Our Update from Valentine's Day

We drove out to look at the progress on the house for Valentine's Day.  When we pulled up, we were pleasantly surprised to see that they had started framing our third floor.  We were only expecting to see the second floor framed.  They seem to be moving along quickly although I'm sure the snow stopped work for today.  

The front of our house

View of the back

Our garage

Daisy and I in front of the house

Construction Update - Week 4

We received our weekly construction update from our PM last night.  They are framing away on the house, and are currently working on the second floor walls.  Our PM expects that they will be framing all next week and build the roof by the end of the week.  It's exciting to hear that our house is taking shape so quickly!  

We will probably do our weekly drive out to the homesite on Monday, so I'll post progress pics then.

Daydreaming about design (lighting)

I have been daydreaming about decorating our future home since the minute we walked into the model.  Lately, I have been mainly thinking about lighting options since this will be one of our first projects.  

Bedroom Lighting

We selected ceiling fan prewires in all three bedrooms.  Initially I thought we would put a ceiling fan there, but now I am debating whether we should put up a nice light fixture instead.  I admit that I have been watching too much HGTV, which is causing me to think more about this.  

What type of overhead lighting did you put in your bedrooms, especially the master bedroom?  Are you happy with it?

Main Floor Lighting

For our main floor we want the lighting to flow well since it's all open.  We added prewires in the morning room (our dining room area) and the living room.  We also plan to convert the two recessed lights above our island to pendants.  Here are some of the options we are currently leaning towards.

Morning room light fixture for above our table

Living room light fixture

Option 1 for the kitchen island

Option 2 for the kitchen island

I won't be buying any of these until after we close, so I could end up changing my mind. 

Framing is Started!

My husband and I received our weekly update from our PM on Friday.  We were expecting that the concrete slab would be complete, but we were pleasantly surprised that the slab was completed and the crew had started framing!  We were so excited that we did our weekly drive-by on Saturday instead of Sunday.   To our surprise, the crew was there working on our house.  Seeing the house make it to the framing stage is making this all so much more real.  We can't wait to move into our first home together in May!

Here are some pictures of the progress:

Driving up to our block

Our house!

The crew working

Back view of our house
We're the second one in

Our pup, Daisy, with the house in the background

Daisy supervising the work

In addition to all the work on the house this week, our puppy, Daisy, gained a pound.  She's almost halfway to her full-grown weight now.  

It's fun to see our puppy growing while our house is being built.

Exterior Colors

We got an email from our sales rep yesterday with a picture of our exterior colors.  In our community, the exterior options are all selected by a designer.  I'm thinking this is probably normal for the townhome communities.  The community is very neutral colors, so we knew that whatever we ended up with would be fine.  It turns out we ended up with the brick I really wanted for the partial brick front!  I also love the color for our door!

Here's picture of the exterior selections:

The brick is Olde Columbia and will go about a third of the way up the front of the house.  The siding is Pebble Clay and the door is Fiery Brown.  

Underground Plumbing Complete

We got our construction update on Friday, and drove out to see the progress yesterday.  Last week our underground plumbing was complete, and the crew started spreading stones to prep for our concrete slab.  Our slab should be done by the end of the week and then they'll start framing our house.

Our homesite

Back view of our homesite

Since we also just got a puppy at the end of November, we decided to start taking weekly pictures of the house progress with our puppy, so we can see both grow together. :)

Our puppy checking out the homesite

Our Floorplan

As I'm anxiously awaiting our next weekly update from the PM to see what was done this week despite the snow, rain, and overall bad weather, I figured I would stop by and post our floor plan.  Our floor plan is the Strauss with basement entry and rear-loading two car garage.  It's 2034 square feet, which, in our area at least, is really big for a townhome.  We will have a nice sized kitchen, 3 bedrooms, 2 full bathrooms, and 2 powder rooms. Here is the floor plan.

For the basement level, we opted for the completely open rec room with no storage and the optional powder room.

