Darty Home Project

What's it been like?

2011-03-25T07:58:00.000-04:00

Getting situated and used to our new house has been pretty painless and enjoyable. Since our house is a "Energy Star Certified" home and a "Green" home Duke Power gives us a 5% discount on our bill every month. And by the way, our monthly power bill through the last 3 cold winter months was only $55.00/month (average). Which was a very nice surprise! I look forward to seeing how we do in the summer when the A/C is running.
One thing we noticed while the house was being built that has been nice now that we're moved in and the weather is warming; is there is a great breeze that comes from the lake to our house. These last few warm days we were able to open the windows on the deck and the top half of the front door and enjoy a pleasant breeze to keep the house cool.

The neighborhood has been great as well. Ashlyn and Wyatt have friends next door that are pretty well aged matched that they enjoy playing with. There is not a lot of traffic, so the kids can ride and play in the cul de sac without worrying about getting run over. PCI Builders keeps the other construction sites clean, I haven't had any nails in my tires. I'm looking forward to using the lake more and taking the kids fishing.

Now that we're in

2010-12-01T17:13:00.000-05:00

We've been happily in our new home for a couple weeks now, still trying to work out new routines to get things back to normal. I thought I would give an update on what we've been up to

Shades
We finally (today actually) had our blinds installed on the house. It's amazing how much you miss coverings on your windows until you don't have any. Steve Spicer came out and did a great job installing 2" faux wood blinds on all our windows, so we now have some privacy.

Home Entertainment:
We finally bought a TV and blu-ray player for our home entertainment system. We bought a plasma that has the capability of viewing 3D videos along with normal 2D.

Home intranet:
I learned the hard way that Time Warner Cable blocks you from enabling DHCP on their cable modems. This is very frustating, but also about as useful as locking your car with the windows down.
I got around it by installing Apple's Airport Extreme wireless router and now I'm up and running.

Ikea:
We needed several furniture pieces to make the house comfortable. We spent a day at Ikea in Charlotte and bought everything we needed. After 2 days of assembly we're enjoying it.

GOLD!

2010-10-20T16:06:00.000-04:00

THE RESULTS ARE IN, AND OUR HOUSE WON GOLD IN THE PARADE OF HOMES FOR 2010!

We have a lot of people to thank, first and foremost our builder Chris Thompson of PCI Builders in Kernersville, NC. He not only took a floor plan we found on the internet and turned it into the beautiful house we're going to move into soon, but also gave lots of advice on architectural changes we could do to the house to improve it (must have worked!).

Mark and Suzette Shelton of Shelton Kitchens and Baths did an amazing job helping us design a kitchen within our budget and also installing the kitchen. This is one of the biggest kitchens we've ever seen and has more storage than we've ever had.

Josh Robertson of Graybrooke construction did an excellent job designing and installing the low voltage wiring I wanted in the house. He was responsible for running the internet cableing, whole house audio, and home theater system/wiring. This was an excellent addition to the home that we're very excited about.

There were many other contractors that all did an excellent job. Chris Thompson has a list of contractors he routinely uses and all of them were top notch.
The whole process of building a house was an exciting experience, I'm glad we did it. I'm looking forward now to moving in!!!!

Judge Not Lest Ye Be Judged

2010-10-14T20:47:00.000-04:00

The 2010 Triad Parade of Homes has finished the judging for the Parade of Homes. As a part of the Parade, the next two weekends the public may tour the homes entered in the parade. If you go to the Parade website you can get a map of the homes to view them, we are home #39.
We will not find out how well the house did until Tuesday, but we do know we won an award for "Best Feature" for the balcony off our master bedroom that overlooks the lake

We have a few more certifications that reflect how our house was built. The first is a HERS rating for our home. A home built to standard is given a rating of 100, anything less than 100 is BETTER than average; or MORE energy efficient. Our house recieved a HERS rating of 67, so our house is 33% more energy efficient than the average home.

