Week 13: Making it Pretty

Week 13 - August 8 - 14, 2016



Days 85 - 91

 

8/8 - text PM to ask for pics of newly installed appliances (crickets - turns out he was on vacay)
8/13 - Door unlocked = surprise visit!

 

 So, we were sad that we wouldn't get to see any progress this week. But an invite to a friend's pool in the area meant a drive by/ door try. We were met with unexpected success!

 

We ran through the house really fast, but managed to notice the following changes (stay tuned for pics):

• Floors uncovered - looks amazing, but now nervous about them getting damaged!
• Appliances installed - need to check these for accuracy. I thought we were getting "gas on glass", and we saw gas on stainless.
• Cabinets swapped out for correct finish
• Laundry-room door swing changed (YAY!)
• Banister stained
• 1 coat of paint on front door
• Interior & exterior door handles installed
• Yard grading
• Toilets installed
• Corrected cabinet and side panels around fridge opening

 

 

Still to be done

• Missing handles on garage door
• Replace/repair dented garage door (a new find)
• More coats of paint on the front door
• Door swing on master bath
• Drywall repairs noted previously (didn't check on these)
• Landscaping & hydro seed (sigh)
• Cleaning (obviously)
• Final painting
• SO.MUCH.TOUCHUP.

 

What else....

• We finally locked in the interest rate on our 80% mortgage (doing an 80/15/5), but are still waiting for the paperwork on the 15% one...
• We ordered our new king bed and bedroom set (moving up from a queen!)
• Submitted my company's internet service request form (they pay for our access!)
• Still need to order a fridge, coffee/side tables for the family room, our daughter's "big girl bed", etc. etc. 
• Need to call the utilities about switching over
• Need to call Guardian about final stuff. Not sure what this is for, but we were told to do this at our pre-drywall meeting, and I'm already a week late....oops.
• Shop for rugs, blinds, curtains, garage door opener, dehumidifier, etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. (basically, hemorrhage money).

Our pre-settlement walk-through is scheduled for Monday (8/22) at 2pm.
People. This is really happening!

Week 10: Tile, Granite, Lighting Fixtures, Driveway, Grading

Week 10 - July 18 - July 24, 2016

 

Days 64 - 70

• Received closing date of 8/29! 
• Tile
• Granite
• Vinyl flooring
• lighting fixtures
• driveway
• grading
• Visited on 7/24 to see progress

So, now that we're 45 minutes away, it's getting harder to swing by the house to check things out. I have no idea what happened which day, but a fair amount was finished this week.


#1 The bathrooms are tiled (floor & shower in master, showers only in guest & hall baths). I'm loving how the master bath looks. We picked a pretty high level upgrade (mostly because I didn't love anything else), and I'm feeling like it was worth it. The only disappointment was that because they tile after the baseboards are installed, the baseboards now appear really short. I get why Ryan organizes their sub schedule like they do, but I really think flooring BEFORE trim, (which would do away with the need for quarter-round), and is the CORRECT order of construction would be smart, and look so much better.


#2 The hall and guest bathrooms + laundry room had their vinyl floors installed. I don't hate them, and actually bent down to make sure they were vinyl because they looked like tile at first!


#3 Power was turned on and light fixtures were installed! I definitely don't love the dining room chandelier or the infamous "boob" lights in the front entry hallway, but they're not horrible. Not 100% sold on the master bath lighting fixture over the vanity in oil-rubbed bronze. I hadn't realized the glass itself would be a beigey/brown streak look rather than white or clear. Not the biggest fan, but it's not horrible, and hopefully we can change those out. I like the black garage door and porch lamps, but they all seem undersized somehow?  Hubs hates having the porch lamp at all, and thinks the 2 lights in the overhang will be more than enough light. Still to be seen, I guess.


#4 Grading is coming along, although I don't think it's quite finished yet. Blacktop driveway was poured.


All-in-all, not as much progress as I expected? Everything seemed to slow down a little bit after last week's massive progress.


