A lot has changed since May- Still Holding onto Our Dream

It's been quite some time since I've last written in this.  A lot has changed since May!

In my last post I mentioned my heartbreak of not being able to construct due to the Bank and their appraiser (I'm still dumbfounded that a brand new house can be appraised at $50,000 less than what it would cost to build, but I digress).  Anyways!

In May, after my heartbreak, Mike and his Dad came up with a plan B idea.  It was to find a fixer upper and take out a 203K loan, which is a loan fit for first time home buyers looking for fixer uppers!  It's the banks way of trying to move houses, especially to us nervous first time home buyers.

So we were told of a house that Mike's Brother-in-laws, dad's, girlfriends, mother owned.  (Did you get all that?!).  Anyways, the poor lady passed away a couple years ago and the house had been up on the market since then.  So we took a look at it- but before we did we looked at the listing online and also gathered a list of other potential properties that we wanted to look at for our potential new plan to get back into trying to construct our dream home.

We went and took a look at the property... it was a time module from the 1970's.  SO clean and everything was like new condition- just all from the 1970's!  This was a one-owner home constructed just for her and her husband and nothing had been touched... I meant nothing.  Mint green bathtubs and toilets along with carpet in the bathroom was just a start.  Move on to the kitchen and you had mustard yellow countertops, appliances- including a washer and dryer in the kitchen, and a lovely vinyl flooring featuring a red brick pattern... yes it was hideous- but so well preserved!  Every room from floor to ceiling had wood paneling to top it off!  The one really beautiful thing about the house was that it has an automatic Jaffrey Stove... it's the coolest wood stove I've ever seen!  I can talk more about that later though.

We saw the potential in the house and determined that of all the foreclosures in the area on top of this one, this had the most potential!  Yes- it needed new floors in the kitchen and bathroom, new counter tops AND cabinets (the cabinets were ridiculous too) and new paint too!  So we went through this wonderful thing called a bank process again.  It wasn't nearly as horrible- in fact it was much easier than before- even with the appraisal.  I dreaded the whole process, but this time, we were introduced to a wonderful woman at a new bank and she REALLY knew her stuff!  She spent so much time with us... and I hope she knows how much it was appreciated.  Her bank didn't hold mortgage loans, however, so there were a few things we had to go through that was ridiculous.  We were once again guinea pigs in this new banks' loan because they had never done 203K loans with the bank we were going through... so yes, a little ridiculous- but not horrible. The sellers agreed to a much lesser cost than they were asking and we added $15,000 to the loan for all the upgrades.

We almost lost the loan when the bank took into account both our land loan (which was a hefty mortgage all in itself) plus the new mortgage plus whatever other debt to income ratio information they could find... we were $42 dollars over our debt to income ratio- $42!!  I told them that my student loan I don't have to pay on until 2016 (because I've paid so much upfront that I don't have to worry about it till then) and then they let it pass... phew!

Anyways- we signed on the house on July 3rd, 2012 and all the work was done in 5 weeks which included a full kitchen remodel, bathroom remodel, and every room in the house remodel (just taking out the wood paneling and fixing the walls with mud and tape and painting).

We moved in on August 11th, 2012 and still had money to spare (when does that ever happen right).

On October 8th, we paid off our land loan (we padded for a month just so we could make sure we were all set). We had just enough!  We took out a $38,000 3 year loan with 4.75% interest and started paying that loan on January 8th 2011.  We've had to pay rent, insurance, and all those other monthly bills you can think of on top of it. In addition, we've paid for our driveway, septic design, and building permit (go figure never built!) AND spent hours on top of hours cutting, clearing, and burning the brush on our lot so that we could build a house.  We not only paid off our loan 15 months early, but we also got through some very tight times (no real Christmases filled with presents the past few years!)  Oh ya... did I mention we also got married, in which we also paid for that as well?!  Fortunately, everyone knew we could use the money to help build our house so we came out even- perfect!

Now we have a house which is an investment and a piece of land.  During this time last year, I was planning our wedding... I would've never guessed we would be where we are today.  I love that we have a place to call our own- but I am still holding onto our dream.

"Shoot for the moon, if you miss, you will still be among the stars."

Building on Hold

Well, it’s been a while since I’ve last written- once again.  I apologize, but we’ve been very busy as of late.  Since the last time I’ve written, we’ve told TD Bank to cancel our loan.  Since they couldn’t figure out what was A from B, I don’t know if I ever want to work with them again anyways.  There were two reasons for us cancelling our loan (which was really heartbreaking for me):

1. The appraisal wasn’t nearly high enough, and frankly, I don’t think this company did their job especially after seeing the appeals and what they had to say for missing a bunch of stuff and then not fixing the appraisal itself. 
2. I’ve never been more sick and tired of having to explain things 3-4 times and ask the same question 2-3 times just to have a different answer in the end.  I don’t know if it was a lack of experience on the mortgage specialists’ part or laziness- either way, it was irritating.  I have the feeling it was laziness.  He took forever to respond to me too, which was not professional in the least in my opinion.

We got in touch with the woman we originally spoke to over a year ago now.  She had “retired” from TD Bank and moved to another bank.  I don’t think it was a subtle retirement, just in the way that the branch that we went to talked about her retirement and the way this woman kind of said things.  She’s been doing construction loans for 30 or so years.

We explained to her what happened with her old bank and I asked for her opinion on what we should do.  The bank she works for does a 90-100% construction financed loan, but they won’t be doing this until mid to late June or early July.  She told us that right now, the appraisals aren’t coming in high enough because of the flood of foreclosures on the market.  The worst part is, if we didn’t have to include labor that Mike and friends/family would be doing ourselves, then we’d be in the green, but the bank required us to add the labor because if something happened to Mike they wanted us to have the funds available.  I get it- but really?  Work with us here.  She also recommended that we move our land loan into a traditional land loan instead of it being seller financed so that we aren’t paying a mortgage a month on the land and it may open other opportunities for us.  I don’t disagree with her, but we’d be doubling the amount of principal just on interest if we went this way.  In the long run, it wouldn’t be best suited.  I wish we could find something that would extend our loan to 3 years at like a 3-4% interest rate.  Private investor is the only way we’d accomplish that I think!

Anyways- with all the sad/bad news we’ve received, it’s kind of put a bad taste in my mouth for the whole process in home purchasing.  Mike asked me if it’s gotten me so upset that I don’t even want to build anymore and I told him that it’s gotten me so upset that I want to prove them wrong and throw it back in their faces when we succeed.

It looks like it will take a few years to accomplish this though.  So Mike and his Dad came up with another idea that may help us in both the short and long term.  We’re working on it now, but we’ll see what happens.  I’d rather see this plan succeed before I really let it out there so I don’t have to re-explain myself to everyone on why it didn’t work.  So- if you’re interested, keep tuned and in the next few weeks, I’ll update again.

We Won't Back Down

Where to start.  Hopeless- that’s how I feel.  Irish- that’s how much I want to fight right now.  Yes, I’m Irish, so yes, this descriptor applies.

I guess there’s something that most people who don’t know me too well should probably know about me.  Tell me I can’t do something, and I’ll do it.  I won’t fail.  I refuse to fail.  Tell me a second time I can’t do something and I’ll dig right in and prove to you I can.  I won’t stop trying- and maybe that’s a downfall of mine or maybe that’s why some things in my life have worked out the way they have. 

