A Personal New Construction Story: Part Five - 28 Day Countdown to Closing

It's official guys, 28 days from now we will finally own our beautiful home we've been building in Saratoga Springs! Last time I updated you we had just had our framing walk through - the framing was done, all utilities were roughed in, and the drywall and joint compound had been delivered. We were still waiting on our sliding glass door to be replaced with the correct size; they had accidentally installed a 6'x8' door when it was supposed to be 8'x8'.

So this is how it looked on June 26:

July 1:

We stopped by the house later at night, and not much had changed because they were still waiting for our new sliding glass door to arrive, and they can't exactly do drywall with the wrong size door in there. We were warned that it takes a couple weeks to order items like that, so we're not totally surprised it hasn't been fixed yet. But, they did take out the small door, and have framed it for the larger one!

July 4:

It's my husband's birthday, and tradition is to take a motorcycle ride, so we cruised down to the house because we were told that drywall had been started, which is exciting! It was hot as all hell, and the new sliding glass door still wasn't in yet, but OH BOY, they had made a lot of progress in just 3 days! The upstairs drywall hadn't been started yet, but the basement and most of the main floor were already done. The superintendent had said it usually takes about a week to get all of the drywall installed and textured on a house this size. The house is a mess, but the progress is thrilling!

July 8:

Drywall is done! It's not textured yet, so the estimate of 1 week to get it all installed and textured was a little off, but that's par for the course with new construction. The house is finally taking shape, and it's getting easier to imagine living our lives here - where the couch will go, how it will look when it's done, and how the space will feel now that there are actual walls up. AND the new door is in! Scroll through the photos below and look at our door compared to the neighbors', and you'll understand why I insisted they replace it with the correct one. Haha.

July 12:

Texturing is underway :)

July 16:

Texturing is done, and we're just about ready for paint! The builder's agent called me to say paint is scheduled for next week, and since we're doing two tone it will probably take the entire week. There were a few doorways in the basement that we were thinking looked too narrow when framing was done, and it turns out that when they started putting in doors that they were in fact too narrow, so they had to widen them a bit, as you can see from the rubble in one of these photos.

They're also starting on the exterior of the home, so it's all wrapped up and ready for siding.

July 20:

WE OFFICIALLY GOT OUR CLOSING DATE! The house will be ready to close on August 31, which means we'll have our independent inspector look at the house around the 15th, and we'll do our orientation walk through and blue tape markings of items that need to be fixed on the 25th. We'll have our final walk through with the superintendent the morning of the 31st and then head straight to the title company for closing.

Normally the inspection would be done a little closer to the closing date, however I want a meth test done, which takes 5-7 business days to get results back from the lab. Some people think it's odd to have a meth test done on a brand new house, but keep in mind that builders use a lot of subcontractors, and also squatters sometimes make camp in empty houses; according to some data, as many as 30% of new construction homes test positive for some level of meth, and I think it's better safe than sorry.

They also ordered the appraisal, and had us sign an addendum to our purchase contract clearly stating what our final purchase price will be, including all of the design options and everything we had added.

July 29:

We got our weekly update from the superintendent, and they say our tile floor in the laundry room is done, as are the luxury vinyl floors throughout the house, cabinets are all in, the mudroom bench is in, laminate counter tops are in, and the quartz ones will be installed tomorrow. With all of those new items, of course we had to take a trip down to see it!

Electrical will be done next week, then appliances can go in the kitchen, and carpet will be one of the last things to be installed (so it doesn't get super dirty). They're in the middle of putting up siding, and then they'll paint it light grey.

We did notice that a couple of corners on walls aren't 100% square, and it appears they put drywall up over the microwave vent shaft, so I sent photos to the builder's agent to make sure they address those items.

So, as you can see- once permits were obtained, the house has come together VERY quickly! Framing started on June 1, so within two months we went from just a foundation to having most major items in the house completed. Three short months from framing to completion on a 3600 sq ft home! Here's our updated timeline - at this point, very little will change with these dates: