The Before: Pre-Drywall Walkthrough

A little less than two weeks ago, we met with our Project Manger Brendan and our realtor Patty to walk through our house before the contractors began the drywall process.

This meeting was an opportunity for us to see the progress that was made, hear a little bit about the  features that will make our home energy efficient, and to ask any burning questions we had on our minds.

Based on a helpful tip from our realtor, we snapped a bunch of photos of the walls in their bare form.

Patty reminded us that it would be good to have these pictures later down the road as a guide to help avoid puncturing any pipes or wiring when we hang up wall art, shelves, etc.

These photos will also be handy for any future construction projects we may pursue down the line, like adding in a window in our master bedroom or removing a small wall in the basement.

Another nice surprise was learning that we will have a larger master bath shower than normal due to us asking for a shelf/seat to be added early in the construction process.  We would have liked to have a built in shelf nook for the shower, but since that wasn't an option, this solution was our best bet.

Since most of the work was done on the interior, there wasn't a huge difference in the appearance of the outside of our home, but we did finally get the fourth window we had been waiting on put in.

The county inspector came through a few minutes after we wrapped up our conversation and tour with our PM. He happened to mention we had a tough one assigned to our house, which I was happy to hear.

Pictures below.

July 26: We finally have our four large windows in!

July 26: Dining room to the right off our front door.

July 26: Living room fireplace with support framing for TV mount.

July 26: Insulation around venting tubes.

July 26: Lots of piping and electric behind the wall in between our living room and kitchen. 

July 26: Vents and other duct work in attic area of the house.

July 26: Our PM Brendan showing us how we could add a window at a later point. He also let us know all of the windows in the home have special UV protection.

July 26: Master bathroom expanded shower with seat/shelf.

July 26: Basement with markers for wet bar rough-in, which we will add at a later point.

July 26:  This wall under the stairs is not load bearing so a lot of people remove it and add in a door for extra storage space. 

July 26: Circuit breaker box was relocated to a new location for us by our PM.

July 26: Storage room area with water heater, furnace, electrical network, etc.

Progress, Progress, Progress

We had our pre-construction meeting in June with our realtor Patty Blackwelder (who I can't recommend enough), project managers and Ryan Homes representative.

The meeting was fairly straightforward. We went through all of our pre-selected interior and exterior options and talked about the schedule for the build.

Apparently, our house is being completed much quicker than we anticipated, which was a neat surprise, but also created some anxiety since we had always planned for an October move-in. Luckily, Patty helped us get that squared away so there are no lingering worries for us on that front.

We were also happy to find out during the meeting that our head PM had a score of 99/100 on his last house, which was apparently one of the highest ratings to date in the community. Not that we have heard any negative stories from folks who built in Potomac Shores, but it is nice to know that our home will be in good hands.

Since that meeting less than seven weeks ago, we've watched our lot go from a flat piece of land, to a large hole, to concrete walls, and now to a point where we can actually begin to see the finished product.

Photos of our progress below:

June 5: This was taken right after our pre-construction meeting.

June 11: Less than a week later, we swung by the house and saw foundation walls up.

June 27: A photo from our realtor showing the concrete slab poured over our future garage.

July 2: We have wood framing up.

July 2: Another shot taken from inside our future kitchen looking towards the living room.

July 7: The beginning stages of our main floor, garage and porch.

July 11: More framing progress. 

July 18: Exterior of the house is coming along. Fourth large window pending.

July 18: Living room and fireplace.

July 18: We have stairs!

July 18: Future dining room looking out to front porch.

July 18: Basement with full bathroom in sight.

We have our pre-drywall walk through with our PM Brendan next Wednesday. I'm impressed with him so far, especially since he took the time to face time with us today to ensure that the crew was putting our utility box in the place we wanted it in our basement.

We're super excited to hear about the progress in-person and to learn  about all the ways they are making our home energy efficient.

Till next time!

Playing Catch Up Pt. 2: Guardian Meeting

Two posts in two days? Isn't that a bit much?

Sorry guys. We promised to catch everyone up on the latest and greatest while I was MIA, so you're just going to have to bear with me this week.

June was a bit of a blur. I was traveling for half the month in Texas for work, and then returned to an almost completely framed house. 

