So after a week delay, we finally closed and the dirt is now ours. And the bank's.
The dirt is a little more than dirt. When they built the house next door, a few bricks and pieces of wood were tossed over the fence. There are also chunks of concrete left over from the house that used to be here. There are also weeds taller than me. And due to the neglected look of the property, we're starting to collect other random garbage.
So MrDinks has decided to clean it up. We headed over on Sunday morning with the truck, some tools, garbage bags and work gloves. The first goal was to clear up the inorganic stuff. We found a 5 gallon bucket of motor oil, an old pallet, bagged grass clippings, approximately 400 feet of unused rebar, a few planter boxes, some antique gardening tools, a giant wool rug, a wooden bench, and a couch. Yes, a couch. At some point in the 2-3 weeks since we last visited the dirt, someone has dumped their couch. It wasn't there when we went to measure for the garage to determine if we needed to cut down the back tree. But as of Sunday, it was under the tree we were measuring. It was probably in good shape before it spent a week or 2 under our tree. Someone would have responded to a kijij ad. But instead, we get to load it up and haul it away.
A few of our new neighbours adopted some of the stuff, the rest we hauled the dump. One guy stopped by and asked if the lot was going up for sale. We told him we just bought it. We should have asked him what he was interested in paying.
On Monday, while I was in the dentist chair, I got a call from the tree removal company we hired. By the time I phoned him back, the back tree was gone and the logs loaded up in their truck. Fortunately I reminded him that we wanted the other tree cut into 12' lengths in order for someone to pick them up to turn into furniture. We wanted both left in long lengths, but it was too late for the first tree. I also got over to take a couple pictures while the front tree was coming down. They were both nice, large trees. But the back one was too close to the garage, and the front one would block our front door.
Our meeting with Ryan last week wasn't as productive as we'd hoped. He had misunderstood how wide we wanted the house. But once he understood, it required re-configuring most of the layout. We got new drawings on Monday, which are much closer to final. We had to do more re-configuring because we had a 23'x13' kitchen, which is too big even for me, and a 14'x14' living room, which is a bit too cozy. I sketched up the drawings and sent them back. Hopefully by the time we meet tomorrow, we'll be planning out the window locations.We need to get the plans in for permits in the next week or so to have any hope of breaking ground before Christmas.
Tonight, we're going up in the bucket truck again, now that we know exactly where our floor is going to be, to take more pictures of the view.
The dirt is a little more than dirt. When they built the house next door, a few bricks and pieces of wood were tossed over the fence. There are also chunks of concrete left over from the house that used to be here. There are also weeds taller than me. And due to the neglected look of the property, we're starting to collect other random garbage.
So MrDinks has decided to clean it up. We headed over on Sunday morning with the truck, some tools, garbage bags and work gloves. The first goal was to clear up the inorganic stuff. We found a 5 gallon bucket of motor oil, an old pallet, bagged grass clippings, approximately 400 feet of unused rebar, a few planter boxes, some antique gardening tools, a giant wool rug, a wooden bench, and a couch. Yes, a couch. At some point in the 2-3 weeks since we last visited the dirt, someone has dumped their couch. It wasn't there when we went to measure for the garage to determine if we needed to cut down the back tree. But as of Sunday, it was under the tree we were measuring. It was probably in good shape before it spent a week or 2 under our tree. Someone would have responded to a kijij ad. But instead, we get to load it up and haul it away.
A few of our new neighbours adopted some of the stuff, the rest we hauled the dump. One guy stopped by and asked if the lot was going up for sale. We told him we just bought it. We should have asked him what he was interested in paying.
On Monday, while I was in the dentist chair, I got a call from the tree removal company we hired. By the time I phoned him back, the back tree was gone and the logs loaded up in their truck. Fortunately I reminded him that we wanted the other tree cut into 12' lengths in order for someone to pick them up to turn into furniture. We wanted both left in long lengths, but it was too late for the first tree. I also got over to take a couple pictures while the front tree was coming down. They were both nice, large trees. But the back one was too close to the garage, and the front one would block our front door.
Our meeting with Ryan last week wasn't as productive as we'd hoped. He had misunderstood how wide we wanted the house. But once he understood, it required re-configuring most of the layout. We got new drawings on Monday, which are much closer to final. We had to do more re-configuring because we had a 23'x13' kitchen, which is too big even for me, and a 14'x14' living room, which is a bit too cozy. I sketched up the drawings and sent them back. Hopefully by the time we meet tomorrow, we'll be planning out the window locations.We need to get the plans in for permits in the next week or so to have any hope of breaking ground before Christmas.
Tonight, we're going up in the bucket truck again, now that we know exactly where our floor is going to be, to take more pictures of the view.
