Building a house
- Thread starter Ron Mehico
- Start date
I have a relative out in California that missed the boom by no more than a week. The previous week his realtor would have multiple bids on a property.
Initially, the realtor wanted to ask $875,000. Relative wanted $850,000 for a fast sale. The first seven interested parties were people fleeing San Francisco, but not ready to flee California. All had cash, no financing. But, no offers.
After day 7O, price was lowered to $795,000 and had a financed offer for $720,000. It was declined.
After my relative slept on it for a week and with no further interest, shot back $750,000. They accepted and sold at day 81.
That payment would have bought over $1000000 house a year ago.
I am late to this but what the hell are you building?I have worked on high end custom houses with small crews but WTH? 8-10 months on a stairway. Somebody saw you coming from a long ways off when you started this.
Nothing too crazy, I’m getting hit hard with it being in central Ohio and the labor and supply shortages. Just in the last 2 months I’d estimate they worked on my house maybe 5 days. We just sat there waiting for 6 weeks for concrete and last week with the beautiful weather they worked in the siding 1 day. It’s very frustrating. Unfortunately 15 miles from my house they are building the giant intel chip facility that was in the news (“the silicon heartland”) which also involves all the infrastructure and other companies that follow. As you know there is a massive cement shortage in the country and labor issues, and unfortunately in my area intel is buying it all up and also hiring all the workers. I know this not from my builder but because I know a guy that owns a cement company and he was telling me about it. Said anyone building a home in our area next year is completely screwed. 2800 square foot homes right now are being given a 2.5 year estimated time to complete.
Well all the siding is done and pretty much the outside structure and all the doors and windows are in so I don’t have to worry about the weather anymore which is amazing. Started electrical this week and that seems to be moving well (put some electric car chargers in the garage). Feel like I’m over the supply chain issues. Builder told me he expects it to be move in ready by September which was great to hear so I can list the current house in the summer for max value. It’s definitely getting exciting. Furniture for this house is a whole ‘nother story so sounds like I’ll have to start that process in January because of backlogs there. Crazy process but feels like we’re finally hitting a good groove. Not sure what’s going to happen to the housing market this coming year but doesn’t seem good. Hope we don’t get crushed too bad trying to sell the house in 7 months.
Sounds like we are nearly in the same stages of our build.
Brick just started getting laid today. Electric is nearly done and HVAC duct work is fully installed. Our builder is estimating May as month ilof completion.
We are starting to shop around for furniture since Black Friday is right around the corner and like you said, long wait times.
Only two things I can see holding our project up now is our fireplace and staircase.
Having a hard time finding a local fireplace company that will install the components of our custom fireplace.
Also, we are putting in a floating staircase and company we are in talks with aren’t the most responsive. I’ve read that in reviews but also read from same reviews that the quality of the product is great.
What is a floating staircase? Is that without drywall underneath? Our staircase (which has been a big hit in this thread) is a spiral staircase. Apparently they build it straight and then have to twist the wood little by little till it’s the proper shape which takes like 6-8 months. But my builder is dealing with all of it. Is your builder not helping with your staircase or fireplace?
Did your builder put in electric before plumbing and HVAC?
They’re doing both right now. There’s a bunch of ducts and vents in - only thing I see now are plastic boxes where the outlets are going. So I guess they’re doing them together?? We did plumbing and gas walkthrough same time with electrical.
Well, I know it’s a detailed build, but if your guy needs another damn 10 months I’d love to know why!
JFC once the shell is there his electric, plumb and HVAC should maybe take 2 months. Inspect………insulate and drywall. The trim, prime, sit cabinets, paint then lay floors and install fixtures.
You shouldn’t be no 10 months on this part!
JFC once the shell is there his electric, plumb and HVAC should maybe take 2 months. Inspect………insulate and drywall. The trim, prime, sit cabinets, paint then lay floors and install fixtures.
You shouldn’t be no 10 months on this part!
🤷🏽♂️ the electric and HVAC guys told me minimum 2 months and then 2 weeks for drywall and my wife is doing a shit ton of built-ins (to minimize furniture - like built in desks in all the kids bedrooms) so I think trim is going to take a while. We have a ton of landscaping with retaining walls as well unfortunately as our lot is on a hill.