A lot happened between May and June though, so let's rewind and take a step back to revisit our wiring and security selections.

In May, we met with our representative from Guardian. They are the vendor/contractor that our community uses for everything from wiring, to speakers, to security systems, and even swanky (and very expensive) features like an in-house HVAC system for new homes.

We went into this meeting knowing we would limit our expenses on this front to the bare necessities since we knew we could install an in-house sound system and speakers on our own later down the road for less if we wanted.

Like a lot of the meetings you have when building with Ryan Homes, you tend to go into this a bit blind. The representatives are hesitant to share too much with you in regards to options and costs ahead of time since people are generally more likely to spend more if they make decisions impulsively.  As the wife of a sales representative, I understand the tactic, but as a buyer and natural planner, it would be nice to get a little more information in advance.

On the day of the meeting, we met with Mike at one of the model homes of our community. He was friendly and walked us through all of the items we would be discussing. First up on the docket was our wiring/cable needs for internet, phone and television. We ended up doing data/cables in the living room, basement and all the bedrooms. We also added the mounting option for a television above the fireplace.

In terms of speakers and surround sound, etc., we skipped out on that option just like we planned. We also anticipated opting out of the security package, but that changed after doing some research post-meeting. A little googling helped us realize that their prices were competitive and the fact that the system was hard wired into the house was a definite plus over other wireless options. 

Adam travels a fair amount for work so it's nice that I'll be able to sleep soundly knowing we have an alarm in place should any intruders try to make their way into our home.

Buying a House 101: A Husband’s Perspective

Introduction:

My wife Amanda and I have rented rooms in group houses, townhouses and apartments in Washington, DC for the last 10 years. Some of the recent areas we were proud to take our parents to, other places we lived in only felt safe during the day. Some of the apartments had pools on the roof and dog parks, others had absolutely no storage space and suspect landlords. Such is life in DC – you get what you pay for, but as we enter the next stage in our lives as newlyweds, we are fortunate to be leaving the rental game and buying our first house. This blog post details what went through my mind as we started our journey to find a house.

Action on the home front

Step 1: Deciding What We Could Afford and How We Planned for the Purchase

My wife and I are blessed in our current jobs. She is a stellar PR director for a nonprofit that used to work for a lobbying firm and I am three years deep into my career as a medical equipment sales rep after a number of years working for a consulting firm.

We dreamed of buying in DC for years, but had only been Zillow “lurkers” up until the time we got married in November 2016. At that point we decided to start taking steps toward being able to buy. The first thing we did was take full inventory of our debts and start seriously monitoring our credit scores to see where we fell on the spectrum. I had a car note, student loan debt, and we both had some minor credit card debt. I set a goal to pay off all of my car and student loan debt by April 1, 2017 so we could start looking for a house by that Fall. 

After I paid off my car and student debt by my target date and we both felt comfortable enough with our strong credit scores, we began seriously looking at the real estate market. I initially started by playing with home mortgage calculators online to see what we could expect to pay in a monthly mortgage based on home prices. 

Knowing what we pay in rent currently, we set a target price of $525,000 – with a maximum budget out the door at $600,000. We felt comfortable we could come up with 10% in six months for our down payment – knowing full well that we would not qualify for any first time grants due to our combined income. But how far would our budgets go in the country’s third most expensive housing market? That was the big question.

Step 2: Deciding What to Buy and Where to Buy

It became very clear early on that we had three options, and only three options for housing in the city: buy a small two bedroom condo in an area like Navy Yard (our current neighborhood) or Petworth, buy a two bedroom townhouse in an area like Rhode Island Avenue, or buy a three bedroom fixer upper in an area that might be up and coming in the next 10-15 years. We had a serious conversation to set parameters behind what we HAD to have with our money. 

My only non-negotiable was that the house had to be able to serve as a safe house for our extended family. My own family has had their share of ups and downs and I had to keep the biggest promise I made to my Mom when she passed away – that I would do everything possible to take care of my Dad. I needed at least enough space that we could have a child – God willing – and an extra bedroom for emergencies. 