That being said- we received our Appeals for the Appraisal back.  I have no words to describe how much I despise the company (Powers, Smith & Associates in Keene) that was used and the woman that did the appraisal.  First and foremost, as I stated in my last posting, this woman completely missed a full bath.  In putting in that full bath, it should’ve driven the value of the house up at least a little- right?  I would’ve been happy if it even drove it up $5,000.  Realistically, it should’ve driven it up more than that.

We gave this woman our appeals.  I won’t lie, I may have written it as professionally as possible, but it was so hard not to have our frustrations creep in.  It’s obvious that this woman did not appraise the house accurately- she missed a few things and her comparable sales… they weren’t comparable.

We received back her response, and she didn’t change a friggen thing.  Not one penny.  Ok- answer me this… if you FORGOT A WHOLE BATHROOM… how the hell does the value NOT change?!  Am I missing something?  She defended her entire appraisal and didn’t once look at the comparable sales that we were supposed to provide to her.  She never even mentioned them.  

The bank has backed this up by not questioning a thing.  I’m sorry- if I hired a third party to do an appraisal and the client appeals it because a few things were missing and they made their case, the company comes back and doesn’t change anything- I’d be asking some questions. 

TD Bank has really upset us; in fact if I’ve discussed this with you already, you’d know the wonderful colorful language I’ve been using to describe everything from A to Z about them.  It’s not like me, but this is the Irish coming out.  The process is keeping us from having our house.  It’s truly infuriating.

Here’s the other thing.  I get this email from my amazing, awesome, State Farm agent.  The bank requires us to purchase home owners insurance before closing.  Ok- here’s the deal.  TWICE I asked this “Mortgage Loan Specialist” if we had to have it prior to the house being even built and TWICE he said NO – that this is one of those automatically generated things that come up and it would be required before the final disbursement since insurance companies won’t insure a home that does not exist.  So I talked to my awesome State Farm Rep the other day and apparently that has changed… apparently we were misinformed TWICE (after asking twice) that we didn’t need home owners insurance and yes, we have to pay it in full before closing- on a house that doesn’t even exist.  She did take the time to explain to me that it does cover xyz for the building process so, it made more sense I suppose.  Regardless, this is the types of things that TD Bank has put us through.

Please know that this isn’t the only question that I’ve asked several times, got the same answer and then the answer changes.  That coupled with having to explain ourselves more than twice has become a really frustrating point for us.  I’ve had to tell them 3-4 times where a “large deposit” came from… it was from our wedding, and that has since been expunged… no joke- 3-4 times! 

It’s just absolutely ridiculous.  Frankly, if it were me in that job with the pressures we get at my current job, I would’ve been canned.  I can’t tell if it’s laziness, inexperience, or what, but the fact of the matter is, the people I am trying to work with are relatively unresponsive as well. 

I feel like we’ve wasted almost two months trying to just get a loan to build our house.  I feel like we have a great design, but now Mike wants to change it.  I don’t know if that’s the solution because he’s putting more sq ft upstairs, but that means more$$ being spent upstairs. 

We need a private investor or a different bank willing to work with us.  Before I tell them to colorfully go play with themselves.. ahem, I asked Mike if I could get 4 questions answered.  1, if we could bring the loan amount down to the 80% of the appraisal.  We can build the house for that, but it would be without labor, so it would be a little tight.  2, since Lisa contacted me at State farm, I wanted them to explain what was going on since I had been told one thing and now another.  3, I had asked a question about the closing and how this affects the closing date and what costs would be incurred.  I asked this FIVE times before he answered me – and he only answered me because I had to put my foot down and put it in an email with these three other questions before Mike and I would make a decision on this loan.  4, our credit score.  When we went for the loan with the bank back in February, we told them not to submit it.  They did anyways and our credit was run.  We want it fixed.  I was told that the corporate office can’t fix it- that we would have to go back to that individual branch to have it fixed…. REALLY?!  Pretty sure the branch answers to the corporate office- or am I off my rocker?  I reminded him moments ago that our credit score was run twice this second time so I want to have it fixed.

Anyways- this is the headache that Mike and I are facing.  Sorry it’s so long, but here’s a warning to all:

If you decide to go for a construction loan or a regular mortgage through TD Bank- I would like to say beware!  I’ve been a client of theirs for 20 years (well it was Bank of NH back then, but regardless, I’ve had the same account number with them for 20 years).  I have never been so disappointed in my entire life with a company. 

Also- if you are in the process of a mortgage in our area and they hire or wish to hire Powers, Smith & Associates in Keene to do the appraisal- request another appraiser.  The appraiser might walk through the house and walk past a bathroom and not have it in the appraisal of the house- just saying.

Mike and I will be going to another bank to try this all over again.  A complete waste of time.  I put a call in to the woman we worked with last year to get some guidance from her- so hopefully something good comes of it.  I’m thinking of talking to a much smaller bank in the area- they do construction loans and have no fee rate locks, be your own GC, and one time closings.  I think they might do better by us- but I want to know where this woman is first and see what she can do.  The bank that I want to look into is First Colebrook.  They sound pretty decent and I’ve heard good things.

I just want a place of our own so we can start our family… 

Appraisal Appeals- Construction and working with Big Banks

I won’t lie- I’m really fed up with this bank that we are dealing with (TD Bank).  When I send them an email, it takes them usually two days to respond.  It’s really quite aggravating- especially since we are getting closer to the closing date.  The stuff we send and do and ask needs to be all done in a timely manner.

Mike and I put together our appraisal appeals.  I wrote 4 pages outlining absolutely everything in our home, what she missed, and I shot holes through each of the houses that she chose as “comparison” properties.  I sent this off to Mike so he could review it and let me know if I misspoke or missed anything.  He then turned around and gave me just over another page that I used for beginning notes since it was a rough overview of everything I had written.

I sent this to the Appeals to the bank first thing on Tuesday, April 17^th in the morning.  We wanted to get it in there ASAP so we could still be on target for our closing date.  I sent them the package with a PDF of our tax bill (before improvements to show them that our land was actually worth more than what we had purchased it for PLUS all the improvements will drive the value of the land up). 

I didn’t hear from the two individuals that Mike and I have been dealing with.  I sent an email on Wednesday morning (4/18) and asked a question about the closing as well since Mike and I had discussed how sometimes there are penalties if the closing is pushed because of the client.  No response.  On Thursday in mid-morning I finally got a response from the Bank saying that we also had to come up with three “comparable” properties that we can give to the appraisal company for compares as well.  I don’t think they understand that there is NOT a comparable house in the area, especially with as much land.  We couldn’t find a single house with radiant floor heat, a metal roof, and ICF blocks- the three big things (among other things like the amount of bathrooms -we have 2.5 and none of the others have over 2- granite counter tops, cherry cabinets, etc.).  Yes, there are houses out there with hardwood floors, carpeting and ceramic tiles- but ours is still unique to the market with the radiant floor heat, metal roof, ICF blocks, stamped and dyed concrete, fully finished basement, etc etc. 

Regardless, I found it humorous that we have to supply up to 5 comparable homes.  Unfortunately, the bank didn’t get back to me until THURSDAY last week, so we had to pool our resources and use Mike’s Mom’s real estate contact to help us find houses that have been sold in the last 12 months that more closely meet our home’s criteria.  It’s really hard to do!  We did find 3 homes that we decided to pit up against ours.  All three sold for much higher than what ours appraised at, but they have much less land.  The three do have a bit more sq ft above ground, and one had a partially finished basement.  The only thing working against us I think is that two of the homes had a garage (which we are trying to build as well, but that’s a whole separate issue). 

Anyways I had revised our appeals and sent the appeals with the tax info and three “like” homes from markets that were closer to us in both distance and market appeal.  I also put in a home that is yet to be sold and BUILT in the next town over, but has a lesser market appeal than our town.