For the main level, our community includes the powder room, the island, and the patio.  We added the optional hutch.

For the upper level, we didn't make any structural changes.

Even though this is our first house, it is pretty much our dream house.  We plan to stay here for as long as we're in the DC area.  Eventually, we would love to live in the Philly area, where I grew up, but this house is the perfect location for now since our jobs are in DC and a lot of our friends are in MD.  It's just the two of us and our puppy, but this house gives us room to have family visit and even some room to grow in the future.  We are really happy with our decision to go with this floor plan in this community.

Starting to See Some Progress

We drove by the house this weekend to see the progress.  We have foundation walls now and underground plumbing is supposed to go in this week.  It's exciting to start seeing some progress on our house and the community around it.  

We had our puppy with us so we didn't stop in the model, but it looks like they are still trying to sell one of the townhomes in our block of six.  They've sold three across the street from us in the next block of eight.  

We were the first to buy in our block of homes.  Now that the block is almost sold out and the next block has started selling, my husband and I can't help but wonder who our new neighbors are.  It would be really great if they are some other young professionals, but I'm sure whoever our neighbors are, our home will be a thousand times better than our current apartment.  We are so excited for our move in May!

Here are some pictures from our visit:

This interior unit is our elevation, but we don't know what color our shutters and door will be yet.

Our homesite with foundation walls

Back view of our homesite

Our block with the foundation walls poured

The March delivery homes have most of the exterior complete now

The entrance to our community

So much work has been done since we signed our purchase agreement in October!  It's amazing!

We received our first update

Last night my husband and I received our first construction update email from our PM.  By the end of the day today, all of our foundation walls will be poured for our house and the other houses on our block.  Next week the plumbers will work on all of the underground plumbing and connections. Our PM even included a picture of the work in the email.  We're really looking forward to driving by the homesite tomorrow.

Work on our house

Our First Change Post Pre-Construction

Well, we already changed our mind on one of the things in our house after the pre-construction meeting, and our project manager accommodated our change with no problem.  I think he is going to be great to work with over the next few months.  

Our change: We are getting a light prewire put in our morning room area since we'll be using this as our dining room and want to add a chandelier.  Originally, we thought it would look good if it was centered between the two walls.  Then we saw the picture below and decided to change the location to centered between the end of the door and the wall.  I think this will look much better, and it won't block access to the deck.

Anyway, I am getting really excited to get our update from the PM tomorrow, and I can't wait to see what's been done on our homesite this weekend.

Pre-Construction Meeting Follow-up

Since I only did a relatively quick post after our pre-construction meeting, I want to go through some of the questions we asked our PM during the meeting along with his answers.

• What are the anticipated dates for the pre-drywall meeting and settlement?  There aren't any tentative dates yet, but it should be in 8-9 weeks and possibly longer depending on the weather.  We'll get an email from our PM 2 weeks before the pre-drywall to set up the meeting.  He anticipates that settlement will be about 6-7 weeks after the pre-drywall meeting.
• We want to bring our own home inspector to the pre-drywall meeting and the pre-settlement walk through.  How should we coordinate this?  Once we select a home inspector we should send their license and insurance information to our PM, so that the inspector can be approved by Ryan Homes to be allowed in the house while it is still under construction.  Our PM needs this information at least a week in advance.  He also said that he would schedule our pre-drywall in the morning and then our inspector could come through with us that afternoon.
• Can we visit the homesite whenever we want?  Yes, we just have to call in advance.  24 hours notice is best.  Our PM wants us to visit as often as we want, so that we really feel like we are part of the process.
• Will we get updates throughout the construction process?  Yes, our PM will either call or email us weekly with updates on what was completed during the past week and what is scheduled for the upcoming week.  
• How many steps will there be to our front door?  Our PM anticipates that there will be 1-2 steps, and if there are 2 steps they will be spaced out (one closer to the sidewalk and one closer to our door).  He does not want to have to put up a railing since it changes the look of the front of the house.
• Are there any exterior outlets and where are they located?  Yes.  There will be an outlet by the front door, an outlet on the deck, and an outlet out back by the AC.
• Are there any exterior lights? Yes, there will be a light on the deck and a light by the front door.
• Will there be drywall in the garage? Yes
• Will there be outlets in the garage?  Yes
• Can we put a deadbolt on the garage door? No, because that has the door is according to the plan and can't be changed. Our PM said he will give us contact information for a handyman that can install a deadbolt in our door after settlement.
• Can we move the recessed lights above the island so they are centered?  (We plan to replace the recessed lights with pendant lights after we move-in.)  No, because there is a joist that runs over where we want to move the lights.  Our PM said we can revisit this during pre-drywall in case there ends up being a way to make the lights more centered.
• Can we pick our own slab of granite?  No, but there shouldn't be too much variation in the slabs.
• Is there an outlet on the kitchen island?  Yes, there are two outlets on the island.  One will be on either end.
• Is it possible to move the attic access to the closet? No, because there isn't enough space in the closet.
• Can you change the wire shelving in the laundry room so that we can put in a stackable washer and dryer set?  Yes
• Where is the thermostat located? On the wall between the stairs on the main floor.

