Thursday, January 3, 2013

Flooring and Electrical Meetings Tomorrow

Tomorrow we have our meetings to firm up our selections, first with the low-voltage wiring company and then with the flooring company. I have an idea of what I want with wiring (some surround sound, extra cable and networking drops, and wiring for wall-mounted tv's), and we have some idea of what we want with the bathrooms but we won't know for sure until we get there tomorrow. If anyone is following this blog secretly (since I am currently my only follower), do have any tips or questions that I should ask NOW so that I don't get into trouble in the future? Anything and everything is welcome.

29 comments:

  1. We did the guardian surround sound and wall mounted TV wiring. When you get the wall mount, they will wire an outlet where the TV will be,mwhich is fn, but make sure your PM has electric it another outlet directly under- where it will be blocked by furniture. Our outlets are another 4 feet away, which is dub because all the wires for the receiver, DVD, etc is exposed.

    Sorry for the typos- on my phone!

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    1. I'll make sure to do that. I've seen another blogger who had everything in the great room wired to the the closet in the mud room. I'm considering doing this, or having the wiring connections run to the home office adjacent to the great room so that I can keep everything out of there. But in the other rooms I will make sure that the PM has the outlets lights up.

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  2. And please turn off the word verification! You'll get more comments...trust me!

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    1. Changed! Didn't even realize that was a thing.

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  3. Sorry, more thoughts... If you get recessed lighting in the kitchen, think about maybe having them placed above the island so you can do pendants if you choose to do so. Also, lights in. Closets- oh, I soooo wish we'd thought of that! Closets can be so dark, especially in our kids bedrooms and those stick up lights aren't that great. In the morning room, if you plan to get a buffet in there, think about getting an outlet behind the buffet, in case you want lights and don't want cords showing. Think about an extra light in the garage. Upgrade your carpet padding, but forget it on the carpet if you have kids! Ask where the half hots will be.

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    1. Hi E!! Are you blogging? I would love to follow your journey. How can we find you and what type of home are you building? We are building Rome in Maryland.

      ricknadase.blogspot.com

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    2. Good point about the closet lighting, I'll have to look into that. And we are definitely planning on upgrading the carpet padding, adding tile in the bathrooms, and hardwood throughout most of the downstairs.

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  4. Hi Brian, what neighborhood are you building in? My husband and I will be building in Eagle Harbor.

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    1. We are building in Eagle Harbor as well. Lot 131. How about you?

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    2. Wow, you guys are neighbors!!! Sherita, I wish we were!! lol

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    3. Yep, Annie told me today Brian. We are building in lot 89 near the entrance of the neighborhood. Can't wait. Way cool to meet a future neighbor. My blog is not quite as interesting as yours Brian (or Nadase's). Finishing up grad school but i'm hoping to post more once we have some movement. We go for our loan app on Tuesday 1/8/13. We will have to have you over for the big housewarming/cookout bash. :) Happy Building!

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    4. Absolutely. I expect my blogging will fall off in a week or two when I head back to school myself. We had our meeting with the LO this past week...now its just the long wait till construction start.

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  5. 1. Additional outlets in the following places:

    gourmet island (one is standard but you may want another one on the opposite end or the side), inside the master bathroom cabinet if you shave or use a blow dryer), outlet inside or above cabinet for router or under cabinet lightening, if your laundry will be stored in basement get an outlet in the basement for ironing, dedicated outlet outside for xmas lights, water hose in the location you desire ( we have a front porch and they installed the hose bid directly in the middle of the porch so we had them install it on the side of the house where most of the grass needs watering)j, if you are getting a fireplace have them install the switch on the wall closet to the window to avoid interrupting picture hangings, this is only necessary if you only have one window etc.

    okay, we had 68 different lightening options in our home -- I think I need to do a blog post before we close next Friday!

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    1. The one sad side of where we are building is that we cannot have a basement. I will definitely be adding outlets. Two additional in the garage, and that's a good point about one for possible future under-cabinet lighting (since we did NOT opt for that feature. and adding on inside the master bath cabinet for chargeables didn't even occur to me but that is a fantastic idea to keep clutter off of the vanity top.

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    2. Uggg wish I had asked for under master bath cabinet outlet. Great idea Nadase (you always have great ideas). RH should hire you to consult!