Open issues our PM is working on -
1. ordering new, 36" cabinet with fridge side panels + filler to replace the 1-paneled 39" cabinet currently installed.
2. Replacing the incorrect vanities in the hall and guest bath with Fairfield Wheat. We're told they're already on order.
3. Correcting the (special request) door swings of the master bath into the bedroom and the laundry room into the loft.
4. Not sure if he knows this yet, but we saw that the quarter-round had been delivered in a really dark espresso. Two problems with that: they don't match our floor color (too dark). We paid extra to have white quarter round to match the baseboards rather than the floor. So definitely not correct either way. LOL


Last thought: Closing is scheduled! Our final walk through has been booked with our PM for August 22 for quite a while.  Last week we got the confirmed closing date of August 29! (We asked for 8/26, but were rejected). 8/29 is a Monday, which leaves us 8/30 and 8/31 for us to move in before we go away Labor Day weekend. Shouldn't be too crazy at all, right? (sarcasm).






Pics!

Day 67:  Exterior Lights installed. Why does the garage lamp look so undersized?

Day 70: Basement - Finished portion

Day 70: Bedroom 2

Day 70: Dining Room

Day 70: Family Room with study door to the back right

Day 70: Vinyl floor in hall bath (notice WRONG cabinet and now that I look closely, the vinyl doesn't look so good/even running to the baseboard on the right. Anyone else see the gap?)

Day 70: Granite! Bonus pic of Munchie & Me.

Day 70: Kitchen with wrong cabinets over and around fridge cutout



Day 70: First - Tilt your head completely to the right.
This crappy pic is a sideways view of master shower and wrong door swing. Isn't the tile gorgeous? It looks like a hotel, and I'm in love. Still annoyed about the plastic shower pan.

Week 9: Siding, Sidewalks, Trim, Cabinets, Paint

Week 9 - July 11 - July 17, 2016



7/11 - day 57 - ?

7/12 - day 58 - Siding & Sidewalks (surprise!)

7/13 - day 59 - Cabinets, doors & Big Move #1

7/14 - day 60 - Trimwork

7/15 - day 61 - Closing #1 & scheduled walkthrough

7/16 - day 62 - ?

7/17 - day 63 - ?




Aside from framing week, this was BY FAR the most exciting week to date. Ryan made so much progress on the house, it's really starting to feel (and look) like our house!


The week started out with me getting my hand smacked by our PM. It's my own fault because I texted him a pic from inside the house. Whoops. I apologized and told him it's not likely that we'll be (sneaking) in again, as our move happens this week, and we'll now be living about 45 minutes away. I did ask what the protocol is for weekend visits, since that's likely all we'll be able to swing!


PM confirmed that he expected the week to include trim installation, painting, and hopefully tile. The fun stuff is starting!

Tuesday was super exciting. We unexpectedly have siding and shutters! Thrilled with how it's looking so far, but I can't wait to see it with the stone and painted door to pull it all together. We had sidewalks and a driveway lip poured too, but with siding to gaze upon, it was barely noticed.




Our movers arrived at 7am sharp on Wednesday morning, and moved us into two storage units. We had a separate pile of suitcases, totes, bags, grocery bags, and coolers to move into our good friends' home for the long wait to completion. Of course, the weather decided to turn from "months-long-drought" to "torrential flooding", which meant our mattress was going to sit in the empty house until Thursday, and everything became more challenging. As painful as moving is, I will say that the movers did an outstanding job. Super fast, and super professional. If you're looking for movers in Montgomery County, PA - Crouse Moving & Delivery is highly recommended. After the movers left, Hubs made several of his own trips to our friends' house, and storage, and made a stop at the house at night where he saw that the kitchen cabinets had been installed! Yay yay yay! It was a very long day.

Thursday I took a half-day from work and spent the morning cleaning the old house, packing up random leftover stuff for storage, etc. The painful end work. Hubs snuck in again Thursday night and saw that the upgraded trim package had been installed, and looked lovely! He also spotted railings and the master bath vanity and countertop.