Additionally, our house is a "Certified Green" home. This certification takes variables into account starting from how much building materials the builder wasted to whether or not we used LED lights or CFL's. Our house received a "Bronze" award.

Structured Wiring

2010-10-13T21:25:00.001-04:00

The structured wiring is complete. Structured wiring is something I really wanted in the house (and something Shelly rolled her eyes about). Basically, all of the low voltage wiring in the house (coax, internet cable, telephone, etc) are all run to a central location in the house. For internet this will allow me to have internet jacks throughout the house, for example there are 2 jacks behind the TV so if I download a movie from the internet it will download faster (not using wireless connections). I can also stream music, videos, etc from my computer to view on the TV.
Here is what the wiring box looks like:

And I have to admit I had a lot of help. I found a great contractor that I've known for several years who has a lot of experience with wiring systems like this. Josh from Graybrooke construction also helped me wire the house for surround sound and whole house audio. If your thinking of doing something like this you should definitely give Josh a call or visit his website.

Walking photo tour, house near completion

2010-09-30T07:45:00.000-04:00

The house is in the final stages of completion, so I thought I would take the time to give you a photo walking tour of the house. We'll start outside:

Here is the house from the street (notice we have grass already!!). The yellow rectangles in the yard are seed blankets to placed to keep the grass from washing away. There are gutter drains at the top of each yellow blanket.

Here is the front door, the door has a 60/40 split. Shelly and I thought this was a unique feature that added a nice extra touch. Let's step inside and have a look around:

After you walk inside, you come to the living room. The fireplace is gas, you can see 2 dark circles in the ceiling these are the recessed speakers for the surround sound system.

From the living room, the kitchen is too the right. The decorative posts frame the kitchen nicely. From this position there is a deck to the left. We'll have a look at that next...

The decking is a composite material that should last longer and be less maintenance than real wood. The deck is screened in with a ceiling fan that rotates at an angle (or precesses for all the mri folks). You can see a little bit of the lake in the right side of the image. We'll step back inside for a look at the kitchen and dining room

Standing in the kitchen, you can see the door that leads to the deck. Then obviously you can see the empty space where a table will be one day.

Looking to your left you can see the living room. The refridgerator cabinet eagerly awaits our fridge. Next to the fridge we have our microwave built into the cabinets. In the foreground you can see the handle for the dishwasher.

To the right you can see where the stove will go one day.

Near the kitchen is the guest bath, here's a peak inside:

We'll go up stairs next, here is the stairwell:

The hall:

Pictures of the master bath:

That's most of the house, I'm tired of writing for now... Maybe I'll add a little more later.

The end is near!

2010-09-09T07:04:00.000-04:00

Lots of finishing touches going on now. Today (9/9/10) the hardwoods are getting their first coat of stain. As you can see from the pictures below, the columns on the front of the house have been installed and the concrete for the driveway and sidewalk is poured. The yard is also being graded to get ready to be seeded!
We will be painting the walls and staining the woodwork (columns, mantle, etc) over the next week or so. It will be hard to stay out of the house after it is finished, but we can't move in until after the Forsyth County fall parade of homes (first 2 weeks of October). We are tentatively planning on closing near Halloween.

Kitchen!!

2010-09-06T21:14:00.000-04:00

Mark Shelton of Shelton Kitchens and Baths has done an outstanding job with our kitchen (see below). The granite looks amazing and the cabinets are perfect. We also made a last minute change with the wall tile in the kitchen. Shelly had a sudden burst of inspiration to use subway tile with a decorative piece above the stove. Enjoy the pictures!!

And finally, our builder and trim carpenter have talked us out of keeping the fireplace mantle from our old house and creating a new mantle for the new house. This new mantle reflects some of the architectural details from the posts in other parts of the house. This mantle also has about 3 different types of wood, so when it is stained it should really look good!!

What's been going on...