You’ll love this.  Guess how much this less than 2 acre land with about 200 sq ft more above ground and not a finished basement is being asked for…??  $272,000.  Yup!  I think it had a one car garage too though.  Regardless, I added that to the appeals form as well.   

So I sent the appeals on Monday (April 23^rd) and asked the question about closing and its effects on us AGAIN.  Tuesday went by and I was trying to be patient.  Then this morning comes and still no response.  I decided to send an email AGAIN asking for a status of the submittal of the appeals and if this guy had any answers to my questions on the closing.

He FINALLY responds back that the appeals had been submitted, but never answered my questions on the closing.

CMON!  If I did that at work I’d get my ass kicked!  First, for not responding in a timely manner to begin with and second for not answering all the questions posed!  So I thanked him for sending it along and asked him AGAIN on the closing questions we had.

I mean really, is it laziness or are you so busy you can’t get to me?  Either way- at least tell me you are looking into my question- don’t ignore it completely!

/facepalm.  This whole thing is so ridiculous. Hopefully we will get this all straightened out though!

Bank Appraisals- what a bunch of crap

I've been meaning to post about the plethora of paperwork that you'll need to sign your life away on in order to get a construction loan.  Sorry- really haven't had time.

Mike and I have been working on trying to finish clearing the land.  It's been a very laborious process and I think I've formed muscles in places I never had before!  Regardless- we're hoping for just one more day and we should be all set!

One of the things that you'll need to do is get your project appraised.  Mind you- the bank already has the amount of money you want to borrow at hand.  The appraisal place will take your specs, land layout, blue prints, etc to appraise the house.  They'll also take a look at what other houses are selling for in the area.

Well, we got a call today- so I apologize in advance if this sounds like a complete rant session, but maybe you'll feel the same way Mike and I do after reading this.

The cost to build our house (materials alone) is $145,000.  We have lots of upgrades in the house- like radiant floor heating throughout the first floor and the cellar, energy efficient trusses, ICF blocks for foundation for efficiency, Water on demand for efficiency, windows and doors that are rated for efficiency  (do you see where this is going?!).  Regardless, it's going to cost us about $145,000 to build.  Our land purchase was $55,000 and we've put a good chunk of change into it with putting in a driveway and clearing it ourselves.  The driveway project was almost $10,000, and clearing the land ourselves was a couple new chainsaws, some gas, some bar and chain oil, and lots of man hours, sweat, and blood.  So in TOTAL Just for costs, our house will cost us approx $210,000 to build (including the land and just the driveway portion).

We got our appraisal.  Guess what it was?! First- I should tell you that hte bank will only give you 80% of the appraisal.  As it stands right now- we have put $47,000 of our own money into this project.  We haven't gone out to eat in months (wedding/honeymoon not included) and frankly, haven't been "living" at all because we've been spending so much time and money at the property.  This is not a "feel bad for us" rant, this is a "I'm pissed off especially since we've done all this work to get nowhere" rant.

Ok appraisal... $214,000.  WHAT?!  You're telling me that we have to find a crew that will build our house for a grand total of $4,000?!  That's not possible!  You can imagine how we felt.  In order to borrow the money we need to build, we need the appraisal to come in at about $270.  We can work with a little less, but $270 is our magic number.  Regardless, Mike was pissed and my heart fell to the floor.  Mike was so upset, he actually called the bank (for those that know him well enough, you know he doesn't call ANYONE and makes me do all the calling).  Left a nice message to the lady we've been dealing with and told her to call me directly- that he was too po'd to take any phone calls.

She did call me and told me that there was an appeals process we can use to make the company redo the appraisal.  We're going to do it- but Mike talked me out of writing it up right now- and he's probably right- if we wrote it right now, we'd just be so fired up that we'd put things in there just to piss the appraiser off.

We went through all the paperwork- she's missing a whole bathroom on the first floor- she listed it as a 1/2 bath, and she's missing our 1/2 bath downstairs.  Now, I understand that "below ground" is not worth as much as "above ground" but half of our house is still "above ground" regardless, she put our SQ FT appraisal above ground at about $92/sq ft- and for those of you that understand this- this is really low even in today's market.  The below ground... a whopping $29/sq ft- we can't even build the below ground for that cost- so what the hell is this woman thinking?!  She put asphalt roofing- we have metal... the list goes on.  What makes us the most mad is she did the appraisal using recent sales in the "area" which stretched all the way 30 minutes south of us in a crappy neighborhood.  Of the 3 houses, 2 were older than 30 years and one was 20 years old.  Only one had as much acreage as we, and none of them had as much living space.  In total, their finished "above ground" floors ranged from $110- $148/sq ft... so EXPLAIN to me why ours is only $92?!

We are both so mad it's not even funny.  I want so badly to start building our house- but it's like every turn is a road block.

I'll be writing my wonderful message to the appraiser tomorrow to make sure she understands that she appraised our house wrong.  If it costs us $210 total to build, why is it worth only $214?  The worst part is, we gave her everything down to the countertops of what was going in this house.  The houses she used for comparison didn't have half of what we are putting in our house- especially when it comes to the efficiency matter.

This is not how I envisioned our house being appraised.  It makes me sick.  At least I have Mike to hug me and tell me that we will get it solved- and if the bank can't solve it- we're done with them and going with another one.

Oh and if anyone wants to know, the bank we are currently using is TD Bank, and the Appraiser was Powers, Smith, and Associates, Inc in Keene... in case you don't want to go through the headaches we are... Live and Learn- right?

Building love, through the most trivial experiences.

Construction Loan Application- Our Experience

Two weeks ago, Mike and I sat down with the bank.  Now, I know many of you know of the troubles we had with this same bank (different branch) in trying to set up our construction loan.  They plugged everything they needed to into their computer and they were magically coming up with closing costs of over $30,000!  Needless to say we were quite upset about it seeing that we’ve already dumped everything we have into the land itself and the improvements that we’ve made on it (ie the driveway).  Even though we told these two individuals that we shouldn’t have to come up with anything considering how much we’ve already put into the property and the fact that we’ve owned it for over a year, they didn’t do anything about it.  The people we worked with had never done a construction loan before- so they didn’t really understand how they are supposed to work.  Our benefit was that we had talked to a woman at that same bank about a year before and she had given us a bunch of information on what kind of closing costs we’d have and how the construction loan works.  Unfortunately, this woman retired, so we had to go to this set of people that had never done one before.

That was in late February, just before our wedding.  They had submitted our application even though we asked them to hold it until Mike and I could decide what to do.  Once it got submitted, our credit was checked…awesome.  We pulled the application so that Mike and I could get some answers on this stuff before we officially got the application into the bank. 

We got back from our honeymoon and started to set in on this project again.  This time, we decided to call around to other banks, get more information, and make sure that we are covered so that we don’t have to come up with a ridiculous amount of money just to try to secure a loan when we already have put so much into the property.  I called around to a bunch of different banks- many don’t actually do construction loans anymore.  The couple of other banks that I talked to had some very strange and ridiculous rules- obviously protecting the bank, but in no way allowing us to build with a clear mind- it would’ve been a constant worry if we weren’t busting butt.

So- we were back at the original bank.  This time, I talked with this guy (who I actually talked to right after we asked the other two to put our application on hold until we figured out what to do) and he was much more knowledgeable.  He had done construction loans before, but it’s not something they do all the time- which makes sense seeing that people aren’t really building right now.  So we set up an appointment with him for March 16^th to start the process all over again.  Come to find out- he needed to leave so we were sent to a young lady named Betty. 