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  6. Figure out what your preference is for the transition from hardwood to carpet, if applicable...some people don't like the hardwood's edge and prefer the little strip that goes across. I didn't like the strip so I don't have a picture, but I do remember a blogger doing a post about it. Don't remember which one, though, I have too many to keep track of! :) Find out if your shower comes with a soap dish, and make sure you approve of its color. Some people got stark white when everything else was beige and it looked weird. And the biggest flooring tip of all: don't feel like you have to make every decision on the spot. As long as you get your selections in within 30 days you're fine...so if you can't make up your mind and need to ponder it, make another appointment! Carpet is easy to switch later but hardwood and tile are much more involved.

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    1. I have a wood strip that transitions from wood floor to carpet. There is a pic on my blog, although there wasn't any carpet installed when I took the pic.

      http://buildingourmozart.blogspot.com/2012/12/homesite-visit-week-11.html

      I also agree about the soap dish issue. We got upgraded tile in our roman shower and opted to omit the towel bar and soap dish and ended up paying extra for corner shelves that match a little better. Totally worth the extra expense!

      The one thing I regret is not getting the tray ceiling in the master. All of those structural things are near impossible to do later on, where you can always get someone to come in and wire your surround sound for you. We ended up not doing the tray and replaced it (due to budgetary concerns) with the surround sound. I wish I could undo that!

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    2. Brian, the blog Amanda is referring too is Sgt Rich (That's Right It's Another Verona??) --he made some adjustments for the transition from wood to carpet. It was a simple fix. Also check out Ravenna Speed (Thomas) & ohh by all means check out Mike with the media closet too (he built a Waverly). You can find all their blogs listed under Amanda's tab on her blog.

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  7. Brian, I invited friends to your blog so now you have friends/followers for feedback! YAY!

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  8. Hi guys! Just started to follow your blog. We are building in Eagle Harbor also. We are lot 85 (We were the first sale ) We are building a Palermo as well! We will be closing 4 April, and can't wait to meet some of our future neighbors!

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    1. http://teamparks2012.blogspot.com/?m=1

      Heres the link to my blog, Lot 89 Eagle Harbor

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    2. Hey Stephanie! Great to come across someone else in the neighborhood. I have also been (jealously) following your build. My fiancé and I took a tour this weekend! I look forward to seeing the finished product. Its always interesting to see the different options that people pick out.

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  9. Hi Stephanie, Lot 89 here. :) We have been periodically checking out your build as we wait for ours to get started. We were the 2nd contract written but we had some delays with our loan processing so we are going to Pre-construction. I have a blog as well. We are building a Ravenna. Looking forward to meeting you.

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  10. We are getting super excited, and have also been patiently waiting (ok maybe impatiently) since September for our house to be built. We have really enjoyed seeing our selections come together since most of them were made by email from California :-/ We have really had our fingers crossed that everything looks good together ;) We really look forward to meeting all of you! Did you guys decide to go with a deck from RH or are you guys doing it after closing? We are looking for a reputable company that does trex decking...do you guys happen to know anyone?

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    1. We got our deck through RH. And I also mentioned the attic storage and i've seen a Palermo that does a much better job of routing the hvac, I want to show Trenton and see if he can do anything about it. I can post a picture and show you.

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    2. That would be awesome. We had to be refunded for our attic storage because it was terrible but we are looking at other possibilities of adding decking in the attic (in another location) so that we can have storage. My husband and I thought the best location (if we would have known) for the attic storage would have been in the bonus room, and not the small bedroom.

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    3. The picture is in my pre-construction post. Talked to our PM today and he let me know that he is working to make some more room in yours and that would give us a better idea of how much space we would have in ours. Hope it works out well for both of us!

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    4. Hi Stephanie. I was added to an Eagle Harbour private community group page (Facebook) by a friend and someone posted information about a contractor in the Carrollton area who does decks. His website is http://www.chrismanelectricandhomeimprovements.com/services.html

      There are pictures of some of the decking he has done on his page as well.

      If you guys want me to add you to the page just friend me on FB "Sherita Parks". Let me know if you can't find me.

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  11. Got my deck thru RH as well. We will most likely be hiring a contractor to do a patio at some point but wanted to at least have the deck to start with.

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