My wife had her own set of goals (thanks HGTV!), and after a brief discussion we knew quickly that we would need to move outside the city to find a house that met our needs and didn't break the bank. So we narrowed it down to Reston and Ashburn/Loudoun County to the west, and Woodbridge and Manassas to the south. I travel HWY 66, I-495 and I-395 enough that I was always going to be partial to heading to the southern Virginia suburbs (thanks in large part to my company-sponsored EZ Pass). 

Amanda took charge early on sending me listings and I kept up with numerous reports about the Silver Line being built out in Loudoun County.  Nothing ever really caught my eye out west for the price point there though.

While on Facebook one day, I saw a Potomac Shores ad and I became incredibly intrigued at the advertised starting prices and the pictures on their web page. The houses looked like something out of a post card – somewhere I could see myself raising a family-- and it didn't hurt that it was voted the #1 new community of the year in 2016.

Our first visit to the community sealed the deal and of course we could easily afford a house starting in the upper $400’s – right?

Step 3: How to Build a House

As a naïve renter, I had no idea that upper $400’s meant the shell and that’s about it. Everything my wife (and I to a lesser extent) wanted came with a price tag. 

Want extra carpet padding? Upgraded granite counter tops? A fireplace? Better elevation? Bigger lot? Cha-ching! Quickly, I realized we could easily add $75K-$100K to the base price – but then we got incredibly lucky. 

A house (the last one in the Fairways Cove neighborhood) fell back on the market and we pounced quickly. I got the email blast about the house on a Thursday and the next day we were there to scope out the lot and have a discussion with our real estate agent Patty Blackwelder and Ryan Homes. We had another conversation re-visiting our housing budget since there were also some new lots that came up for sale in another area of the community that day that we began considering.  

Due to the urgency of needing to sell the lot, Ryan Homes threw in all sorts of incentives and free upgrades at us that would slash the build budget by tens of thousands, including a deck, upgraded countertops and appliances, crown molding, a washer and dryer, finished basement and $10K to put towards closing. The offer was too good to pass up so we jumped and put $5k down less than 24 hours after seeing the original email.

My wife has covered the selection meetings in-depth, but hopefully this paints some picture of the anxiety that is created when you don’t realize every selection can come with a cost. But the words to remember here are OPPORTUNITY and RESELL. 

What will happen when we go to sell our house in 5, 10, 15 years in what will then be a potentially packed residential development? What happens when our home is competing against similar homes at comparable price points? 

You begin to wonder about how construction elements like a finished basement and welled exit that you may or may not have decided to add will affect the price of your house. This is when it's helpful to have a real estate agent like Patty who can identify unique opportunities like ours that will help you get the most bang for your buck, and who can talk facts and figures with you to help decide what options will pay off the most in the future should you need to sell. 

Real estate is ultimately a gamble on what the future market holds, which leads me to…

Step 4: Betting the Future

This is the section where I talk about what I don’t know.

Map of  Planned Potomac Shores Amenities

Even during out first tour of the community we were told that there will be a VRE station opening in early 2018 (which was originally supposed to be early 2017). We have been told there will be a commercial development featuring restaurants, a luxury hotel, shopping – all within walking distance of the Potomac Shores Club House. 

As someone building my house in the neighborhood this all sounds incredible and I can see the house appreciating with every future announcement. But in my head, what happens if none of this comes to fruition? What happens if the proposed townhouses and villas end up not selling which discourages commercial development? 

This seems doubtful given all the buzz and current sales in the community, but you never really know. Ultimately, we decided we are okay with things the way they are now – and that’s why I know this was the right call. 

We are happy with what the house holds for us in the community’s current state. If the house you are buying or building will be your primary residence, you really have to be happy with what the current neighborhood offers today, not tomorrow, in order to be comfortable spending your hard earned money. This includes everything from your commute to the schools, area amenities and more. 

I'll admit there are a couple of things that I would change if I could.  Anytime I start to get sad about a smaller back yard than we originally anticipated or a price tag that would be considered high anywhere outside of this area though – I remember that our yard is bigger than anything we could have found in DC and the house is a size that will allow us and our families to grow into it.  This is something that would not have been possible in DC, where we would have been sized out of a small condo or townhouse within the next 2-3 years. 

I can’t wait to see what the finished product looks like and am looking forward to writing more about this amazing journey.  Expect to see more posts from me in the future!