I won’t lie, we were really nervous because she hadn’t done very many construction loans either and said herself that she would be using Mortgage Support to help her through the process, which is what the guy that we were supposed to meet with, advised.  Mike was pretty tense at first.  Betty was a real sweetheart.  We explained to her everything about the property, what we paid for it, what we put in for improvements, and how long we’ve owned it.  Mike explained that we were told by this woman about a year ago that there would not be a need to come up with anything upfront for a down payment since we had paid so much on the property already (and this was BEFORE we made changes to it!). 

Betty understood and we finally got to a point in the preliminary check of what our closing costs would be.  They looked MUCH better, but still included things like the Transfer Taxes and Title Insurance, etc.  We already paid all that when we purchased the property so why is it on there?!  Needless to say, the mortgage application at TD Bank is NOT friendly if you are looking for a construction loan.  Anyways- we agreed to the closing costs with the understanding that a few items would disappear and we started the application process.

Mind you, at this point, we sat there trying to figure out the closing costs and trying to make the numbers work for about 45 minutes.  I had left work at 2 to try to get back for 3.  Keep that in mind as we go through the next steps.

Betty walked us through the application.  We told her what we were looking to borrow, the value of the land (which we kept saying the original asking price plus the improvements we’ve made), and how much we still owe on the property.  We get to the closing costs part again and it has a ridiculous closing cost again (upwards of $30,000).  What the heck is going on?!  So on the phone with Mortgage Support and we go back through the beginning portion of the loan again to try to fix it.  A woman that works on loans often came into the bank at that point too and Betty pulled her in to try to help as well since the numbers weren’t working for us.  We finally figured it out and the young lady that helped us went to her desk to work on other stuff, and she let mortgage support go. 

That’s when her computer froze- completely locked up.  At this point it was already 3:45 PM and I’m in a panic thinking – they’re going to kill me at work!  So- we had to start the process again.  At this point, we’ve worked the numbers 4 times to get the closing costs to be agreeable- where it’s not $30,000 that we have to come up with.  If we had that kind of money, we probably wouldn’t be asking the bank for a loan- just saying.

So- we start it again.  Had the same problem AGAIN!  Betty called Mortgage Support again and got on the phone with a woman named Amy.  She was good.  What was happening was our land was being counted twice.  We do owe on it, but we put what we owe into the cost of construction to cover what is left over on the land.  That’s not what was messing up the mortgage application- in fact, it was two little BUTTONS that say- is the property mortgaged and is there money owed on the property.  If these are checked, it goes into closing costs.  Ridiculous!  Even Betty said that this was the most ridiculous form for a construction loan and it wasn’t friendly to our type of situation.  I don’t think using that form would be friendly to anyone period unless you were trying to buy a regular home.

We finally got through the process.  They ask some very odd questions like- what’s the value of the project… well what we are going to put into it is this- but it will be worth more than that- obviously.  Well, they want to know what it’s WORTH.  How the hell do we know?  We are not appraisers!  So a rule the bank has is they will support the land + 80% construction costs.  Our situation is different because we already own the land (and we thought this was the best, easiest way to get this done and be ahead of the curve). That being said, we need to have our house appraised at X amount in order to be able to cover what we project our construction costs will be plus the closing costs (which are small, but we’ve dumped every penny we own into this project.  The funny part in all of this is we asked for a loan on a total amount with labor- but we will only be using a small portion of that labor because Mike, myself, and whoever wants to help us, will be doing the work… will you work for Pizza and Beer?! J  Anyways- our estimated project cost is actually much higher than what we need because of the labor that’s built in. 

Regardless, we do need the appraisal to come in high so that we don’t have to come up with ridiculous closing costs.  By the time we gave Betty our life stories and signed away our first born so that we could build a house, it was 5 PM.  I missed three hours of work because the application system that TD uses is not user friendly at all for construction loans.  I thought I was going to die… Got back to work just past 5 and stayed till about 7 to make up for some of the time.  The nice thing is, my coworkers understood.  I didn’t get any real heat and explained what happened to the team manager and he was pretty cool with it.  I still felt super guilty, so I stayed to make up some time, then I made the rest the next week.

This whole process has been a bit of a nail biter since the start because there are SO many unknowns.  And you should see the PAPERWORK involved- holy CRAP!  I’ll make that a separate post- it’s just too much to keep going now.  I think it’s important to know what kind of paperwork is involved in a construction loan so that you understand what is expected.  We went to the bank with everything we thought we needed including specs, plans, plot plans, amort  calc on the land and payment history, the entire packet we received from the closing on the land to begin with- including the title insurance, tax returns, my pay stubs for the past month, ID, and septic approval.  We don’t currently have a building permit- that comes next week when we go to the town for it.

Building our home, one step at a time, learning patience, and loving more.

Obtaining a Physical Address, Septic Design, and Finishing Clearing!

I know it's been a while since I've last written, so for that I apologize.  We have been at a little bit of a standstill- waiting for the winter to be over so we can dig.  We have gotten a lot done though!

After the driveway was put in, we decided to try to get an address.  We thought it was going to be a pain to do, but really, it was quite easy!  We need the physical address for the State for when we submit the Septic Design.

How to get a physical address:
Contact your Selectman's Assistant (at least that's what we had to do!).  Let them know you are looking for a physical address and they will contact the Emergency Services person (in this case, it ended up being a friend of my Dad's!).  This individual is in charge of making sure that addresses are updated for emergency purposes (if you call 911 and need ambulance services, he makes sure that everything is up to date).  What he will need is your lot and map number (and frankly if you don't have it memorized at that point, I'd be surprised!), and you need to sign a little piece of paper that goes to the state.  THERE IS NO CHARGE (how awesome is that!?).  Anyways, it takes about 2 weeks normally to get the physical address.  The way they figure it out is they take the numbers from either side of your property (if you have neighbors) and do some measuring.  Figure out feet and have some sort of calculation that figures out what your physical address is.  It's kind of neat really.  They have to measure to the driveway apparently.

The other thing we've accomplished is an approved Septic Design!  Our Septic Guy (Pete Bissell) came out after the October storm of 22" when all the snow had melted off again, and did some digging.  He did the perc and did some calculations and what not and drew up a really nice design.  It's pretty impressive actually.  You have to go to the Selectmen at your town to get it signed off on.  He explained it all to us at a meeting a couple weeks ago now.  We were afraid that the town was going to give us trouble at first, but I think they were sympathetic, listened to Pete, which explained everything, and signed off.  It was really cool actually!  An example of what a Septic design looks like is:

This is kind of what one looks like.  Ours has lots of pretty colors, some elevations, etc.  It's really neat to look at actually!  Pete did a great job in designing it.  

After the town signs off on it, we write a check to the state DES (Department of Environmental Services).  You also write a check to the designer of course!  But there is no other cost at the town level... yet.  Once you get the signatures, the designer sends it to the State.  They approve it and send you a piece of paper (which I didn't really understand at first... it's all in typewriter format on a carbon copy type paper).  The Septic Designer then sends you a copy with the state signatures/approval on it.  

We also accomplished cutting many many more trees to clear the land since I last wrote.  We will have a rather large yard when we are done.  We were afraid that we were going to have to pay someone to take the logs out (very few hardwood, lots of soft), and were blessed to have a friend of my Dad's come over and wanted all the short softwood that we cut (5-6 foot lengths so that Mike and I could man-handle it to a pile somewhere... what a workout!).  

