We Have A HOLE!!!

With kids being back and school, and other random life events happening (including packing and preparing to move from my current house), I've been too busy to post on our homes progress. But then one day...we had a hole!!!

Us

Our PM sent a text about a week ago, stating that our permit had finally arrived, and offered for us to come take a look at the site whenever we were available--as long as it fit within his 8-4 business hours. We've both taken off several days of work, and still need to save some leave...so his schedule was difficult to work with. However, we randomly went up there last week, and low and behold, there was a hole!!

Once he said that his ummm, "line guy"--I don't know...whomever surveys the land and marks it-- had done his job. I then set something up with our PM later in the week so that he could walk the site with me and point out stuff (property lines, well locations, line of disturbance (LOD), etc.,). There's not too much too see, other then our wonderful hole! But I'll list the take aways from our meeting below:

• Ryan Homes is pushing for him to finish all homes before the end of the year. Not just ours. He said therefore that a mid-Dec closing is possible--but not likely. Such a time table would require no delays or hiccups whatsoever--and how often does that occur in life?
• He showed me where our wells would be and septic tanks.
• He discussed his confidence that his first priority would be to build us a solid and sound house, rather then hastily throwing one up.
• Our PM mentioned that even if he had crews working on the weekends, it could only speed things up by 1 week, maybe 2.
• We spoke about the grading of our land (actually fairly flat for a good portion of the 3 acres).
• He spoke about the line of disturbance, in which he's required to work
• He spoke about what falls on the developer and what's outside his control. For instance, BGE, still needs to lay the power lines in our entire neighborhood, but with them being the big bad, monopoly, they will get there when they get there!

BGE. When it comes to scheduling

• He also mentioned that there's a fair amount of things he can do without power--but there is a stopping point where he couldn't do any further work without power. And that he's at that point right now on a home or two in our neighborhood
• Finally, he did give me a loose run down of what would occur over the next few weeks. From footers to concrete and waterproofing to framing, etc., But I was so excited over our hole, that I didn't take notes or anything. I just trusted that it'll occur when it occurs.

Without further ado, our hole pics!

Our lot and permit

Back view of the hole. From the back of the house looking towards the street

Profile view from the corner of our house to our neighbor

Our backyard. There's not as much room between us and the tree line and we'd hoped for

Hopefully, they'll clear that grass and weeds. But we'll have to be responsible for the trees

The hole is larger than the footprint of our house

Side view of the hole. 

Our well can be seen here

You can see the garage frame on the left side, near the front

The developer still needs to move this dirt

The mounds with grass growing are the ones the developer needs to move

Mounds with grass growing are ones the developer needs to move

The gravel there is our drive way. The black tarp is roughly the LOD

From our driveway looking towards our neighbor

Delays: Hurry Up and Wait

Fast Snails. aka. Hurry Up and Wait...

Still no definitive start date on when Ryan Homes will break ground on our home. See below for this week's text from PM

Hi Walter, we have your start scheduled for next week, but a lot needs to happen for us to start. I'm still waiting on your permit. The developer still needs to move his equipment and dirt piles which is delaying my stakeout. The road was on schedule to be paved today but I didn't see anyone back there yet today. No signs of BGE yet. I'll let you know about next week when I have more answers. 



It's interesting, the entire rush that NVR Mortgage places on you, to get this document and that document, and so forth--then Ryan Homes, on the other hand, is veryyyyy laid back in terms of when they can and will begin your home.

On another note, the kids and I are slated to move out of our rented town home before the end of the month. Next stop is my Mom's house, until our Avalon is done, sometime this year I hope. So now here comes the joy of packing, and moving, only to pack and move again, one day in the future.

Who remembers this movie? Classic Richard Pryor

In any event, at this stage, it's seeming less and less likely that we'll be in our home by the original estimated move-in date of 11/15. Which is fine, but again, moving in before the end of the year would be awesome! I'm just not optimistic. However, I'd be happy when they just simply break ground!

After having read so various blogger's issues with Ryan Homes, pre-construction, and post-construction--I was somewhat mentally prepared for "delays". So I'll keep hope alive and such, but it's getting tougher by the day!