2010-08-27T07:02:00.000-04:00

There has been a lot of small things going on since the last update. The exterior of the house now has all the vinyl, the balcony has the Trex flooring laid, the rock columns in the front are up and the decorative support pieces are in place on the dormers. See the pictures below:

But more importantly the cabinets are being installed this week. There will be cabinets going in the kitchen, bathrooms and the craft room. I was tempted to post photos of the cabinets without the granite tops in place, but decided to wait until the granite is installed. Instead I want to give a big thank you to Mark Shelton of Shelton Kitchens and Bath for getting the cabinets installed so quickly. Nearly all the cabinets were in place the first day, and the second day all the handles were installed. That seemed very fast (and accurate, all the cabinets were level horizontally and vertically). Here is Shelton's contact information in case you need cabinet work:

Little more style

2010-08-20T07:36:00.001-04:00

Time to update on a few of the more exciting that have been going on with the house. As you can see from the pictures below, we have some of the decorative columns installed. There are 2 as you walk in the foyer from the front door and 2 that will frame out the kitchen counter. Next to the front door you can see the newel post and rail leading to the upstairs.
You can also see from these pictures the tile and hardwood floors that are in. Going in soon will be the kitchen cabinets (next week)!!

We're Back!

2010-07-28T21:23:00.000-04:00

It's been a while since I've posted. Things have been crazy, the house is moving quickly and of course June/July is when the hospitals get new Fellows (don't go to a teaching hospital unless you have too) so I've been busy at work.
But the outside of the house is almost finished (see photo below) and we are getting flooring installed in the house. The lower level will be all hardwood and tile and the upper level will be mostly wood, tile in the bathrooms (and laundry room) and the bedrooms and office are still undecided.
Since the office has no windows we are pricing the cost of a solar tube to let in some outside light. And we are trying to work it out to use LED lights in our recessed can lighting. LED lights will last for ever (ok, not forever but a really, really long time). They also put out nearly no heat, so it will help keep the house cool in the summer. I really hope this works out, I think this will be a very nice thing to incorporate in the house.
I also am having "structured wiring" in this house. Basically, I will have internet cabling run to a central location so I will have internet ports throughout the house. This will help me with my entertainment center to download movies off the internet, as well as many other (admittedly geeky) things.

Roof and Windows

2010-05-20T18:48:00.000-04:00

As you can see we now have a roof over our heads as well as windows! Things feel like they are moving very fast now, everyday there is something new that is immediately obvious. I'm going to show a few of the advanced building techniques the "green" and "energy star" builders use that may be a little different than average construction.

If you click on this image and view it full size. You will notice there is caulk everywhere! On the wall at the floor on the 2x4's beside the window, everywhere. This will help "seal" the house so it looses less heating and air. And of course to be 'green' it is an environmentally safer caulk that uses fewer caustic chemicals.

If you look at the corner in this picture, you may notice one of the 2x4's appears to be turned funny. This is done by design. By doing this, when they install the insulation they can tuck a full thickness sheet of insulation all the way into the corner. This will also help insulate the house better

In this picture, it looks like one of the walls of my house have been attached to a ladder. While this looks a little odd, this is again done to allow the insulators to be able to place a full thickness sheet of insulation behind the ladder. One more thing that will be a little different in my house since it will be a 'green' and 'energy star certified' home is there will be no plumbing in the exterior walls. This is done so the insulation can be installed with it's full thickness and not sandwiched behind any pipes (causing a bit of a decrease in the insulation ability to insulate). All these steps may seem small or petty by themselves, but when you begin to add up all these little things you end up with a more energy efficient home and lower heating and cooling bills.

One last detail I almost forgot. Even in the headers around the house you can see instead of using OSB in between the boards, he uses real insulation. Again, by itself there's probably not any difference; but combined with many other of the things he does it adds up to a noticeable difference.

So you can see building a "green" home doesn't mean we are using manure, red clay and hay; but just better building techniques that may cost a little more in the short term, but long term will save us money.

So come down and see us sometime on Lot 21. And if you have questions about building a green home, give Chris a call. I'm sure he'd be happy to talk to you.