We also went over the placement of all of our prewires and all of our options.  During the meeting we went floor by floor.  Our PM gave us details on what would be on each floor and gave us a chance to ask questions.  

The only question we still have is what color the exterior siding and shutters will be.  Our sales rep has been calling the main office daily to try to get us this information, but the designer for the community still has not yet decided on the color scheme for our block.  We know it will be something neutral and it is our only minor issue so far, so it is not really bothering us.  Overall, we are really happy with our entire Ryan Homes experience so far.  We can't wait to stop by our homesite this weekend to check on the progress!  

Pre-Construction Meeting Complete

We had our pre-construction meeting today, and we found out that they broke ground already and put in the footers. We thought that construction would probably start before our meeting since we waited a couple weeks to schedule it until we had a day off.  It was so exciting to see that construction already started!  From here on, our project manager will be sending us weekly updates.

This was the first time we met our project manager and he was very helpful. He answered all of our questions and was willing to accommodate us with some special requests such as moving the shelving in the laundry room so that we can put in a stackable washer and dryer set. He was very open to us bringing our own inspector to the predrywall and presettlement meetings. He also said we can stop by the homesite whenever as long as we call in advance.

We were really happy to see all of the progress in the community while we were there. There was another set of Strauss homes finished and one almost done. The condo models were also opened and another condo building was going up. The playground was complete too. We can't wait to see how far along the community is when we move in May. 

Our homesite

The footers on our lot

The alley behind our homesite with other Strauss town homes 

Newly built Andrew Carnegie NVHomes 

More Andrew Carnegie NVHomes 

New building of condos

More views of the other Strauss town homes in the community

More views of the other Strauss town homes in the community

Pre-Construction Meeting on Monday

We have our pre-construction meeting on Monday morning, and we are very excited to finally meeting our project manager.  We're hoping that the PM will be laid back and let us stop by the house to check on the progress.  We live about a half hour away from the community so we will only be able to stop by on the weekends, but we are really looking forward to seeing our house being built.  I plan to take a lot of pictures of the building process and post them here.  I can't wait to move in to our first home in May!

We also cannot wait to see all of the progress in the community when we go in for our meeting.  Our community, Greenbelt Station, is a mix of NV Homes Andrew Carnegie townhomes, Ryan Homes Strauss and Strauss Attic townhomes, and Ryan Homes Matisse and Picasso condos.  The community will also have a park, a playground, and walking paths.  

Last time we stopped by the community was in December and they had almost completed the first building of condos.  They were also working on two blocks of Strauss townhomes with delivery dates in January and March and one block of Andrew Carnegie townhomes.  The playground was also almost done being built.

