There were lots of steps that had to occur before we could officially "start building" the house. And these steps had to occur in a specific order and most could not overlap.
- Apply for Construction Loan
- Get Appraisal Ordered thru bank (2 weeks)
- Get Land Survey (1-2 wks)
- Apply for Building Permit
- 911 Address (5 minutes)
- Sanitation Department Permit (3-5 Business days)
- Plan Review & Building Permit Issue (5-10 B. days)
- Close on Loan
- Get Site Review & Approval for Electricity (3-5 days)
- Get Electricity Turned On (5-10 days)
Getting a building permit definitely takes a little hoop jumping. Thankfully, all of the ladies that I worked with were really helpful and nice.
Here are the hoops and time frame (to the best of my memory).
Get a 911 Address at the Courthouse. This was surprisingly easy and quick. It took less than 5 minutes. Then take the approved 911 address form to the Sanitation Department. We attempted to get passed for sewage field lines (we failed). But in order to do the test, we (Pappy & Buster) had to dig 3 30 inch deep holes, fill them with water for 2 days, and then get the sanitation lady to come test. Let me note here that this was before we got any of the rain lately, and the ground was hard. Rock solid hard. The boys were not happy about this task. 30 inches never looked so deep. So since we "failed" our test b/c the water didn't soak into the ground properly, it looks like we are going to have an over land system. Which, ironically, I found out later is actually cheaper than the field lines. Go figure!
Here are a couple pictures of Pappy & Buster digging their holes. They had to get inventive since the ground was so hard.
After getting our sanitation permit, I dropped the plans off at the clerk of court office (with the permit and plan review fee). Thankfully, my fear that this step would be difficult and time consuming was unfounded.
While the boys were digging their 30 inches holes, I decided to go ahead and mark off exactly where we wanted the house. We originally, had it parallel with the woods, but decided to angle the house with the hill. In the end, I'm really glad that we did, b/c it is going to make the view better out the back, my elevated front porch works better, and it saved us alot of money not only with the dirtwork but also other foundation issues. Buster likes to remind me that he suggested this a couple months ago but I wouldn't hear him out. :)
We decided to use Channing Nolan of C&L Construction for our dirtwork and housepad. They brought out the trackhoe and dozier. They did an excellent job and I was pleasantly surprised by how fast they worked. This is the only task in the entire house building process that we agreed on an hourly rate instead of a by job basis. Hourly rates truly worry me. But they worked fast, didn't stretch out their time, and actually came in well below the job estimate (granted the estimate was given before we angled the house... but still I felt like I definitely got my money's worth).
In this picture, they are removing the topsoil.
Chris Terral (the son of our father/son framing team) came out to make sure that the housepad dimensions were correct and properly placed. Though he didn't have to do this b/c we are contracting out the house ourselves, I was extremely happy that he did. Definitely going above and beyond the required job. Even though we are still early in the building process, I have already learned that having a main person that you completely trust is extremely helpful and comforting.
Per my design, the front porch is elevated 2 feet on the furthermost side from the house. Since the house will be built on a concrete slab, they had to dig out with the trackhoe to make this edge.
This is the completed housepad. The little step up in the front is where my elevated front porch will be. Thankfully, they didn't have to bring in a lot of dirt.
Here is our driveway. And yes, it is steep. Once the house is finished, we will blacktop just this entryway. We really had limited options on the driveway due to coming out below the hill on the main road. So we had to move all the way on top of the hill for safety reasons. And wouldn't you know it, the gas line is just on top of that ridge and is only buried 3 feet deep. Therefore, we couldn't dig out the driveway like we originally planned.
I've already learned that some things just are out of my control and I just have to let them go. When the guy from the electric company came out to give us the approval for electricity and set the pole location, he informed us that the line had to have a 40 feet opening between trees (limb to limb). The line is coming across the road almost directly in front of our carport. So my beautiful tree-lined privacy barrier from the road just got a huge 40 foot hole put in it. Lovely! Just lovely! And since we didn't know this until after the dirt guys were gone, guess who got to cut those trees. Yeh, that is right. Pappy & Buster. Again, they were super excited.
When we were on the last tree Saturday afternoon, a huge soaking rain came down. There was not a dry spot on any of us. But since we were already wet, we decided to just finish.
And here are the stumps. Aren't they just lovely. We will eventually do something with them, but right now we just needed to get them down. We, also now have a pile of nice-size pine trees. Wish I could get my lumber out of them from the house.
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