We have walls

2010-05-13T10:30:00.000-04:00

It hasn't been long, but we already have walls! In the upcoming posts I'll try to highlight the advanced building techniques my builder uses to build a more energy efficient home.
One thing I was surprised by is that I have 3 steel I-beams supporting the second floor. This should definitely make for a firm support system.
More to come, I'll post more this weekend.

Foundation Looks Complete

2010-04-28T18:06:00.000-04:00

I just figured out my cell phone does panaramic shots, so here are the last updates until I return from the cold city of Stockholm. Below is a view of my lot from one side to the other:

Next is a side view of the house. The opening in the wall will be the entrance to the crawl space. On the opposite side of the house is where the garage will be. To the right of the crawl space entrance is the foundation for the front porch:

The final picture is a picture I took while standing on the back wall of the house where the back porch will be. I took this picture because this will most likely be the view we will have from the back of our house. We're both very excited, its a nice quiet lake. Enjoy:

A firm foundation

2010-04-27T21:25:00.001-04:00

Here is the foundation! The brick is oversized and tumbled. Looks like I'll have a decent crawl space on one side of the house. The framers will be starting soon to start building.
Shelly and I will be in Stockholm later this week for 10 days, so updates may be slow. Here is one more picture from the nieghbor's second story window

We Have Footings!

2010-04-23T07:14:00.000-04:00

Yesterday the footings were dug and poured. We now have an outline of our house in cement. The foundation will go up as soon as the cement cures and the weather permits. Unfortunately we are expecting rain and thunderstorms this weekend so it will probably be next we that the foundation is laid.
Notice the lake in the background

This week is the Week

2010-04-21T20:48:00.000-04:00

Here is the evidence that it is finally going to happen:

916 Maxine St will be our little slice of Heaven in Kernersville. We will be digging the footers this week and construction will move ahead at a maddening pace as weather permits.

This is what we have now (notice Shelly pointing out to the bulldozer it missed a spot)

Here it is !!!!!!

2010-04-03T21:20:00.000-04:00

After many revisions and much debate, the final plans have been made! I feel like we are using every inch of usable space without going over board. Our house plan has gone from a 3 bedroom 2.5 bath to a 4 bedroom 3 bath home. We now have a guest bedroom downstairs and an office upstairs. The room above the garage will accommodate a closet for one of the kid's bedrooms as well as a generous laundry room. Our architect and builder, Chris, is a very unusual architect. I have to say I've never seen floor plans like the ones he drew for us (below). Must be a new trend in the industry.
We have also changed the name of the living room from "Oregon Room" (this is what the original floor plans called it for some reason) to the "Carolina Room". In the Carolina room there will be a cantilever fireplace and a wall dedicated to an entertainment center. We will be picking up some sketches of our kitchen soon, as soon as I get my hands on those I'll be sure to post them. In the meantime, below are the final plans (there will be a few minor changes, but I won't bore you with them).

Taking advantage of every square inch

2010-03-23T11:50:00.000-04:00

We are nearly done with the floor plans. The big hold up has been we decided to floor off the foyer, which created an extra room on the upper level. Originally this room was going to be the laundry room until we realized how big it would be (now it will be an office). So we looked to the room above the garage for a solution.

We are considering finishing the room above the garage off to make that the laundry room as well as give closet space to the bedroom on that side of the house. The deciding factor will ultimately come down to cost. The new upper floor plan is looking something like this:

The bulldozers are rolling in

2010-03-09T10:34:00.000-05:00

Keeping things moving quickly, the bulldozers are already grading our lot. PCI builders are not wasting any time or any of the great weather we have been having. We are amazed at how quickly things are moving.
Notice in the top picture you can see the lake in the background.

Lot #21

2010-03-09T08:42:00.000-05:00

Here is a picture of lot #21 in the Macy Lakes subdivision in Kernersville, NC.

