The transit arrived and my son Tom and I went t the property to correct the original driveway path.
Found out that we were off quite a bit, so we began correcting it.
The southern neighbor complained that we crossed the line about 100'. We met with him and he showed us the surveyor string he ran from the front property marker to the rear marker. I didn't realize that a survey had ever been done - found no mention of it in the county's iMap database. But the markers were clearly in place. Could have save much trouble and work had I known. We had indeed crossed into his property. He's rightly upset, so I need to try and make it right with him.
Moral of the story; when buying land insist that the seller provide a survey with boundary markers, especially along the critical areas!
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Week 19
Christmas week - not much to report.
Trying to figure out exactly on property where driveway will run. Have been clearing a walking path along the driveway. Original path appeared to be off line - it should be running parallel to south property line, but it appears to be getting too close to the line. I need to buy a transit and work out the exact location.
Trying to figure out exactly on property where driveway will run. Have been clearing a walking path along the driveway. Original path appeared to be off line - it should be running parallel to south property line, but it appears to be getting too close to the line. I need to buy a transit and work out the exact location.
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Week 18
The UBuildIt guys and I met at the property last week to check out my driveway and building site ideas. I found that there's a better, flatter, area if I move the building site west and slightly north. It gets me a little close to the well circle (100' restricted area) but there is still a decent 75' buffer to the start of the circle. I'm looking for ways to reduce the excavation costs - they're estimated by UBuildIt to be $92K, which I think is steep. At this point we're trading off driveway costs - more driveway sqft, more cost - for excavation costs. In particular trying to limit the size and number of retaining walls.
UBuildIt brought a small hand level, like this one, to measure elevations. I'm not convinced it's very accurate. The elevations they were calling out didn't jive with my guesses. But they could be right. I need to do a good job of mapping the driveway and creating site topologies, so I've ordered an AmScope 32x Automatic Level Transit - this is what I ordered. I'll spend a few days at the site and verify the county's elevations and create a fairly accurate topo map of the building site. Later, I will hire a surveyor to do an official topo and to identify locations for driveway, building site and well.
To make sure the price estimates are not way out of line I'm going to get quotes from contractors on septic, water well, driveway and excavation. These are some major expense items, so if there are any savings this is where they'll be found.
The architect sent me revision 3 (R3) of the floor plans, and they look great. So we're moving forward with the next step - getting the exterior elevations and roof worked out. We've decided to postpone the spa and pool - it's over $100K savings alone! But, we will build the house with the pool room under the roof, but open to the outside so that later (2-3 years) we can add them without a major re-model of the house. We will not put in the outside walls, but instead we will add columns to support the roof - this way we can get a bobcat or backhoe in there to add the pool.
Here's the latest site layout. I think this is the final one until an official survey!
UBuildIt brought a small hand level, like this one, to measure elevations. I'm not convinced it's very accurate. The elevations they were calling out didn't jive with my guesses. But they could be right. I need to do a good job of mapping the driveway and creating site topologies, so I've ordered an AmScope 32x Automatic Level Transit - this is what I ordered. I'll spend a few days at the site and verify the county's elevations and create a fairly accurate topo map of the building site. Later, I will hire a surveyor to do an official topo and to identify locations for driveway, building site and well.
To make sure the price estimates are not way out of line I'm going to get quotes from contractors on septic, water well, driveway and excavation. These are some major expense items, so if there are any savings this is where they'll be found.
The architect sent me revision 3 (R3) of the floor plans, and they look great. So we're moving forward with the next step - getting the exterior elevations and roof worked out. We've decided to postpone the spa and pool - it's over $100K savings alone! But, we will build the house with the pool room under the roof, but open to the outside so that later (2-3 years) we can add them without a major re-model of the house. We will not put in the outside walls, but instead we will add columns to support the roof - this way we can get a bobcat or backhoe in there to add the pool.
Here's the latest site layout. I think this is the final one until an official survey!