Adam

Playing Catch Up: Our Final Structural and 14-Day Choices

Sorry for being MIA there for a while guys, life caught up with me so I'm a bit behind documenting our progress (of which there has been a lot) on the house.  This is post one of playing catch up on our experiences thus far.

First things first, we officially have our exterior colors for the house!!!  Woohoo!!!

Model house that shows our color scheme.

Pardon the excitement, but you cannot believe how long I've wanted a red door on a future home.

If you can't tell from the photo, we went with the Arctic White color scheme, which includes the aforementioned red door, white hardiplank siding, dark brown/blue shutters, tan garage door and catawba ridge brick for front and side accents of the house.

Given the color scheme choice, we also made the decision to upgrade our "elevation".  Not sure if this term is used by other builders, but for Ryan Homes "elevation" is used to essentially describe the structural look of the home.

The standard Venice (which is our house type) does not come with the accent shutters.  We knew the extra character and color contrast would be worth it in the end so we bit the bullet and upgraded to the higher elevation.

During our 14-day meeting, we also made the decision to skip-out on the deck that was included with our home.  Originally the deck seemed like a great idea, but we figured a fence, small deck landing and large patio would ultimately make the most sense for how we like to live so we decided to leave it out.

Having a deck when we moved in would have been really nice, but we knew we could ultimately customize a lot more for a lot less if we held out and went with an independent contractor for this after closing.

For the kitchen, we opted to add the gourmet kitchen island which will allow for bar stool seating and ample cooking space, as well as three pendant light rough-ins for above the island.

Photo of a Ryan Homes gourmet island and pendant lights

With regards to other structural changes, we also added in a fireplace to the living room, a couple extra windows, a bathroom in the basement, a rough-in for a future wet bar, ceiling fan rough-ins for the bedrooms, and lots of recessed lighting.

That's it for today. We'll be posting a few more catch-up posts in the coming days, with a special guest post from my other half.

Till next time!

Tiles, Flooring and More...

Our tiling and flooring appointment at T.A.C. flooring in Manassas was less than 14 days after we signed on the dotted line.

This appointment was the one I was most looking forward to, but also the one that caused the most anxiety. I knew from online research and blogs what I generally wanted most of our selections to look like, but it was a little scary going in there without having a sense of what the upgrades would cost.

Luckily, we were able to splurge in some areas and save money in others.

For our selections, I leaned heavily on this inspiration photo. It was from a Ryan Homes model that I found online while doing some googling.

Kitchen Inspiration

For our kitchen, we wanted a clean and white crisp loom.  We opted to go with the Rushmore Painted Linen cabinets (Level 2 ) for the entire house.  I was a little torn between the Sonoma cabinet style used in the model and the Rushmore style, but ultimately picked Rushmore as I liked the extra detailing on the doors.

Our granite selection was a little trickier, I had a difficult time deciding between three different colors: Luna Pearl (Level 1), Bianco Diamante (Level 2) and Azul Platino (Level 2). Ultimately, we went with the Luna Pearl granite because it was lighter and brighter than the other two.

Azul Platino, Luna Pearl and Bianco Diamante

The kitchen backsplash was fairly easy. I loved the look of subway tile, but wanted something a little different.  We found a beautiful natural marble subway tile (Level 3) with hints of gray throughout. We thought it would look fantastic with the the white cabinets and Luna Pearl granite.

White Marble Kitchen Backsplash

Flooring was also simple . We knew we wanted dark hardwood floors throughout the main level of the house as well as the hallway of the upstairs. While the addition of hardwoods to the upstairs hallway was a pricier upgrade due to the fact that it is a red flag item (ie custom change) with Ryan Homes, we thought it would be worth it in the long run given the volume of traffic in the hallway and the fact that we have two dogs.

We ended up choosing Armstrong Engineered Wood 5”– Misty Gray flooring (Level 3) for the majority of the house. Since we plan on having gray tones throughout, we thought the unique coloring of the hardwood would accent some of other selections.  Here are all of our kitchen selections together:

Kitchen Cabinet, Granite, Backsplash and Floor

For our bathrooms, we went ahead and went with a clean and simple look with Rushmore Painted Linen Cabinets throughout. The differences between the three bathrooms in our house will mostly be in the flooring and tiling choices,all of which play on white and gray undertones.