You'll notice the all important "under contract" sign in front which officially states we are under construction. Our builder, Chris Thompson of PCI builders in Kernersville, is carefully redrawing our floor plans to accommodate some of the changes we asked for. Just to help orient you to the photo, we are on the cul de sac side of the lot, the drive way will be somewhere to the right of the under contract sign and the lake is near the trees on the horizon.
Sometime this week we will begin grading the lot. There are many large and heavy rocks on some of these lots in this subdivision, so the sooner we find them the sooner we can work on getting them moved. After the floor plans are finalized we can start the build.

LET THE GAMES BEGIN!!!!

2010-03-05T10:20:00.000-05:00

Papers have been signed and checks are being processed! So finally we can enjoy sitting down, talking about floor plans and building our home. We meet this weekend to go over floor plans and move forward with beginning construction.
I can tell you the house in the lot next to ours is being built at a phenomenal rate, especially considering the weather we have been having. I would be happy if our home is built at 1/2 the rate of the house next to ours.

I hope the posts become more interesting from this point forward. More to come...

Reinspection

2010-03-01T08:25:00.000-05:00

Today we have our home inspected again to ensure the repairs that were done are adequate and acceptable. We basically replaced a window that had some condensation in it, sprayed mold killer in the crawl space and had a dehumidifier installed in the crawl space.
All the work looks look, I'm glad the inspector isn't coming on a day that we are having several days of rain and snow. If all goes well, we are scheduled to close on March 4 at 2:30
Of course they are calling for 2-4 inches of snow on that day, but I will make it to the appointment regardless.

SOLD!!!!

2010-02-20T09:23:00.000-05:00

Cooler heads and common sense prevailed. We are signing papers and packing boxes. Big Thank You to my Realtor, Chris Thompson for preserving a sale that I was sure wasn't going to happen.

Now i'm going to be focusing on floor plans and breaking ground for the new house, It's no longer a desire but a reality.

Crucial day today

2010-02-18T07:34:00.000-05:00

So today is potentially the "make it or break it" day on selling my house. After finding out the inspector the buyers hired to inspect our house has litigation pending against him for not pointing out mold in a house he inspected a while ago, he has since called mold in every house he inspected. Even in a house that somebody tried to commit arson in, where the trusses were charred, he called the charred wood mold.
So to break the stalemate; we are calling in a 3rd party; a mold and water specialist. I hope this guy is a stand up honest guy that doesn't need work and settles this issue. If he says there is no problem, I hope that should be enough to counteract the damage done by the other inspector. If they are still not satisfied, I guess the only thing they can do is move on.
There is nothing we would like more than to sell our house and start building our new home, but I'm not going to give away our current house to do it.

Sic semper tyrannis

2010-02-17T07:31:00.000-05:00

Well, it appears the opinion of a home inspection done during one of the most active winter seasons on record will cost me the sale of my home. If you don't remember we had our house inspected last fall during average conditions and did all the repairs that were suggested. The potential buyer for our house had their own inspector go through our house during the middle of all the snow and rain we've been having and he said he saw standing water and evidence of water infiltration.
This inspector says the water infiltration he saw was old and new and suggested the buyers have me get it fixed by a company and show receipts and warranties for the work. I have a big problem with that since I've lived in the house for 10 years and have never had a problem with water in my crawlspace.
We even had the buyers call our original inspector who again agreed there was no evidence of water problems with my crawlspace and said it makes complete sense that we could have a little water with all this rain.
I don't mind doing repairs for problems that exist, but I have a big problem doing repairs when they are not warranted. Never mind my house is on a hill and even if I did have water under my house, gravity would naturally carry it away.
I'll let you know how it all works out, but it's not looking good.

