Excavation photos and comments on beginning the construction process
(originally posted to LiveModern 1/9/2005)
I thought I'd start adding some photos and stuff about the actual activities of building now that were in the thick of it. These are pictures I took on the day we broke ground, November 30, 2004. Exciting and unreal at the same time. Up to this point, I was still hearing a little voice in my head on an almost daily basis telling me that it wouldn't happen.
Starting construction November 30th was about six months later than we anticipated, but we feel fortunate to be cruising right along now thanks to the milder than normal winter this year. The biggest downfall to getting started late aside from being at the mercy of the winter weather was that we were required to make interest payments on the land portion of our construction loan beginning 60 days after closing which amounted to several hundred dollars, essentially wasted, every month. Not an ideal way to start out. Because we were expecting it to take a long time to find land yet we found what we wanted in a matter of weeks, we had barely begun researching the details of the various financing options and had to make a quick decision so as not to lose the lot. In hindsight, we would have been much better off getting a land loan but at the time, we (naively) thought we'd have our plan details wrapped up and be ready to start in short order.
Until the point that the guys show up with the equipment and actually start moving dirt around, it's really hard to visualize what the topography of the lot will be like with the house on it, especially when the lot is sloped and there's a basement involved. As far as the actual excavation goes, the top soil is scraped off first and grade is established a few inches lower than finished slab height using a story pole and survey laser. Next the footing trenches are dug, to within an inch of what is required for bottom of footing...I found the whole process really interesting... In our case, this amounted to about $7K worth of digging, not including what we'll pay for the remainder of the backfilling against the north wall and the finish grading in the spring.
(originally posted to LiveModern 1/9/2005)
I thought I'd start adding some photos and stuff about the actual activities of building now that were in the thick of it. These are pictures I took on the day we broke ground, November 30, 2004. Exciting and unreal at the same time. Up to this point, I was still hearing a little voice in my head on an almost daily basis telling me that it wouldn't happen.
Starting construction November 30th was about six months later than we anticipated, but we feel fortunate to be cruising right along now thanks to the milder than normal winter this year. The biggest downfall to getting started late aside from being at the mercy of the winter weather was that we were required to make interest payments on the land portion of our construction loan beginning 60 days after closing which amounted to several hundred dollars, essentially wasted, every month. Not an ideal way to start out. Because we were expecting it to take a long time to find land yet we found what we wanted in a matter of weeks, we had barely begun researching the details of the various financing options and had to make a quick decision so as not to lose the lot. In hindsight, we would have been much better off getting a land loan but at the time, we (naively) thought we'd have our plan details wrapped up and be ready to start in short order.
Until the point that the guys show up with the equipment and actually start moving dirt around, it's really hard to visualize what the topography of the lot will be like with the house on it, especially when the lot is sloped and there's a basement involved. As far as the actual excavation goes, the top soil is scraped off first and grade is established a few inches lower than finished slab height using a story pole and survey laser. Next the footing trenches are dug, to within an inch of what is required for bottom of footing...I found the whole process really interesting... In our case, this amounted to about $7K worth of digging, not including what we'll pay for the remainder of the backfilling against the north wall and the finish grading in the spring.
posted by splatgirl at 9:07 AM
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