Friday morning at 10 was the closing on our current house. So bittersweet to be leaving our first home! We met the new owners at closing and loved them, which helped. After closing, we enjoyed a rare kid-free, weekday lunch date where we ran into neighbors from the new development. At one we headed to the house for a sanctioned walk-through with the PM in training. That poor kid has no clue about anything - and no power, so that was a little frustrating. He wasn't writing any notes on the issues we found, so we'll need to follow-up with our PM ASAP.


Overall- it's looking great. But there are definitely some issues.
1. Pass-through hallway between the dining room and kitchen is framed/drywalled crooked. Not sure which, but visible leaning is noticeable along the ceiling line.
2. Kitchen cabinets are looking a little beat up in a few spots.
3. Only one side of the wall section around the fridge cutout came from the factory and was installed. We did hear that this was a known issue, and that spacing did not allow for the second side wall...we indicated that we want it, so....hopefully they get that figured out.
4. Cabinets in the hall bath and guest room bath are wrong. They were both the basic oak, when we had selected the Fairfield Wheat. I strongly dislike basic oak, and would never in a million years would have chosen them.
5. Open hole in the cement wall at the bottom corner of garage, near door. I have no explanation as to how or why that happened...
6. Maybe more that I can't recall at the moment, and the "problem" pics are still on hubs' phone. I'll post them ASAP.


It was a crazy, insane week. One I don't wish to repeat in the near future, but (un)fortunately will again in 6 weeks or so!
Our little one summed it up one night last week. "Mommy and Daddy, I feel both happy and sad". Us too kiddo, us too.


Without further ado....(out of order) pics:

Day 58: siding, shutters, and a sidewalk!

Day 58: siding side view

Day 59: Kitchen Cabinets! Notice only 1 side of fridge surround. Sigh.
I am really happy with our custom double-oven move though!

Day 60: front door view

Day 60: Master bath vanity. The "Crema Marfil" granite appears more tan than what I pictured.
I may need to pick up the sample from the model to double-check the color...

Day 59: fireplace and study door

Day 60: dining room with raised trim to accommodate our installation of taller baseboards.
You can also see the crooked hallway ceiling/doorway. Sigh.

Design Selections

Note - I'm including pricing for all selected options in the hopes that it helps other Ryan builders. Note that this is 2015/2016 pricing in the Philly suburbs. All is of course, subject to availability and change.


Model: Rome Elevation C
Siding: Irish Thistle
Shutters: Black
Door: Copper Red
Stone: Chardonnay Ridge
Trim: White
Roof: Black
**Our development did NOT require that we choose from the pre-approved Ryan "package" color combinations. We're officially rebels!

Exterior selections

A Rome in Irish Thistle! Photo from blogger A Rome of Our Own.

Irish Thistle closer view. Photo from blogger buildingwithryanhomes-parkplace

Trim package 3 ($1995) - Cased door openings, interior mouldings, interior chair rail moulding upgrade, interior crown moulding upgrade, exterior column round
Downstairs flooring: Armstrong Rural Living hand-scraped engineered wood in "Deep Java" (whole first floor except study) - level B upgrade
Whole house brushed nickel upgrade: ($995)

Kitchen
Wall Cabinets: Rushmore painted hazelnut glaze (cream) (level 3 upgrade)
Island Cabinets: Rushmore maple espresso (level 3 upgrade)
Counter-tops: New Caledonia granite (level 1 upgrade) Remove granite backsplash ($0)
Fixtures: Delta Leland brushed nickel faucet upgrade ($200)

Wall and Island cabinets, counter-tops, floors & study carpet

Granite closeup

Powder Room
Flooring: Armstrong Rural Living hand-scraped engineered wood in "Deep Java"
Fixtures: Brushed nickel upgrade

Study (playroom)
Carpet: Upgrade level C - "Favorite Choice Macaroon" ($200)
Pad: Upgrade to level A ($75)

Master Bath
Cabinets: Scottsdale Maple Espresso (level 1 upgrade) ($500)
Counter-tops: Crema Marfil ($595)
Tile: Florentine FL09 Nociolla 10x24 (glossy), floor 12x12 (matte) ($1,995)
Shelf: Travertine light corner shelf/ remove standard soap dish ($95)
Fixtures: Oil rubbed bronze upgrade ($0 - thrown in by SR since only wanted in master bath + already paying for brushed nickel upgrade for house)