Home Inspectors

2010-02-16T07:26:00.000-05:00

I understand and fully endorse the concept of a home home inspection prior to buying a home. Having a certified professional crawl through the house to find potential landmines the sellers are trying to hid or may not even know about is great.
But....
After having my own home inspected by a professional inspector, I'm a bit perturbed at what they find important to report to buyers. The most ridiculous was for them to tell me to change the air filter in my house (thanks for the reminder). I couldn't believe the buyers actually included that as one of the "repairs" they wanted done prior to closing.
Also we were told we had standing water in our crawl space. Keep in mind the inspection was done when we had so much snow and rain and the ground was more saturated than I have ever seen it. So yeah, there was a little water. When I when under the house a few days later to remove said water, of course there was none because it had drained out like it is supposed to do.
There were other things noted that were crazy and I won't bore you with every detail. But I think inspectors should just use common sense and report the things that really matter. Not to find as many issues as possible just to make themselves look better because they have a laundry list of things to report.
I also have a bald spot on my lawn with no grasss, lots of weeds; want to report that?

Inspections, Inspections, Inspections

2010-02-10T08:49:00.001-05:00

It's nice to be "under contract" but the number of inspections that go on in the home buying process is maddening! Keep in mind our house has been maintained with quarterly pest inspections and we paid for a home inspector to do an inspection before we put our house on the market.
We have had to allow another home inspection, a termite inspection and a radon test done. The home inspection went well, nothing really big (just piddly stuff they may not even worry about). The termite inspector they used is not available to do the inspection before the deadline the buyers setup in the contract. If it was me I'd use another termite inspector, but whatever. And we've had a radon test done over the past 2 days.
I've never had a radon test done, but evidentally they attempt to measure 4 pCi of radon gas. 4 pCi is next to impossible to measure, that is 4 trillionths of radioactivity (probably the same amount in a smoke detector or the face of a glow in the dark watch). If I still worked in Nuclear Medicine, I could have come home with enough radioactive materials from work on my clothes to make that device register >4 pCi. I really hope the test goes well, but the whole thing is asinine.

Anyway, after the myriad of inspections I hope to have the house sold and start building our "lake house"

Here's the proof!!!

2010-02-03T14:55:00.000-05:00

Here is a picture to prove we are in the selling/building process. Hopefully I can soon be telling you about the design components we hope in incorporate in the new house.

Goodbye old house!!!!

Blog is alive again

2010-02-02T07:58:00.002-05:00

It appears we are finally ready to move forward. We have a buyer for our current house so now we feel like we can move forward with our building project. The closing date for the sale of our current home is March 4, so after that we will be focused on building the house!!
Stay Tuned...

Patiently waiting

2009-09-16T12:22:00.000-04:00

Not a lot has has happened recently as far as the new house goes.
We did finally complete the home appraisal and inspection for our current home to help sell it. The inspection went very well, there were no big problems. It was interesting to see some of the problems were things the builder neglected to do when they built the house. The builder did not vent the bathroom exhaust fans to the outside, just into the attic. Also there was a section of shingles that were allowing water to get behind the gutter, again a problem from the builder.
Good news is all these items will be fixed appropriately. And hopefully new home buyers will have confidence they are getting a quality home.
To view the listing click here

Officially For Sale

2009-09-11T07:31:00.000-04:00

We have finally finished the process of listing our current home for sale. You can view the listing online at http://tiny.cc/Tiajq
We have kept this house up and even done many upgrades to make it a good buy. We are leaving behind the amazingly quiet Bosch dishwasher we bought earlier this year and the newly remodeled guest bathroom that looks amazing. This will definitely make someone else a great little house, the only reason we are selling is we have outgrown it.
If any of you out there that read this blog know somebody that would be interested, please pass along the information and/or have them call the listing real estate agent, Chris from Roberts Realty at 336-996-2101

More information on where we're building

2009-09-05T19:50:00.000-04:00

Here is a link to another website that has more information on the Macy Lakes subdivision we are building in. We are getting Lot # 21. As you can see it is about 1.1 acres, one side of the lot faces a cul de sac and the other faces a dead end road that leads to the parking lot to the Old Kernersville Lake Park.

We really like this lot because it not only is very quiet and has a great view of the lake, but it is also centrally located enough to be able to get to the store quickly when we need to.