This time the condo models are going to be open and we plan on stopping by those.  The playground and some of the townhomes will also probably be complete or nearly complete.  It is amazing seeing how quickly the community is coming together!

Construction to begin in the next two weeks

We just got an email from our sales rep that construction will begin on our house in the next two weeks!  We are working with our sales rep to set up our pre-construction meeting with the project manager.  We will likely be meeting with the project manager on the 19th since we are both off work that day.  So far everyone we have worked with through Ryans Homes, NVR, and their subcontractors have been so helpful, and we can't wait to finally meet our project manager.

30 Day Change Request

We met with our Ryan Homes sales rep and completed the 30 day change request for all of our options.  Our meeting only lasted about a half hour and we only had to sign one paper.

Our sales rep is the best!  I feel like we are always bombarding her with questions when we see her, but she's very patient and answers all of questions thoroughly or follows up with the project manager if necessary.

It's fun driving out to the community and seeing all the progress.  They are almost done with the first building of condos and finished another row of townhomes.  They have only sold one more house in our row, so that has slowed down.  However, they have sold a ton of condos in the community.

We're getting very excited to see to start seeing our house under construction in January or February!

TAC Tile & Flooring Meeting

We had our meeting with TAC today to pick our tile and flooring.  This was the meeting we were most looking forward to and also most anxious about since we had no idea what everything would cost.  Since we signed our purchase agreement we have been visiting lots of Ryan Homes models in the area to get ideas for tile and flooring and also for general decorating.  I am so glad we spent the time going to other models because we went into the TAC meeting knowing what we wanted.  The samples at TAC's showroom were the typical sample size, which in my opinion isn't really enough to show you what your home will look like.  

The sales rep at TAC was very helpful and patient when we were trying to make decisions.  She started by pulling out our granite and cabinet selections.  We are getting the Santa Cecilia granite in both the kitchen and master bathroom, and we are getting the Lausanne cabinets in the kitchen and bathrooms.  We wanted a nice sleek, modern look, but we also wanted our choices to be timeless.

After we had the granite and cabinets out, we started by discussing what type of flooring we wanted.  We decided on vinyl in the laundry room (which is standard), 12x12 tiles in the bathrooms, carpet in the bedrooms, and hardwoods everywhere else.  First we selected our hardwood.  We could only get engineered hardwood in the basement since it had to be glue down with the concrete slab.  That worked for us since we had decided we wanted the dark engineered hardwood that was in the model home.

Our flooring selection with the kitchen cabinet sample.

 After we decided on hardwoods, we moved onto picking the carpet for the bedrooms.  We went with a neutral color but not too light.  We also upgraded to the next level up since it is more stain resistant and we have a puppy.  We also picked a basic vinyl for the laundry room.

Our carpet selection with our hardwood and cabinets.

 After we finished up our flooring selections, we moved on to tile.  We started with the master bathroom.  We went with level C tile in the master bathroom.  This gave us a listello, 9x12 wall tile, and 12x12 floor tile.  We selected neutral colors with grays in the stone listello.

Our master bathroom selections with the cabinet and granite samples

Close-up of our master bathroom selections

Next we moved on to the hall bathroom tile. We had seen the basic tiles in a hall bathroom at a model and hated how cheap it looked.  However, We didn't want to upgrade the tile in here too much, so we went with level B tile which keeps the basic white 6x6 tile on the wall but includes a 12x12 floor tile.  We also added a listello, since it was only $65 and will make the bathroom look nicer.  We stayed neutral again with a natural stone and glass listello.

Our hall bathroom selections

Close up of the listello for the hall bathroom

We finished up by adding a tile backsplash for the kitchen.  We chose to mix and match with a neutral off white main tile and a gray stone and glass accent band.  We wanted the off white tile instead of the gray tile that the accent band was shown with in case our granite ends up more yellow in color.  It was $1295 to add the tile backsplash, but we knew we wanted a backsplash and like the option we chose.