Plumbing should be completed first, then HVAC, then electric. Plumbing should be about two weeks on a house your size, then about a week each on HVAC and electric.
They should be drywalling no later then first of the year. Even if you were doing full custom and wrapping everything in wainscoting and trim, it shouldn't take more than a couple of months. I'd have you ready for move in by April if that were my job.
They should be drywalling no later then first of the year. Even if you were doing full custom and wrapping everything in wainscoting and trim, it shouldn't take more than a couple of months. I'd have you ready for move in by April if that were my job.
I just finished remodeling a 6500 sq ft house and was thinking about retirement 😶
Yep, and has gaps between the treads.
He is, but is having a hell of a time facilitating it. Seems to not be a lot of people close that do the floating staircases. As far as I know, he is in talks with a company called Viewrail. They are based in Goshen Indiana. They are just slow to respond.
The fireplace was manufactured by a company called Acucraft. They don’t do the actual install so that’s up to us to find someone to do that. The fireplace is set in place and framed. Just gotta have someone install the components. First guy quote 14k LOL. He has someone else coming to check it out next week.
Your staircase sounds unreal! Can’t imagine the house it’s self as well. Makes sense why it takes so long to built. Can’t really rush bending wood like that.
With higher prices on the supplies and the interest rates hovering near 7% I am glad I'm not the one building a house right now.
I have 4 neighbors within eyesight of my house that have moved in within the last year or so. Two are from California, one is from Georgia and 1 from Ohio. I also go to church with 1 more from California, 1 from South Carolina and 1 from Florida. Then there is 1 from Texas and 1 from Georgia that I know of. That sure is a lot of folks from all over the country moving to a small town in Southeast KY in such a short time.
Started on the electric last week - HVAC and plumbing about 75% done. Hoping we can get all that finished in March to start drywall. Officially entered the “f*cking finish this house” already part of the process. Not enjoying it at all, keep getting constant overages, whole thing is just frustrating and I’m completely over it. Ordered a bunch of furniture this month which has been 🤢. Just money, money, money
I was worried about this almost a year ago when we were looking. Lots of stories of headaches and increasing costs. Just a nightmare of a process for people.
But you're almost done. And if you waited any long you'd be paying double interest rates.
Interest rates are almost double now from when he started.
Just get that C.O. And get it over. As your 1year goes find and keep a list of shit for the builder to come back and take care of even if it takes him past the 1year as long as it’s stated and agreed to.
Just get that C.O. And get it over. As your 1year goes find and keep a list of shit for the builder to come back and take care of even if it takes him past the 1year as long as it’s stated and agreed to.
The ridiculously low interest rate I locked in for 30 years is my only saving grace from not getting into constant arguments with my wife about the ridiculousness of this house tbh
Everyone told me that I was probably paying 30% more than I would normally be paying pre-pandemic but my wife has a best friend that just started building in Baltimore and I’m not seeing their cost to build that much lower. The builder also told them he’d be done in 8 months and they signed in November and he still hasn’t even started 😂 The labor shortage is definitely still a huge issue it seems
Drywall starts Monday - really excited for this part - got a massive out of this world overage from landscaping as I need 3 retaining walls they didn’t anticipate. Wrote my builder an email bitching him out. One of the most ridiculous nickel and dime industries I’ve ever seen in my life - just get this done so I don’t have to deal with a contractor or builder anytime soon. Christ.
Ya completely insane. They totally misread the grade or some shit. I have no clue what they hell I’m looking at but hopefully the quality is good. Was walking around looking at insulation on Friday but I have no clue what I’m looking at so it’s just blind trust really. The whole thing has been a drawn out mess IMO. I don’t know if it’s the timing of our build, the builder, or a combination of both but I’m just ready to be done with this shit.
It's definitely a tough environment right now, but to me it sounds like you are definitely getting jerked around by your builder too.
Have you considered kicking his ass?
Don't fight guys who do manual labor, in my experience. They have innate old man strength and a serious penchant for opioids and alcohol (or both!), making them nearly impervious to pain.
I always enjoy these threads where people's dreams are dashed into hopeless despair and their lives crumble page after page for our own enjoyment at their ruined lives.
Builders starting to get a little desperate by me. A lot more email marketing going out. Lots of "and we'll throw in $10k of upgrades", buy down rates, etc.