Master bath 

Master bath - without the *choke* $1045 listello

Laundry Room
Flooring: standard Armstrong Initiator "Glenville Creme" vinyl (to be tiled later)

Hall (Kid) Bath
Cabinets: standard Fairfield Wheat
Shower Surround: standard semi-gloss white 12x12 squares, no listello
Counter-tops: standard cultured white marble
Flooring: standard Armstrong Initiator "Glenville Creme" vinyl (to be tiled later)
Fixtures: brushed nickel upgrade

2nd (Guest) Bath
Cabinets: standard Fairfield Wheat
Shower Surround: standard semi-gloss white 12x12 squares, no listello
Counter-tops: standard cultured white marble
Flooring: standard Armstrong Initiator "Glenville Creme" vinyl (to be tiled later)
Fixtures: brushed nickel upgrade

Hall & Guest Bath (white tile)

Upstairs Flooring
Carpet: Standard "Baseline Warm Stone"
Pad: Upgrade to mid-level ($895)
Basement Flooring

Carpet: Standard "Baseline Warm Stone"

Pad: Standard

Coleman Flooring

Finally - an appointment I was looking forward to! The hubs and I had not finalized any color selections at the house, and figured we would just do everything in one shot at our flooring appointment. We booked a babysitter, both took off a half-day from work, and drove off to the Coleman Flooring design center in Quakertown, PA on 1.15.16.
Our rep Heather was very nice, but maybe not 100% informed on all of the products. Couldn't answer questions on how the engineered floor was installed. Wasn't sure if we could paint certain cabinets. Didn't have the Ryan selection pricing sheet to give us numbers on anything (we brought our own). Didn't mention soap dishes/shelves, etc. I thought I had prepared well in advance by reading other Ryan build blogs, but was quickly overwhelmed with choices and lost sight of my plan.

I went to that appointment with the goal of keeping everything base level, knowing we would update later. Hubs had different ideas, and was willing to suck it up and do floors on the first floor IF we found something we loved. So, that started well.

With a little bit of help, I narrowed down the kitchen selections to two very different "looks".
#1 - Rushmore painted hazlenut glaze cabinets, Santa Cecelia granite, and Rural Living Deep Java floors
#2 - Rushmore white cabinets, don't remember greyish granite, and dark grey-washed floors.

I've been completely paranoid about choosing anything too trendy, for fear it will forever date the house as "built in 2016". So option #1 felt too themed/ French Country/ Shabby Chic. None of which is my jam. I wasn't sold on the glaze, but was OK with the cream cabinets. I LOVED the Santa Cecelia granite and the floors. Option #2 felt a bit too cold/modern and more trendy. Plus, because of the laminate covering, the white wasn't paintable in the future. Feeling completely pressured and unsure of myself, I selected option #1.

We moved on to carpets, and fairly quickly decided to keep the base carpet upstairs and in the basement, but to upgrade to the 8lb (upgrade 1) padding on the second floor. We upgraded to level C carpet in the family room and study, with the same 1 level upgraded pad. We tried to find a carpet color that was somewhere between tan and grey for decorating ease, and found Macaroon for the upgrade, and Warm Stone for the base carpet.
So.Not.Excited about carpet situation.

On to tile and bathroom land...my mantra here was "pick the least offensive free option!" What fun.
For the hall and guest bathrooms, I picked (wait for it.....white square tiles) for the shower surround. No fancy listellos for us! The least offensive vinyl was another quick pick - Armstrong Initiator Glenville Creme. The hubs will tile these floors later, and paint and shower curtains will solve these problems. I wish we could have afforded the double sink vanity upgrades, but again, we can do that later. Cabinets will be inoffensive Fairfield Wheat.

