Broken Ground . . .

We have a hole in the ground - YEAH! The initial dig and leveling was done and now we're waiting on a re-survey so forms can be set for the foundation. The foundation pour will happen in 3 stages although, I'm not exactly sure what each stage consists of. Here are the pic of recent activity . . .

Good Meeting!

Our meeting with Adam (agave building supervisor) and James (head builder for our house) was good. It was great to walk the lot knowing where the foundation would be and get a true sense of the location of the house . . . the views will be terrific!

While I am confident there will be "issues" to solve between now and closing, I also feel better now about the future of our house and Agave as a quality housing development than ever before. I've always known it was a GREAT concept, I now have hope that the building execution will also be of the highest quality . . . that is in context of the price point of these houses.

Ground breaking should take place early next week (hmmm, I think I've typed that before) as long as all crew members return from the holidays on time. As soon as that happens, count on more regular updates and pictures galore!

Survey stakes, we have survey stakes!!!!!

Yes ladies and gentleman, the first physical sign of our house now exist on our lot! We have a meeting with our new builder on Tuesday afternoon to go over plan details - can't wait!!!!

I'll update again after the meeting.

Meeting results . . . remember, low expectations . . .

Went over a bunch details with Chris today - he was very accommodating and I believe understands our design wishes very well.

Met with Adam briefly and he was pretty straight forward regarding when our house MIGHT be started -- November 6th is his best guess -- and MIGHT be finished -- best case April, worst case June . . . assuming a November start date. WOOF, this is a long way past the original close date of September 15. BTW, we signed our contract on March 25, 2006.

Nope, noting this week . . .

We have a meeting with Chris, plan supervisor, and Adam, construction supervisor, to go over construction details on Tuesday. We are hoping to get some reliable information then.

If nothing else, this process is teaching me to set my expectation VERY low in hopes of being pleasantly surprised (this is a hard concept for me to grasp)!

More after Tuesday's meeting . . .

This week!

Met with Larry Cabrara on Thursday and he showed me engineering plans that have been approved (yeah). They plan on scraping the lot and setting forms by Friday!!! All body parts are crossed!

Pictures as soon as the begin moving dirt . . .

Nothing new . . .

Never believe rumors . . .

No evidence of our plans back from engineering and no ground breaking ceremonies this week . . . maybe next week?

rumors . . .

I ran into Chris Czichos (agave building supervisor) a couple times this week and he said our plans have been held up in engineering but "should" be completed Monday at the latest - they're planning on breaking ground on our house Tuesday or Wednesday . . .

. . . all body parts are crossed!

Permits have been approved!

Just received word tonight that our building permits have been approved . . . YEAH!!!!! The building should begin in the next few weeks - keep your fingers crossed for us!

Nothing to report, but here are few updated pics from the site . . .

This is a view from the top of our lot - obviously a couple houses at the bottom of the hill now . . .









Same place looking a little more north . . .







This is an updated pic of the smaller version of our house from the front . . . check out the cool wood siding









And from the rear . . . we are going with either an earthy green or light brown color for our stucco portion and a gray metal roof.

LOOK, it's our house . . . well, not really . . .

They have been framing the smaller version of our house down the street near the South entrance to Agave (BTW, it's been named "The View House" by the architect, Travis Young). The exterior looks almost identical to ours, except ours will have a two car carport vs. the one pictured above.

The left side of our house will go the full length of the right side - you can see above that this house has the shorter shaped living room.

Also, the ceiling heights on the bottom two floors will also be taller in our house, so the house will be 2 feet taller overall (1 foot per floor).

It's pretty exciting to walk through a home that will be so similar to ours. Karen and I were both surprised how small the kitchen/dining area is going to be . . . we may need to buy a smaller dining table . . . unexpected expense!

As far as we know, our plans are still with the awaiting permitting and our lot sits untouched. Time to email Julie again to get an update!

Thanks for looking . . .

PROGRESS!

Karen and I met with Chris Czichos and Julie Ferri of agave today to review the revised plans from Travis and I am HAPPY to report that we have officially signed off for the plans to be submitted for permitting - YEAH!!!! The revised plans are just as we wanted, with only "slight" modifications that Chris simply "red lined" on the plans that will be copied for the construction crew.

Chris also said that they were very hopful that the permitting process will be much better (i.e. faster) in the near future. Apparently the city is voting tomorrow on a rule change that will give S.M.A.R.T. housing projects priority and, since all agave homes are a part of this program, they should jump way up the list. Keep you fingers crossed!

I'll try and get digital versions of the revised plans and post ASAP.

Coming Soon . . . Revised Plans

Got word today from our architect,Travis Young, that his revised plans will be delivered to the Agave office tomorrow morning. I hope we can set a meeting in the next 2 days in order to sign off and get the plans submitted for building permits. At the rate permitting is going with the City, we'll be lucky if they break ground on our house by the end of September . . . the irony is that the close date on our contract reads September 15!

Nothing sexy to report

There has been MUCH activity via email this week regarding the changes we requested and the costs thereof (including some good news coming just today), but we have still not seen final plans so that we can sign off. The plans are now back in the hands of Travis Young (principal architect - and founder/owner of Studio Momentum) to redraw the kitchen to include upper cabinets, master bathroom, gameroom entrance, and increase the height of the ceilings on the bottom and main floors. With any luck we'll see some tangible results next week.

'Til next time . . .

The Beginning

Well, following in the foot steps of several other Agave owners, we're jumping on the blogging band wagon!

Our story begins on August 21st, 2005 when I first emailed Carrie Bills after seeing the Agave announcement on the Green Mango website. Since that time our path has been full of countless ups and downs (several bottles of wine and LOTS of time would be needed to recount all we've been through) waiting for an architect to submit a floor plan that would accommodate our family's needs and aesthetic desires. We had our hearts set on one of the large lots on Ava Lane therefore we were concentrating on the designs of KRDB, Studio Momentum, and FAB. We were familiar with S.M. and KRDB as I had contacted both firms while toying with the idea of a custom build on a city lot - which, with the rising real estate and construction costs, was just to darn expensive for our budget.

After reviewing several plans from all mentioned firms, we focused on a design by Travis Young of Studio Momentum for 7301 Ava Ln. Here's the view from the street . . .



The design was originally 2003 square feet, with 3 bedrooms (master down w/ 2 kids rooms on third floor), a large screened porch on the bottom floor, and a one car carport within a 3-story design (which is currently being built as originally planned at 5304 Agatha Circle) . . . below are the prelim floor plans . . .

LOWER FLOOR


MIDDLE FLOOR



UPPER FLOOR



After too many emails to count and numerous meetings with Carrie, Larry, Julie and Chris we arrived at a significantly larger (2488 sq ft) and different set of plans, including 3 bedrooms (Master suite up w/ 2 kids rooms on bottom floor), a gameroom/study, an enlarged living area w/ screened porch, and 2 car carport . . . see plans below . . .

LOWER FLOOR


MIDDLE FLOOR


UPPER FLOOR


The plans are still in flux as to some details, but the final version will be very close to the above floorplans.

The exterior will be quite beautiful with a great mix of materials (cedar plank, Hardi board, stucco, cement block, and large laminate structural timbers and a metal roof). Here are some initial renderings . . .

EAST SIDE (FRONT OF HOUSE)


WEST SIDE (REAR OR HOUSE)


We have yet another meeting this week to HOPEFULLY sign off on the floorplan - all body parts are crossed!