He asked what we planned on doing with the rest of the logs (the large ones) and we said we needed to find someone to take them.  Our prayers were answered about 2 hours after this friend of my Dad's came.  He brought back another guy, an older gentleman, that trucks for a mill.  He said he'd take it all! :)  Mike and I had been moving slowly to clear because we'd clean up and move the logs/brush out of the way to try to keep it cleaner.  Now we found someone to take the logs!  How exciting!  He's already taken 50 tons of logs off our property, and still has quite a bit to  go!  Mike worked all week to clear the rest.  The only thing standing now is the hardwood.   Pictures Below!  Please know this was soooo wooded at one point, that there was much more shade!  

Where our house will be...

Love this Tractor.  I want one just like it!  Winch, Thumb, and All!

The left side of our property now

Backyard area

A small portion of the logs coming off the property!

Mike did have a mishap last week when he was clearing (without me since I had to work, but was with his Dad and this older gentleman).  He cut a tree down and it got wedged in another.  He started limbing it and one of the big limbs jumped up and whacked him in the face.  He chipped his front tooth, got a nice gash on his chin, and his mouth was so swollen that night.  Not exactly what I wanted to hear a mere week before the wedding!!  Fortunately, his beard covers the gash, the swelling has gone down, and if you didn't know the story, you wouldn't know that his tooth was chipped.  It's crazy though because we started slowly clearing the property in July, took a break when Dad ended up in the hospital, and then again when his cousin was building his house, and all this time, no one got seriously hurt until then.  Of course, that makes me feel comfortable that he wants to go and keep cutting.  Ugh!

Next step: We are going to the bank tomorrow to see if they will approve our house and give us money!! WOOT!

That's the update for now!  I've been crazy busy with wedding planning and such.  I can't believe that I'll be taking his last name this Saturday.  It's come up so quick!  Can't wait to spend the rest of my life with him.

Building Dreams, Building our Future <3

A Little Discussion Goes a Long Way

I sent an email to the town rep yesterday (as you know) that I would like to pick up the road bond either today or Monday.  I guess he was away at meetings all week, so he hadn't been able to get back to me.  Coincidentally, he called my Mom (because she works with said rep) and said that the lawyer  should have it ready today or Monday.  Yay!  I've found that you have to get a little pushy with this town in order to get them to do anything... but at least this part is over!

I also emailed the guy that takes care of getting physical addresses yesterday since I hadn't  heard back on the process for that.  He asked me if I filled out paperwork, which I didn't know we had to, but he was great.  He was like no problem, I'll bring it over to the property tomorrow and we can meet up then.  Come to find out, he  is one of my Dad's friends!  So when I told Dad I was meeting him, he wanted to see him too.  This guy was awesome.  Dad launched into a conversation about what Mike and I had gone through just to get the driveway.  He said that the road agent was an ass and really hard to work with.  It cracked me up!  He told me that he would've told the Road Agent to pound sand when we told him that the road agent wanted us to get the driveway engineered.

Mike was afraid that I was  going to piss off the town if I got too pushy, but after talking to the emergency contact of Sharon, it only renewed my spirits to really go after them to get what we want.  I don't disagree with Mike that we need to be careful and pick our fights carefully, but at the same time, we shouldn't back down either!

oh, p.s. The guy taking care of the physical address for us told us that we didn't need the second culvert, that it was just a waste.  That also made me laugh, especially after how I told him we were trying to squeal out of getting the driveway engineered.

Driveway Complete!

Well since the last time I posted, our driveway has been completed!  Eric was able to put the whole driveway together in a quick turnaround time (3 days in total really) and we have an apron... of 20 feet.  We aren't completely pleased with the apron, so the people that did it originally are due to come back and fix it.  We think they put it down cold so it's a bit crumbly and bumpy, and that's not what we were looking for.

In any case, the driveway was considered finished almost 2 weeks ago.  I asked the town to send out the road agent to sign off on the road bond being complete.  Of course, I can't expect much from this road agent seeing that he doesn't like to work WITH people.  They have yet to get back to me on the status of the road bond.  It's really starting to tick me off, so I sent another (4th or 5th) message to the town rep that I use and asked him what the status was and that I would like to pick up the check from the lawyers office tomorrow since all obligations have been fulfilled.  If there was a question about the apron, it's there, and I even had Mike shovel it off on Tuesday in case the road agent hadn't looked at it yet.

The best part is, I have before and after pictures.  The road is completely untouched, which is why I'm starting to push harder on the road bond.  We gave them the road bond within two days, so I expect to be treated fairly and have the same turnaround time that we gave them.  It's only respectful.  That being said, I told the town contact that I will be going to the lawyers office tomorrow to pick it up, and if it's not ready then, I will have my Mom pick it up on Monday.  I'm done playing this game, especially when this money is due to Eric.  It's not fair for him to be waiting on the town when the road is in the exact same condition it was before he even started.

That's my spiel.  I'll let you know how it goes after I visit the lawyer tomorrow!

Let's have some more road blocks... with a side of fries please...

Since my last posting, we've received our Driveway Permit.  It was like pulling teeth to get the Road Agent to meet up with our contractor (Mike's cousin Eric) for the driveway, but it happened because the one Selectman that wanted to help us is a good friend of the road agent apparently.

We met with both the selectman and the road agent along with Eric a couple of Saturdays ago.  We were able to get the location OK'd.  In the background, we found out that the road agent was giving Eric a very hard time about how the driveway needs to go in and all this crap he needs to do.  He kept saying to Eric that he was concerned for our safety (meaning Mike's and mine) as well as others on the road.  The way it sounded was that the road agent was badgering Eric.  Eric finally got fed up and told him that he's Mike's cousin so of course he wants to do a good job and make sure it's safe!

So not only did we have to put a huge bond in ($3000!! Let me tell you my heart jumped into my throat when we were told this amount) for the Road Bond (so don't screw up the road and we get it back), but now that Eric is ready to start the driveway, he's getting more crap from the Road Agent.  Eric's truck broke down but he wants to move forward with this project so Mike and I can finally drive up into our lot instead of lug all our crap from the road, which isn't safe in itself.  He has a friend that trucks so he has to get new trucking permits for his friend so that it's all legal.  He wanted to start the driveway today, but it was raining so, can't really do this stuff in the rain.

Anyways, the trucker that's going to be trucking in stuff to our land freaked out that it was in this particular town because of how much he dislikes the road agent.  Apparently, we aren't the only ones that have had serious trouble with this road agent or with the town in general.  Serves us right for wanting to live in a nice town I guess.   It makes me sad to say that I have a bad taste in my mouth because of this process.  Anyways, he agreed to truck for us anyways since Eric's truck is down.

So after the road agent freaked out on Eric, they were finally able to set a time to meet tomorrow (since Eric is pushing to start this tomorrow) at 8 AM.  Well apparently, Eric just got another call from the road agent which then told him that he can't be there till 11 AM.

This is just becoming more and more BS.

On top of all of this, when we got our permit there was a two page addendum. One that addendum from the Road Agent, there included a minimum apron that must be put on the driveway before it's considered complete... it's 20 freaking feet!  There is no reason for an apron to be so long!

I have so many words for this Road Agent and for the town.  We've had nothing but headaches since we started this process.  I can't imagine what building our house will be like... but this just pisses me off to the point where I want to do it just in spite of them.  They don't want to see our house from the road (and right now, where we plan on putting our house, they won't... they never said anything about garages... maybe we should build the garage right in view and have it so that it's multicolored or super ugly.  Anything to piss them off at this point.

I know, that's not nice of me... but someone needs to talk to them.  This is absolutely ridiculous!