I still don't know where the hell this is going. OP got in at a good time.. but now, who the hell would buy these overpriced homes for 6.5% interest rates? It's insane. I read a few housing articles every ither day, and it's just a nightmare out there.
Hochul for NYS is trying to push through 800,000 homes/units to be built in some x amount of years, in an effort to combat the housing supply shortage (and also turn NY into a bigger cesspool of crime and low income areas). Don't agree with it for many reasons, but it's also an interesting case study in where we are heading.
I still don't know where the hell this is going. OP got in at a good time.. but now, who the hell would buy these overpriced homes for 6.5% interest rates? It's insane. I read a few housing articles every ither day, and it's just a nightmare out there.
Hochul for NYS is trying to push through 800,000 homes/units to be built in some x amount of years, in an effort to combat the housing supply shortage (and also turn NY into a bigger cesspool of crime and low income areas). Don't agree with it for many reasons, but it's also an interesting case study in where we are heading.
Drywall has been pretty awesome, actually feels like a house now. They are currently “painting the joints” so should be done in a couple weeks. Final trim walkthrough this Friday and then I’ll get my last big overage hopefully. Now that I’ve learned about building a house and costs I’ve learned that I was really given a make believe price to commit and then basically every single step has been an additional charge. Really interesting profession to pull that shit off - basically just nickel and diming the entire time. Could never pull that off in my business so bravo to him I guess.
This has been my biggest complaint so far. My builder has been grossly under on his budget on several things so far.
He budgeted our cabinets and countertops together. The price of our cabinets alone are the price of the total for cabinets and countertops he had budgeted. We realize its not even like we are choosing insane cabinets. We could not possibly hit the number he had...Our cabinets and countertops will double the number he gave us for that category.
Another category that had my jaw dropping was the number he gave us for lighting. It is 0.43% of our overall budget. On the low end lighting should be around 0.75% of your budget and high end 5.5%. We are building a nice house. Our recess lighting alone blew the number he had for us. This doesn't take into account the decorative lighting number we got back. We are making changes to try and save money there. But the number we got back for light is 3.5% of the overall budget. So it's not like we picked stuff that totally blew what the budgeted number should have been.
Our builder is a good guy, his guys do great work and he always answers the phone when I call. 95% of the categories that we have no say in, he was pretty accurate on. Just mainly the decorative categories we are picking that he is not that accurate on.
Literally every.single.step for me. He’s a small builder (currently only working on 5 houses) and we meet with him personally and the quality is supposed to be good like yours, but the overages have been ridiculous. When we picked out window the ones he “budgeted” for us were a 38 week wait or something crazy so we went with another brand that was slightly cheaper and downgraded some window options - 1,500 overage. Dafuq? I mean literally everything. And none of this has been us upgrading, we were very clear in what we wanted and have been consistent, it’s just literally he just gave us a lower price to sign that he knew was bullshit.
During the time you built your house……..from the time I did your lumber takeoff to actually starting 10 months ago we had 15 window price increases, 22 exterior door price increases and 13 interior door price increases.
Concrete went up, plumbing went up and so did HVAC.
So ANY of those that his budget was off can somewhat be pinned to astronomical increases he couldn’t have seen as it’s NEVER happened that fast in this industry from what I’m told.
You literally could not have pick a worse time to start, and IIRC you were delayed by a few things that cost like 8 months which would have saved you 10’s of thousands of dollars!
Concrete went up, plumbing went up and so did HVAC.
So ANY of those that his budget was off can somewhat be pinned to astronomical increases he couldn’t have seen as it’s NEVER happened that fast in this industry from what I’m told.
You literally could not have pick a worse time to start, and IIRC you were delayed by a few things that cost like 8 months which would have saved you 10’s of thousands of dollars!
You built during one of the worst times to build. I tried warning you at the beginning.
Material and labor prices have been skyrocketing, and that's if you're able to procure either. I sold every property I owned starting in 2021. Treading water now and planning to jump back in when the market crashes.
Glad you are almost finished though. Building is a tough venture for any family.
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![[laughing]](http://l.yimg.com/j/assets/img/emoticons/classic/laugh.r191677.gif "Laughing [laughing]")
Well gat damn, way to rub it in. I like to think ole Ron Mehico got exactly what he wanted out of his house. More than many of us can say.