Monday, December 10, 2007
Week 17
Some of the problem with the cost estimate being so out of line, as I mentioned last week, was that I was not considering the 1100 sqft of space of the pool room. When you take this into account the "heated space" is around 4100 sqft. In my calcs I had factored out the pool, so am basing my analysis on a 3000 sqft home but I did not fully factor out the structure cost associated with the extra 4100 sqft. UBuildIt generated a new OPC for me that does remove these structure and related costs. The new Dev & Structure costs are $811,579 which includes their fee and state sales tax. When you add land you get $1,111,579, and this divided by 3000 sqft gives a value of $371/sqft which is $93/sqft over average or $278,092 over average. We continue to fine tune the analysis.
One area that sticks out to me is the nearly $100K in excavation costs that UBuildIt thinks it will cost to do things like cut down the trees, bulldoze the stumps, dig the utility and drainage trenches, and construct the retaining walls. I thinks this is high, by about double. The only way to get an accurate estimate is to have excavators come and quote the job. This is what I'm working on now - get in a position so that quotes can be made. My friend Ray Lyle and I have cut a path through the brush along the driveway route and up in the building site area. This makes it easy now to walk the land and see the exact topography. Until now we've only relied on the county topography maps for the area. They are in 5' intervals, but turn out to be way off. According to the county topo maps the property gains 100' elevation as you move east to west on the property. But I now know it's more around 50'. And where I want to place the building site it's around 35'. Fortunately the building site is fairly flat up in the area I want to place the house. I don't think we'll need any retaining walls - in the OPC that UBuildIt created, they estimate we'd have to excavate out a 100' x 100' building pad which would require a 4' H x 100' L retaining wall at the western edge and another one that size at the eastern edge. Hopefully I'm right, and we can now avoid the major part of that expense.
In general, I think the UBuildIt estimates are about 20% high - we'll fine tune this in the weeks ahead.
Unless we can get the Development and Structure costs down to around $650K I won't be able to build - can't afford it. At this point it seems likely that the pool and spa will have to go because that's over $100K alone. That would be a shame, it was going to be a central component of the home.
One area that sticks out to me is the nearly $100K in excavation costs that UBuildIt thinks it will cost to do things like cut down the trees, bulldoze the stumps, dig the utility and drainage trenches, and construct the retaining walls. I thinks this is high, by about double. The only way to get an accurate estimate is to have excavators come and quote the job. This is what I'm working on now - get in a position so that quotes can be made. My friend Ray Lyle and I have cut a path through the brush along the driveway route and up in the building site area. This makes it easy now to walk the land and see the exact topography. Until now we've only relied on the county topography maps for the area. They are in 5' intervals, but turn out to be way off. According to the county topo maps the property gains 100' elevation as you move east to west on the property. But I now know it's more around 50'. And where I want to place the building site it's around 35'. Fortunately the building site is fairly flat up in the area I want to place the house. I don't think we'll need any retaining walls - in the OPC that UBuildIt created, they estimate we'd have to excavate out a 100' x 100' building pad which would require a 4' H x 100' L retaining wall at the western edge and another one that size at the eastern edge. Hopefully I'm right, and we can now avoid the major part of that expense.
In general, I think the UBuildIt estimates are about 20% high - we'll fine tune this in the weeks ahead.
Unless we can get the Development and Structure costs down to around $650K I won't be able to build - can't afford it. At this point it seems likely that the pool and spa will have to go because that's over $100K alone. That would be a shame, it was going to be a central component of the home.
Monday, December 3, 2007
Week 16
I met with my UBuildIt consultant last Thursday to go over the Opinion of Probable Cost.
In this blog, back in July, I discussed the Site Review done by the consultant. Then the estimate ("opinion") of what it would cost to build the house was about $24/sqft for land development and $118/sqft for structure - or $142/sqft total. This was reasonable and in line with what a market analysis of properties in our area shows to be the average values. Our house being 2731 sqft (back then, but now 3000 sqft) would then cost around $388K to develop the land and build the house. This doesn't include price of land - in my case $300K. So add on the UBuildIt fees and state sales tax which both amount to $63K. This gets you to $751K. If you divide that $751K by 2731 sqft you get $275/sqft - this is almost exactly what the "better" but not "opulent" home values are around here.