Warning to all: If you decide to try to buy land in what seems to be a small, quaint, pretty town... think twice and look elsewhere... if you are looking to live in the same town as us... DON'T DO IT!

Driveway and Progress... They Do Go Together!

Well, it looks like we are finally getting somewhere on our land.  We met with the Selectmen this past Tuesday.  As some of you already know, we’ve been getting the run around since day 1.  We don’t have a driveway yet and we’ve been actively trying to get one since the early part of March.  We started this process, though, in January!

So we went to the Selectmen’s meeting on Tuesday to discuss what we need and what they need.  The road agent told us that we MAY need an engineer to determine the size of the culvert for our driveway.  We kept being told that we may need an engineer to engineer our driveway.  Well, here’s the problem.  We’ve pretty much exhausted our resources in trying to find someone that can engineer a driveway.  We were laughed at when we would tell them that we were looking for an engineer that could engineer our driveway.

We were laughed at because it simply doesn’t exist in NH.  People who have been in the driveway profession for decades have told us that it’s the Road Agents’ job to determine the size of the culvert.  The Road Agent was telling us we need to find an engineer to do it. If we were actually to get a Civil Engineer, it would cost us a fortune for them to engineer our driveway!  Mike also said that at the meeting to help drive another point home. 

So at our meeting on Tuesday, Mike took the floor and discussed what we’ve done thus far.  He discussed how we got our permit, the length of time it’s taken to not even have a driveway, and what we are going through now.  It was a plead for help but he was extremely firm on points that he gave.  I think they could tell that we were frustrated and at the ends of our rope.  I let Mike do most, if not all, the talking because he was doing such a good job explaining everything and showing his frustration in a very professional kind of way.  I was really impressed, actually! 

Near the end, the guy sitting to my right spoke up and said that they needed to help us.  He really spearheaded the rest of the conversation and asked if he could keep a copy of the application and all the materials that we had brought with us.  He said he was going to talk to the Road Agent and try to work something out.  I got a call earlier today from this particular selectman saying that he was planning on having breakfast/coffee with the road agent in the morning and wanted Mike to give him a call tonight to see if Mike and our driveway contractor could meet them in the morning.  I left Mike a message to let him know and I’m hoping they both can!!

PROGRESS!  It’s such a beautiful thing!

Cross your fingers for us!

Driveways and Small Town Politics...

The Selectmen’s meeting is in about a week, and Mike and I are trying to get everything together for it.  We have the wetlands permit, the driveway permit, and according to the application details, we just need to basically put together a plot plan with where our driveway is and whatever obstructions there might be within 500 feet in each direction.  I believe it was 500 feet anyways…

But guess what, we have to do more than what’s on the application now.  Mike met with the Road Agent yesterday.  I’m beginning to think twice about EVER buying land in this town, which to me is really sad because I’ve always wanted to live in a quiet, peaceful little town, but just this driveway process has been so incredibly infuriating.  We have everything required to get our driveway permit, except for the Selectman’s and Road Agent’s signatures, which requires that plot plan.  When Mike met with the Road Agent yesterday, the Road Agent said we’d have to get in touch with the planning board.  I had already sent an email to the Selectman’s assistant (which seems to be the ONLY person in the town offices that knows what the heck is going on!) because the Road Agent hinted about this when Mike talked to him last week to set up a meeting to see the property and where we want to put our driveway. 

Not to get too far off subject- but if there are other special requirements, why isn’t it written in the applications or any other area that we can find?!  They aren’t even written down anywhere!  If I have one thing that absolutely drives me up a wall, it’s when we ask what is required and only get half of it.  When it comes to applications and permits normally everything is written in plain text right there… Hello?  Anyways, the fact that we had to contact the Planning Board isn’t what upsets me the most.  Mike called the head today (coincidentally, the Selectman’s Assistant is also the Secretary for the board… and he’s the one that told us that we didn’t have to contact them!!!) and the head told Mike that they have nothing to do with the Driveway. 

What ticks me off the most is that the Road Agent wants us to get our driveway ENGINEERED.  Are you frikken serious?!  He wants us to get an engineer in there to tell us what size culvert we need…  Well it says on YOUR application that YOU are supposed to tell us what size culvert we need IF you want to see it a size other than 15” in diameter!! Plus- why can’t we just use the same size as what’s going under the road that links the other side to ours, which is where most of the water is coming from anyways?  I swear they are trying to pull out every road block POSSIBLE to keep us from building a home- and that just makes me want to dig in my heels and be even more hard headed than I already am!  I’m sick of playing this game- but if that’s how you want to play- fine- I can play this game. 

Small town politics is really infuriating.  I recommend anyone looking to buy a house or a piece of land in a small town to think twice.  We’ve been trying to build JUST a driveway for about 9 months now!  REALLY?!

Love always finds a way… and so shall we!

Wetlands Permit Accepted!

On Saturday, August 27^th, we got our Wetlands permit from the State!  That’s 30 days ahead of schedule!  I’m really thrilled that they were able to push it through so fast!  Of course, I think Mike and his boss are right- I think the State would be more concerned about a larger parcel of land being filled for something like a Walmart or a Home Depot or something, and not necessarily as concerned with a few feet to cross for a residence.  It makes sense to me.  I’m sure they are still concerned, but I think they put less emphasis on a home owner than they do a retail store/chain.

Anyways, it’s very exciting news!  Since my last update this is what has happened with this process:

The Conservation Committee of the town would not sign the expedited minimum impact application because they wanted to see the parcel first (and I had offered to show it to them at their monthly meeting, but they wanted to see us first!)  and they wanted us to get it delineated by a forester.  Fine, we got it delineated by a rather well known forester in the area.  Mike got to meet with him and he was very knowledgeable and walked Mike through the whole process and explained what different plants were (like Princess Pine… which do not grow in wetlands- they are an upland plant!).  But since the Committee wouldn’t meet again for another month and told us they would only sign it then, we submitted it anyways.

We brought it to the Town Hall so that the Town Clerk could sign the paperwork.  She was very sweet and it was the first one she’d ever done, so we had to walk her through it.  I made it as painless as possible.  When I brought the paperwork to her, there was the woman from the Conservation Committee there.  She instantly jumped down our throats, told the Town Clerk she was not allowed to sign it until we met with the Committee again.  Mike was a little heated, so I stepped in and asked her why, and she said that we couldn’t submit the paperwork without the Committee’s signature, but I pointed out to her that we didn’t need their signature according to the paperwork that we had filled out and read her the line that said the application would automatically transfer into a Standard Dredge and Fill if the committee didn’t sign it.  She got on the phone with the head of the committee (who is a really nice gentleman) and she continued to try to poke holes through our application process, which I continued to show her the different sections in the application where she was wrong while she was on the phone with him.  He ended up telling her that there was nothing they could do, that we were doing everything according to the book.  I think I upset her and her power trip she was on because I had shown her all the instances in which she was wrong. 

The Town Clerk proceeded to sign all 5 documents and sent the paperwork into the State on July 12^th.  On July 19^th, we were notified that we were missing one piece of information from the Standard Dredge and Fill, which we hadn’t thought about since we were focused on the Minimum Impact and not the Standard form.  It was a letter and map from NHB stating that there were no recorded findings in the database of rare/exotic plants.  At first I thought that it was going to take forever to get- but they have a website that you can type in the zip code, put a pointer on the map, and they automatically generate and try to find anything in their database of any occurrences of rare/exotic plants!  From there you can download a PDF of the letter and map from NHB and you’re done!  It was so easy! 