Kitchen backsplash option with the small tile accent band instead of the brown/orange color one

Close up of the accent band with the granite

 We walked out of the meeting spending $10,000, but we felt like we got everything we wanted.  This was definitely our favorite meeting.

Guardian Technologies Meeting

We met with Guardian Technologies to make our low voltage wiring selections.  Our Guardian Specialist was not pushy about adding all of the extras.  He did recommend the security system, but he didn't push it.  It was $250 to have the security system installed and $50 per month for a minimum of 3 years for the basic home monitoring package if you got the security system installed.  There were also options to add security cameras.  

After we went through security options, we discussed phone and cable outlets.  Our home came with 2 phone outlets and 2 cable outlets.  Since we don't plan to have a phone in our house we were able to switch one phone outlet for another cable outlet.  We put a cable outlet in the rec room, living room, and master bedroom.  We put the phone jack for our wi-fi in the living room since it's the most central location.  It was an additional $150 for each additional phone or cable outlet.  Since we don't plan to have TV in the two additional bedrooms and we only use wi-fi, we opted not to add any additional outlets.  

There were also options to pre-wire for a wall-mounted TV ($415 per TV), add an intercom ($2845), and add a surround sound system ($1185).  We didn't opt for any of these.

NVR Mortgage Meeting

Within a week of signing the purchase agreement, we had to meet with NVR Mortgage to get approved for our mortgage. You have to meet with them even if you are planning to get a mortgage somewhere else.  We were planning to use NVR anyway since we get $15,000 in closing costs covered if we go through them plus we bank with Ally, which doesn't offer mortgages. Our loan officer emailed us a list of all of the documents we needed to bring with us to the meeting within a day or so after signing the purchase agreement. The fee for the loan application was $550. We emailed all of our documents to the loan officer in advance, which made our meeting go quickly. Our loan officer was very friendly and easy to work with. When we showed up he had already filled out a lot of the paperwork and ran our credit report.  They use all three bureaus and pulled reports on both of us.  They use the middle score of person with the lowest scores for the application.  If you don't have the full down payment already in your account you will have to fill out a budget worksheet, so NVR can see that you have a plan to save for the down payment.  We filled out a lot of forms for NVR, state, and federal.  We got a copy of all the paperwork including our credit reports at the end of the meeting.  We also got an updated copy of our estimated closing costs based on today's mortgage rates, but this didn't really mean much since we hadn't made your tile and flooring selections.  We were approved within a week of our meeting. 

Homesite Reservation on our Second Visit to Greenbelt Station

About a month after our first visit, we went back to view the model home at Greenbelt Station again after viewing other houses in the area.  I had crunched the numbers and knew we could definitely afford a Strauss townhome while living comfortably and paying off student loans within the next couple years.  Still my husband was waiting on his bar exam results, so we were going to hold off on purchasing until November.  We showed up to the model and about 5 more homes had sold in the past month and the base price had increased $5,000.  We walked through the house with this information in mind.  Once again we loved everything we saw.  This house was perfect for us.  We knew we wanted to be in this house in this community.  The sales reps were now selling homes with delivery dates in May 2015, which lined up with our timeline to buy.  We didn't want to risk another price increase, so we put down a $1000 homesite reservation fee.  This gave us a few more days to think about it without risking the price increasing again.  

We went back on 10/23/14 with our realtor to sign our purchase agreement.  Signing the purchase agreement paperwork took about 3 hours.  We got our $1000 homesite reservation fee back and paid $5000 as an initial deposit.  We also got a list of companies that we would be working with to finalize all of our options.  We had to meet with the vendors within 30 days to make our selections even though our house wasn't going to be ready until May 2015.  In our area, Guardian handled security, phone, internet, and in-home sound systems, and TAC handled carpet, tile, and flooring selections.

We were so excited to be getting our first home!

The laundry room in the model.  It's located on the same floor as the bedrooms.

The kitchen at the model.  We ended up selecting these cabinets.

The main floor of the model

The master bedroom