We decided that since we were going all in for the soaking tub/shower with seat upgrade here, hubs suggested that we should just suck it up and do the master bath how we wanted it. I was on board with the plan, and honestly, the tile upgrades prices are really not that bad.
We selected a level C (3) upgrade - Parkway Floor and Polaris. A large vertical white rectangle shower surround tile, greige square floor tile, and blue/grey/green rectangular glass accent tiles. Pretty modern, but I was on board! Picked a level 1 cabinet upgrade Tahoe Cherry Bordeaux, and a cultured marble countertop called Carrara Gray.

We leave. I'm full of angst and spend the weekend texting pictures of our selections to everyone and their brother for advice. The most "intense" advice comes from an an architect friend who doesn't pull punches.

She called my beloved Santa Cecelia granite "vomit countertop". OMG. For the record, "vomit countertop" is industry slang for "tan/brown colored counters with chunks". Yikes. I could feel my love fading. She offered her advice after viewing my Pinterest kitchen love pins:
White/cream cabinets, light grey-er countertops, dark floors.
Back to the drawing board.

I call Coleman to schedule a round two appointment for Monday, 1.18.16. Hubs is working on the MLK holiday, so I invite a friend to join me.

A cabinet surprise of epic proportions awaited us!

Apparently THAT DAY, Ryan started offering different colored islands for the same price as the level 3 cabinet upgrade. Well....that sure changes things!

We pretty quickly chose to keep the creme cabinets for the walls, after again ruling out the whites. For the island, a complimentary Rushmore espresso. I keep the Deep Java floors I love, and change out the vomit counters for New Caledonia. We have a winner, and I feel GOOD!

While I was angsting all weekend, the hubs had decided he didn't love the white shower tiles we had initially picked, was afraid of white grout turning grungy looking, and preferred a more natural stone "spa" look. Loud sigh. So we looked at that next. There really aren't that many tile options available, so this process is quick. A "hate" pile grows quickly, the "ehh" pile is medium, and the "love" pile is very slim, and generally very expensive. No real surprise there.

So it was fairly quick work to select the "Florentine Floor & Wall" bathroom package level E/5. A gorgeous striated greige square floor tile and rectangular shower tile with large square accent tiles. Upgrade level 2 Scottsdale espresso cabinets, a cream travertine shower corner shelf, and Crema-Marfil countertops completed the look. I was happy again, despite the ever-increasing budget.

Also noted - a white or almond shower pan is standard. Our rep mentioned in passing that we could upgrade to a tile shower floor for a shockingly high amount (don't remember price, just that it was way too high to consider in the blown budget). But it's definitely something to think about, because you can't upgrade that yourself later! This was not on Ryan's upgrade selection sheet, so make a note to ask about it if it's something you want to consider!

All was well....for 3 days.

I get a text from the flooring rep on Thursday. The master bath tile is for NV Homes only, I can have the floor and wall tiles, but the accent tile would be an additional $1045 upgrade.

ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME??????

I'm working on booking my third visit. Our sales rep also neglected to show us/tell us about selecting a stain for the handrails, so we'll need to do that as well.

1.26.16 - Third visit was the charm.
After another review of the somewhat limited selections, I ended up with the same "Florentine Nociolla Floor & Wall" without the listello. At second view, I decided I didn't really love that detail anyway, and that the tiles alone had a higher end look without it. Very hotel/spa/glam.

Also learned that they will automatically match your banister stain to your floor (color: Mocha), and our tile selections come with a pre-selected grout (color: Urban Putty)  to match. I liked both, so that was finally something easy!

2.5.16 update - I've learned from reading more Ryan blogs, that many of you were able to mix and match your tiles with additional listello options. We were told we could only choose tile sets from the same board, and that there were not "additional" listello options anywhere. I guess I could have asked if we could swap listellos among the approved boards at the same upgrade level, but I didn't think of it at the (3) times. I can't think about it anymore, because I start feeling my heart squeeze, so I'm letting it go.

Alternate #1 master bath tile (not selected) 

Alternate #3 master bath tile (not selected)

Base level carpet selection specs

Kitchen Choice - round 1 (ultimately kept the cabinets & floor)

Carpet upgrade level C specs (study)

Visit my "Design Selections" page for photos and details on the FINAL selections!