Laundry

2009-09-05T19:39:00.000-04:00

Just when we thought we had scrutinized every square inch of our floor plan, we found something else we want to change. It occurred to us that since all of the bedrooms are on the upper floor, it might be useful to have the washer and dryer on the upper floor as well.
So once again, we are asking Chris from PCI Builders to change the floor plans to see if this is feasible. If we are unable to carve out the space in the upper level to accommodate the washer and dryer, we may extend the floor over the foyer and make a new laundry room.
If any of you out there that read this blog have an opinion on this, please leave a comment and let us know what you think!

I apologize

2009-09-02T08:48:00.000-04:00

I have read over some of my earlier posts and noticed a few grammar issues. This blog has some auto spell check features that may be a little too aggressive. I'll do a better job of proof reading in the future.

As for the house, our goal is to finish getting it ready to put on the market by next week.

Changes in floor plan

2009-08-31T15:48:00.000-04:00

We are simultaneously reviewing the floor Plan with Chris from PCI Builders. It's not that the original plans we bought from Cliff at designs for living were bad, we just want to give the house some personal touches to make it our own. I am going to show low resolution images from our plans to hopefully avoid and copyright issues.
Below are the original front elevation (top) and the new plan (bottom). This is not to scale or anything, just a quick visual aid to show you what we are thinking. This essentially will move the window seats from the side of the house to the front of the house.

(original)

(new)

There are some changes we are looking at for the first floor floor plan. The first is to try to shorten the front porch. Since the lake will be in the back yard, we don't see a need to have an extensive front porch. The original floor plan (top) is shown for reference, and the revisions we want to make will be in red (bottom). The blue scribble represent areas we are removing.

The second floor we will be making a few small changes as well. Once again the plan on top is the original and the one below is our modifications. The changes we want are in red and the blue scribbles are what we are getting rid of.

These are the big changes we are talking about right now. There are other minor changes we are working on, but it was too cumbersome to try to draw them in.

Next Steps

2009-08-31T12:19:00.000-04:00

So now we are in the process of listing our existing home to hopefully sell it before we start construction of the new home. We will be listing the home with Roberts Realty of Kernersville. We haven't finalized the Right to Sell agreement, but as soon as we do you can view the listing online.
In getting the home ready to sell, we have repainted many rooms, replaced the railing on the front deck and cleaned and sealed the back deck. The house is about 1000 sqft, 3 bedroom, 2 bath. The guest bath has been renovated with new tile flooring, new vanity, new ventilation light as repainted (Looks really good even if we did do it ourselves). We will be leaving the new Bosch dishwasher as well as the stove, fridge and washer/dryer. And how can we forget to mention the custom artwork in the kids bedrooms (Lion King and Disney Fairies).
It's a great little house and I hope it sells soon.

UPDATED LINK FOR FLOOR PLAN, See original post

2009-08-31T12:13:00.001-04:00

Here we go!!!!

2009-08-28T13:30:00.003-04:00

Today we should receive the house plans from www.designsforliving.net My specific floor plan can be seen here http://www.designsforliving.net/plans/index.php?act=viewProd&productId=86 The architect was C. Lyle Scott, I had a chance to speak with him before buying the plans. This home was the 2005 Parade of Homes "Best of Show" house in Washington State.
There is a picture of the front of the house available, so ours should look something like this:

The floor plans for the lower floor have a large living area, and all the bedrooms are on the upper level. We chose a 1 acre lot across from the old Kernersville Lake Park. The lake will be almost in our backyard.
We have selected a builder as well. We have been working with Chris Thompson of PCI Builders in Kernersville, NC ( http://www.pcibuildersinc.com ). PCI Builders are a Green Home and Energy Star Compliant builder that have been in business for several years in the Kernersville area. I'm hoping that the "green" and "energy star" design of their homes will translate into saving money over the life of the home.

Here is a view of the lot we plan to build on:

The plans did come, 6 copies in perfect condition as promised from www.designsforliving.net. Now we will review the plans with our builder and discuss any modifications we would like to see done.