So then, the paperwork was resubmitted to the State on July 25^th.  The State then has 60 days from the time they send us a notice (which they sent the notice of receiving all necessary paperwork on July 28^th, which was super fast in my opinion!) to when they must correspond with us (whether it be them requesting more information or giving us a decision).  From there, we waited, and hoped that they wouldn’t ask for more info over and over again so that we’d have to be stuck in the process.  We just got the permit on Saturday- August 27^th!  I wasn’t sure if the State was going to hold onto it for the full 60 days or not, but we got it and can now move forward with submitting for our driveway permit! 

But now we must get the road agent over to the property, show them our plans for the driveway, where we want to put the driveway (where it was approved by the state), and reasoning for putting it there.  We have to draw a plan for the road itself to scale with any obstructions (like hills, corners, trees, other driveways, etc) within 500 feet in either direction.  We hope to get the road agent over there before their next meeting (next Tuesday, September 6^th) so that we can then get the permit and push forward and get at least a portion of the driveway put in! 

Hopefully moving forward, this process will become a well oiled wheel.  We could’ve had the entire house up by now if not for the running around like crazy trying to get a hold of people to answer questions and getting the wetlands permit! 

On another positive note, and since this isn’t JUST about building our home (though mostly it is) Mike and I are engaged!  We have the wedding date already set and the wedding will be before we build our home and during a beautiful time of year! <3 I can’t wait to marry my best friend!

Love Can Build a Bridge

The Last Leg of our Driveway Journey- I Hope!

One step closer…

I’d like to start by recapping what we’ve done thus far for getting our driveway permit, which some of you may already know but nonetheless, here’s the recap:

1. Tried to get a hold of the Road Agent for the town of Sharon for the better part of a month in April just to find out that he “retired” and that the old Road Agent is back on staff. 
2. Went to a Selectman’s meeting where we were able to introduce ourselves and get some much needed information in accordance to what the State of NH DES requires for this wetlands crossing permit.  They were all very helpful in this process and I appreciate the direction that they’ve given us. 
3. Received abutters addresses and sent them certified letters informing them of our intent due to what DES requires for their permit application.
4. Received Tax Map.  Scanned the Tax Map and made several copies of our section where our land is per the requirements of the DES application.
5. Purchased copies of a 1:24,000 scale USGS Topographical map of the Town of Sharon and adjacent towns.  Blew up our section of the Topographical Map so that we could draw boundary lines of our land per the requirements of the application and made copies of those as well.
6. Had my Mom take a few photographs of the land (where we plan on putting the driveway).  We picked 4 of the ones that came out best.  My camera broke so… she was able to help us out!  Printed off originals of these photos and made 5 high quality color copies of these photos.  Yes, I will be keeping the originals!
7. Received an estimate/description of how the Driveway is going to be built from Mike’s Cousin who will be doing the work. 
8. Drew plans for the driveway, where the wetlands will be impacted, and put all the measurements we took on the maps/plans.  We also had to figure out a North facing arrow on all our plans.  That was a little tougher than I expected seeing that we didn’t have a point of reference per se. 
9. Last night we put all the paperwork together, drew up all the plans, made notes and the like on all the copies of photos, maps, etc, and found that we only need a couple more things.

One of the biggest things that will help us out now is the Conservation Committee signature.  We were hoping to get this last month or a few weeks ago, but weren’t able to since we had missed their monthly meeting.  We didn’t know that we were going to need this and that the only time they’d be able to meet with us is once a month- we had literally missed it by a day!

Since we have all the plans, photos, etc, we hope to have this signed off on tonight, when the committee meets for their once a month meeting.  I had tried getting a hold of them three to four weeks ago to see if we could expedite this then so we could submit the paperwork and be on our way.  We tried both email and phone and left messages but no one returned our call or email.  So I got in touch with my new friend, the Selectman’s Assistant.  He got me in touch with the Conservation Committee and thus they were able to help us.  Of course, this was only last week when we were finally able to get a hold of them.  We’ve also tried getting a hold of the State DES people and they are really, really hard to get a hold of themselves!  We’ve left messages and the like for them and sometimes they are great- but the last message we left (2-3 weeks ago) has still not yet been answered.

We wanted the Conservation Committee come out to look at the land with us and allow us to show them where we are looking to put the driveway, where we think the least amount of impact will happen.  Unfortunately, they want us to see them tonight and then they will decide what they want to see on our property from there. 

All I can say is hopefully we provide them with enough information that they won’t have to go to the land with us and they will just sign off on the document.  That way, tomorrow, I can stop by the town office when the clerk is in and submit all the paperwork as instructed.  The clerk is only there on Tuesdays every week from 5-7, so getting this signature tonight will save us yet ANOTHER week of waiting and relying on other people.

Of course, once this goes in, the “expedited” form will take up to 30 days, which is ridiculous, but it is what it is and we have to abide by the rules.  After that, it’s a matter of getting our driveway permit from the town and then getting the driveway put in. 

This has already been a drawn out process… so hopefully this is the last leg of it and we can start seeing some stuff get done to our land!  Wouldn’t that be nice?!

So here’s all the paperwork/requirements the State DES needs in order for them to allow us to have wetlands crossing permits.  By the way, the wetlands that we are crossing probably isn’t anything near what you are thinking that it looks like.  When I get a chance I will post pictures so you can better understand what we are seeing.

1. The Application- filled out with signatures from the applicants, Conservation Committee, and Town Clerk.
2. FIVE copies of the application and all forms that are to be submitted.  One copy with the original form gets sent to the State.  The rest are given to the Selectmen, the Conservation Committee, and a couple other entities.
3. Photographs of where we are looking to place structures
4. USGS Topographical Map with lines indicating boundaries.
5. Description of work to be done and amount of materials used for the work. (ie the driveway information has the culvert and different soil/dirt used).
6. SQ FT of wetlands to be impacted.  Ours maxed is 1200- their max is 3000. Our 1200 Sq Ft takes into account 20 Feet from the mouth that goes to the road through to the actual wooded area that is no longer considered wetlands.  We won’t actually be putting in 20 feet of fill the whole way, it will likely be more like 12-15 feet, but we just put the max in case.
7. Map of land with wetlands designation and our drawing of the driveway and such with hatchmarks indicating where the wetlands are impacting.  Mike drew this to scale (he’s very good at it!).
8. Tax Map (the map we bought from the Town of Sharon, but I also included the actual “tax map” that the town gave us but it’s just basically showing what is paid in taxes).
9. $200 check- the State has to get their portion too, of course!

I think we might be able to become experts on this application and necessary documents the State needs before we’re finished with this process.  We’ve only read the application and requirements a few dozen times to make sure that we have everything and that we are doing everything that the State needs so that we don’t screw it up and find out later that we have issues with our application so we would have to re-file.  That would just be bad, because that would mean another $200 for the application. 

So please cross your fingers and toes and say a little prayer for us!  I think I’ll go bezerk if this doesn’t go through smoothly now!  Especially since we’ve been chasing our tails trying to get a hold of people to get questions answered! 

Building a Driveway- A New Hope.

Lessons Learned: and I'm sure there will be more later on!

Sometimes when you think you have everything you need and you think that you are doing exactly what you need to be doing, you find out you’re wrong!

So, this is a lesson learned and kind of a funny story when I stop to think about it.  It’s also frustrating, however, since this has been holding us back from getting started on our project.

Mike and I are trying to get into this driveway building stuff.  We have started on a lot of paperwork that we know the town is going to need even for our building permit.  I sent some info over to his cousin on the driveway permit since his cousin will be building the driveway for us.  We’re looking pretty good I would think!

