance of closing. I'm not sure if I'll get any heat tomorrow to lock. It looks like this debt debacle in Greece is about to get worse and a fall in consumer confidence with the Eurozone could lead to mortgage rate drops in the short term - but who knows what will happen. As of Friday the rates sucked (4.375% unless buying it down which costs way too much). We'll see what happens with this tomorrow and over the next few days. While a higher rate isn't preferred, it is manageable for us.

Siding continues

To the left of our front door. This hole is around 2' deep.

To the right of the door.

Right side of house near the front.

Our front stoop was poured

Back corner of morning room.

View of the missing window. I wanted to get closer but was already sinking into the mud.

Thursday, June 25, 2015

Update Call

PM called this afternoon to let me know that he is taking tomorrow off. He joked that things are so busy he may end up working anyway, but that he wanted to call today to make sure we caught up.

Drywall guys are working on second coat of mud. He expects them to be sanding early next week and that painters will be in to prime next week.

Siding guys were delayed due to equipment issues on their end. He expects them to be finishing up next week (no progress since last Friday from them).

Various cabinets and fixtures were delivered to the house and are awaiting installation.

Hard surface flooring should start late next week.

I should be in the house for trim work in 2-3 weeks time.

We are still on schedule for the dates previously discussed.

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I also received an email with current rates from NVR today. We haven't locked yet and she was letting me know that we are inside the 30-business day window. I have hesitated as I was really hoping to get back below 4%, but it is looking more and more like 4.125% will be the best we are going to get (and have to pay a buy down to get that, to boot). This is unfortunate as it will ultimately equate to about $100 extra per month versus the initial paperwork we did back in March at 3.75%

We did decide to the up-front PMI option and the appraisal was delayed because of that paperwork. They accepted those docs on 6/22 so the appraisal would again have been scheduled. The LO told me that they will email over the appraisal soon after they receive it.

I'm a bit disappointed with the mortgage rates, but I do understand that we are still in a time of historically low rates. We have been sub-4% for so long that I didn't really anticipate a growth in rates like this, but it won't have a big effect on us outside of the increased payment.

Tuesday, June 23, 2015

Siding Continues

There was an SUV parked in the driveway when we drove by around 8:30pm so I assume the drywall people were inside working. Very little progress was made on the siding today in comparison to last Friday.

As you can see in the pics, the windows are open. I hope they get closed each night as well as when it rains. The house has already seen enough interior water for my liking.

The basement condition is unknown as I didn't want to approach the house with the guys working. I'll try to get a picture into the basement windows tomorrow to see if the 2" of water is still down there. Since we plan on finishing that space I hope they are able to effectively solve the issue.

This side didn't change from Friday.

And neither did the back of the house. Both of our neighbors have Canyon siding. From this angle it is a Palermo (reverse plan) on the left and a Stanford on the right.

Sunday, June 21, 2015

Drywall Hung

The interior drywall is all up. I had stopped by to take a couple pictures before the drywall was finished - but no such luck. This is a positive though as it seems like we are making quick progress.

One bad news item is that one of the basement windows is still missing and they haven't done any grading yet - so our basement has 2" of water due to today's heavy rain. It seems as though the sump pump wasn't running either... The SR was with us but the sump seemed to be energized so it was odd that all of the water was sitting there. If the pump is faulty hopefully that is resolved soon. I wasn't surprised to see the water because there are pools around the house that are 2-3' deep filled with water as well, so the sump would basically just be circulating that water anyway...

Kitchen and morning room

Morning room

Great room

Sitting area

Dining room (Library)

Siding Begins

On Friday the drywall hangers were in the house all day (more on that in another post). The siding guys also started and did about 3/4 of the sides and 1/2 of the back of the house.

Below are two pics - Twilight Shadow color with two different lightings.

Also, all of those who got into our community got a driveway included in their contract. We weren't so lucky, but all of those driveways have finally been paved. My neighbor here did a third lane that goes down the side of his house as well.

Friday, June 19, 2015

Pre-Drywall Meeting

We met with our PM on 6/17/15 at 3:30pm to do our formal walk through. I have spent a large quantity of time in the home over the previous four days so I had already sent my list of issues to the PM and they had already been resolved.

I did not hear any floor creaks except for an odd creak/crack sound at the base of the stairs. He acknowledged this and it was corrected the next time the framers came in.

Pending open issues:

One missing hopper window in the basement
Broken window in the morning room
Various unlevel floor seams
Garage door slider locks do not line up

I didn't notice anything else worth noting here. The crews in our house have done a great job. I have worked in dozens of new construction homes and the quality here has been at and above par.

At the end of our meeting our PM got onto his iPad and let us know that our tentative pre-settlement demonstration should be on July 27, 2015. He said we should close on July 29, 2015 pending any unforeseen circumstances. This is exciting news! We had initially been told a variety of dates ranging from July 17 (which we knew wouldn't happen) to August 18 (which we had hoped it would be earlier).

Photos: Notes & Updates

Lots of information and photos in this post. If I had more time to post over the last week I would have done so. I also did not take pictures at our Pre-Drywall meeting and I will ask the SR to let us in on Saturday to do so.

I have had fairly open access to the site due to being a contractor with RH. Until drywall and paint are done I expect the PM to provide little access to the home to go in and take pictures. I will try to get in as much as possible, but it sounds as though he would prefer that not be the case.

From midpoint in the garage towards the front of the house.

From midpoint in the garage towards rear. They ran the microwave vent below the ceiling and also boxed in a big MEP chase - not my favorite solution, but acceptable.

Inside that large MEP chase.

Concealed gas line in the garage!!!! Also some LV wiring through the ceiling.

I was very happy to see that they did bury the gas line in the wall. This was a request that I was initially told could not happen, but they came through.