Fast forward now to December. The house size increased to 3000 sqft - 269 sqft increase. The OPC shows the land development is now estimated to be $196,625 and the construction costs $715,173 - or $911,798 total. Add on the land and you're at $1,211,798, and then add on the fees and sales tax and you are at $1,327,195. Divide this by 3000 sqft and you get $442/sqft. The average in this area is $278/sqft - that's what the average "better" quality home sells for. I'd be $165/sqft above the average; do you think anyone would ever buy a house that far above the average? This obviously would not be a good investment; the day I took occupancy I'd be about $494K behind.
So, what's wrong - that's the question. I meet with UBuildIt again tomorrow to go over the comparable analysis that I created and sent to them showing it was a poor investment, and didn't make sense. I will report back next week what I learn. You can see my analysis here (totally created by me, not UBuildIt)- I've taken out the UBuildIt details because they don't like that shared with people.
Last week I also started the barn design process. I sent Uncle Howard's Barns a $1000 deposit to get it started. I got into AutoCAD and drew up the main floor plan and the loft plan. They will draw up the plans showing placement of stairs, doors and windows and the exterior elevations. My floor plan designs are so they take into account how I eventually plan to build it out - of course it's subject to change, but knowing where I'd place walls will keep them from doing things like putting a window in the wrong place. You can see my layout here.
I also started working with Puget Sound Energy Construction department so that they can determine how best to run the power service to the property and what my cost would be. There's a transformer at the property edge, so they will have to run a line only about 90'.
In this blog, back in July, I discussed the Site Review done by the consultant. Then the estimate ("opinion") of what it would cost to build the house was about $24/sqft for land development and $118/sqft for structure - or $142/sqft total. This was reasonable and in line with what a market analysis of properties in our area shows to be the average values. Our house being 2731 sqft (back then, but now 3000 sqft) would then cost around $388K to develop the land and build the house. This doesn't include price of land - in my case $300K. So add on the UBuildIt fees and state sales tax which both amount to $63K. This gets you to $751K. If you divide that $751K by 2731 sqft you get $275/sqft - this is almost exactly what the "better" but not "opulent" home values are around here.
Fast forward now to December. The house size increased to 3000 sqft - 269 sqft increase. The OPC shows the land development is now estimated to be $196,625 and the construction costs $715,173 - or $911,798 total. Add on the land and you're at $1,211,798, and then add on the fees and sales tax and you are at $1,327,195. Divide this by 3000 sqft and you get $442/sqft. The average in this area is $278/sqft - that's what the average "better" quality home sells for. I'd be $165/sqft above the average; do you think anyone would ever buy a house that far above the average? This obviously would not be a good investment; the day I took occupancy I'd be about $494K behind.
So, what's wrong - that's the question. I meet with UBuildIt again tomorrow to go over the comparable analysis that I created and sent to them showing it was a poor investment, and didn't make sense. I will report back next week what I learn. You can see my analysis here (totally created by me, not UBuildIt)- I've taken out the UBuildIt details because they don't like that shared with people.
Last week I also started the barn design process. I sent Uncle Howard's Barns a $1000 deposit to get it started. I got into AutoCAD and drew up the main floor plan and the loft plan. They will draw up the plans showing placement of stairs, doors and windows and the exterior elevations. My floor plan designs are so they take into account how I eventually plan to build it out - of course it's subject to change, but knowing where I'd place walls will keep them from doing things like putting a window in the wrong place. You can see my layout here.
I also started working with Puget Sound Energy Construction department so that they can determine how best to run the power service to the property and what my cost would be. There's a transformer at the property edge, so they will have to run a line only about 90'.
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