Well, we’ve been trying to get a hold of the Road Agent in town to see if he can give us some direction on our driveway since it will be crossing a tiny piece of designated wetlands as I discussed in my previous post.  Between Mike and I we’ve probably called the Road agent about ½ dozen times and left him at least 3 messages.  Each time we’ve called it’s gone straight to voicemail.  We started calling him two weeks ago.

My dad got an idea from our soon-to-be-neighbor, whom we also bought the land from.  He said to try going to the Selectman’s Meeting that happens every other Tuesday.  Why didn’t we think of that first?!  It makes sense- go see if the Road Agent is there.  Mike’s concern has been upsetting the Road Agent if we went above him to get this done.  So he asked me to call the Selectman’s Assistant to see if the Road Agent will even be there.

This is where the funny part comes in.  First, the Selectman’s Meeting isn’t this Tuesday- it’s the First and Third Tuesday of the month and Mike and I were both like, oh ya, we’re already that far into May (YIKES!!).  Second, the Selectman’s Assistant (a very nice guy) actually retired- good for him!  In any case he was helping us.  He told me that the reason we couldn’t get a hold of the Road Agent is because he’s no longer the Road Agent.  No wonder why we can’t get a hold of him! 

He then gave me the new number to the now Road Agent, who use to be the old road agent.  Mike called him and discussed with him what we are trying to do.  He’s been very helpful already and told us what we need to do for the next steps including giving one of the Selectmen a call because this particular Selectmen can help direct us with what steps we need next (really?  Does this come with a manual?!  AWESOME!).

Unfortunately, we do need to go to the State to get approval to cross the Wetlands, which means even more time wasted.  Ugh.  On the Brightside- at least this Road Agent is giving us useful information that will help us speed up the process- and hopefully when we touch base with the Selectman, he can help us further and speed the process right along. 

All in all, it’s a little funny because we’ve been trying to get a hold of this guy just to talk to him and discuss what we need to do just to find out that he’s no longer with the Town.  On the other hand it is a little frustrating because we have lost quite a bit of time on this process.

I guess it’s all part of the learning process- right?

Best Part: We have some good connections we can use in order to get our answers answered!  Fortunately, it seems like we’re moving forward- thanks to the great people that we are now getting a hold of! :)

Love Can Build a Bridge…

Will it build it over my little wetlands area?  lol! :)

Let us Begin, Shall We?

Everything comes in steps… this is so true when building a home!  Originally, Mike and I tried to get a construction loan when we were looking at a different piece of property.  We wanted to purchase this piece rather quickly so we could get it up and weather tight before snow flew.  With the bank we were going through (which came highly recommended but we had a horrible experience with) it just wasn’t going to happen.  We got our deposit back on the land we were trying to purchase through the bank and went on our merry way since it seemed impossible to get a quick loan, and even a land loan at that point since it was going to take MONTHS to get!

So that’s when we found out about the land we just purchased.  We were lucky and knew the guy that was selling the piece and was willing to do seller financing on it.  No banks, but still a process.

Really, it’s a smart thing to try to buy the land first, sit on it for a while, and then roll it into a construction loan.  Our meeting on Friday went really well.  We went to our own bank this time and we had been prepared with questions and information for the woman that met with us.  She told us that we really did our homework!  One of our biggest concerns is whether we could use the land as collateral, and she assured us that we could.  It’s interesting how construction loans work- and here’s why.

No matter what bank you go to, their construction loan program is different.  Some will give you 90% of the value of the home, some will give you 80%, and some will even give you less.  They require a lot of information up front before they give you the actual loan.  For instance, we need to get together the material list (which we have already, just not in their format), a septic approval, and a building permit, my last pay stub, and at least two years of tax information.  All simple things really, but let’s put this into perspective.

Mike and I have spent hours putting together our material list and getting prices on the materials and all that good stuff.  I can’t tell you how many hours we have spent doing this already.  Even though we have this to start, it may change.  For instance, the town in which we are building does not have their own building inspector so they require us to get an approval from the state on energy related things.  We were going through this energy sheet last night and have had to change a few things already due to U-ratings or R-values (U-ratings seem to be related to your doors and windows and the energy efficiency of these and R-Values are your insulation and the like).  Reading through some of their requirements gave us both a bit of a startle.  I’m not saying that we weren’t creating an energy efficient home, but some of their rules did seem a bit silly.  But, we have to abide by the code- AND we have to fill this form out and get approval before we can get a building permit. 

The beginning stages are such a process!  So in order for us to get the septic design approval, we need to get into our land- but in order to get into our land, we need to get the first portion of the driveway put in and have the lot cleared so the septic designer can dig and do a perc test.  In order to get the first portion of the driveway put in, we have to go for a driveway permit, which may also require a State of NH wetlands crossing approval, depending on what the road agent says.  The “wetlands” on our land isn’t really wetlands either though- it’s seasonal run-off.  It would be silly to not put a culvert in for something that gets wet like it is currently for a couple months out of the year.

So where do we start?!

Well, we found the most important pins on our land yesterday, which is a good start… and I have a call in to the Road Agent for the town in hopes that he can meet with Mike so him and Mike can discuss the driveway and the plans thereof so we can skip the extra time it will take to get approval from the state.  Hopefully from there we can have Mike’s Cousin draw the design for the driveway and we can submit that to the town with the check for the permit and get that approved.  Once that’s approved then at least the ball gets rolling.

In the meantime, we’re trying to fill out the energy efficiency form (which has me confused because of the hieroglyphic like lingo, but at least Mike knows what most of the items on the list mean) and try to get that approved so we can add that to the building permit and submit that once we get the septic stuff done.

It’s all a process… but at least we are starting now so we can hope that the house could potentially be completed by Thanksgiving. It would be so nice because I want Thanksgiving at my house this year!! 

Pursue some path, however narrow and crooked, in which you can walk with love and reverence.  - Henry David Thoreau

Beginning to build your list for price quotes

All I can say is I'm glad that I have someone that knows what they are doing!  Without Mike and his dad, I wouldn't know what to do about putting together a list of materials that we would need TO build a house and how to figure things like studs and TGI's and the like.  

So one of the things that we need to pick out to get prices on (other than the kitchen which we pretty much have all ready to go for quotes) is flooring.  So we started looking at hardwoods and tiles... we'll have carpets in the bedrooms (I hate waking up and putting my feet on a very cold floor in the morning!).  We found two beautiful hardwoods that we really like.  

Mike really took to the Brazilian Koa (below) and I love it too!  It's beautiful!

But it's expensive... $6.29/ft.  Ok it's not SUPER expensive but for the area we are looking to put it in, we'd be spending quite a bit (it's a rather large area).

We also really liked the Spiced Hickory.  We thought we would put this downstairs- but the more we talked about it the more I realized that really, we don't need to spend a ton of money on really nice flooring for the finished walk out basement... because in reality most of the time, it will just be us seeing it..

So I started looking for other options and stumbled across two beautiful BAMBOO flooring options... and Mike liked them too!  They were almost 50% the cost of the hardwood flooring and they are about 2-3 times harder!  check these out and tell me what you think!

The first one reminded us of the Brazilian Koa- so we may just do that for the upstairs dining/entry area.

The second one we found would be perfect for downstairs... more durable and looks a little like the spiced hickory...

So I think we are settled on that but it sounds like we may go explore Lumber Liquidators this weekend so we can actually see and feel the products... then we will go to HD and check out tile... you just can't really make a decision without seeing it first!  Though, I found a beautiful Gray Slate tile that I think would be perfect for the Mudroom area! :)

More to come!  For now- this is all the time I have to post! :)