The master bathroom was a bit of a splurge since we went with Level 3 selections. I couldn't help falling for the simplicity and modern look of the 3” x 6” White Brick-Joint Subway Tile with the 12x24 Gray Grigio Floor Tile so we bit the bullet and upgraded from the standard 4x4 white tile and floors that come standard with Ryan Homes.

Our Master Bathroom Floor and Shower Tile Choice with Grout Color

The guest bathroom will have the below Level 2 shower and floor tile. For the basement bathroom, we decided to save some money and only upgrade the floors to the below gray tiling.

Guest Bathroom and Basement Bathroom Tiling and Floors

For the bedroom and basement flooring, we had no problem going with the standard carpet that Ryan Homes included. I can't remember the color of the carpet, but it's in the below picture, along with the vinyl we picked for the laundry room. We did go ahead and upgrade the padding though since we have dogs and they have accidents from time to time.

Carpet and Vinyl Flooring

We also opted to go with the oil rubbed bronze finish for all of our interior finishes, which includes our front door handle/lock, kitchen and bathroom faucets, door handles, shower frame, and more.  This is a small change that will make a big impact in the overall look and feel of the house.

Oil-rubbed bronze kitchen and bathroom faucets.

That's it for all of our internal selections. We'll cover our external/structural and Guardian choices in our next post.  Happy building to all you Ryan Homes folks!

All of our Final Selections

Tick, Tock, Tick, Tock

So you just bought a house? Time to rest on your laurels for a bit right? Wrong!

The moment after you sign your contract on a Ryan Homes house, the clock officially starts ticking.

Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

You have two sets of dates when most of your major interior and exterior decisions must be completed by.

These decisions fall into two major buckets: 14-day and 30-day.

Your required 14-day order includes a lot of the big ticket item decisions you will need to make regarding structural additions or upgrades. Examples of these items are as follows:

• Elevation Upgrade
• Morning Room Add-On
• Fireplace 
• Finished Basement 
• Gourmet Kitchen Upgrade
• Master Bathroom Configuration
• Plumbing - Wet Bar or Basement Bathroom Rough-Ins
• Electrical - Ceiling Fan Rough-Ins and Recessed Lighting
• Deck  

Playing around with exterior color option ideas.

Your 30-day decisions are definitely more fun.  This is when you get the opportunity to make the house a little more your own, as opposed to the standard builder including options. By this date, you will have picked the below:

• Appliance Packages
• Exterior Colors
• Flooring (Hardwood, Carpet, Tile)
• Kitchen Cabinet Type and Color 
• Kitchen Granite
• Kitchen Backsplash (if you selected to do one)
• Bathroom Cabinet Type and Color
• Bathroom Countertops
• Bathroom Flooring and Tile
• Hardware Finish (Standard or Oil Rubbed Bronze)

I'm not sure if this is the case at all Ryan Homes communities, but at Potomac Shores there is a designated Customer Satisfaction Specialist who helps walk you through all of your structural and interior/exterior options.  It's definitely a lot easier making these decisions when you can see things in person, but it helps to have some idea of what your vision is for the house.

We had a few options we could pick from for our cabinet, granite and vanity top selections:

Standard (Level 00) and Upgraded Cabinet Options for Kitchen/Bathrooms

Level 1 Granite and Level 2 Granite Options for Kitchen/Bathrooms

Bathroom Vanity Top Options

For flooring and tiling, you will go to a designated design center.  I suggest booking that appointment as soon as you can as they tend to book up extremely fast.

Before your 30-days is up, you will also have a separate appointment with Guardian to go over your wiring and security needs. 

Your two-hour allotted windows for these selections go fast so I'd highly recommend taking a look at  the above options and doing some "Ryan Homes" online sleuthing to see what other buyers have done in their homes. Pinterest is great for this as well. 

If you are a Potomac Shores buyer like myself, there are a number of other great blogs out there that are extremely helpful on this front. I have a few highlighted on my reading list, but two of my favorites thus far are Potomac Shores Living and Living with an Elizabeth.

I will cover our experiences for those meetings in a future post, as well as all of our final selections. Till next time...