A second time submittal

We actually thought that the two alternative designs that the architect came up with were downright ugly. Here they are..

After dwelling on them a bit, it occurred to us that perhaps the direction we were being steered in wasn't that of preserving the historic nature so much as it was being in line with the rest of the neighborhood. So we decided to modify the plans to incorporate some of his ideas but also in a direction that we originally wanted. We put in the front and the porch we'd wanted from the beginning! We played with some designs where we wrapped the porch around the corner, used more craftsman like columns and gable roofs, and added a french door leading out to it.

We were thrilled with the results..

After submitting the revisions and some more waiting, the town architect approved!!!

It was time to send out the notification letters to the neighbors and put up the story poles. The story poles is a requirement in my town (did i mention they're strict here?) whereby a contractor comes out and erects this orange netting structure to show the neighbors what the outline of the proposed house looks like. One of the builders i'd been talking to was willing to work on it and it took them about a day and a half to put up..

If you look, you'll see the outline of the house roof line in the orange netting. The gables, the porch, the 2nd story, etc. 

The notification letters also went out. Essentially it allows 10 days for the neighbors to comment on the proposal. If nobody comments, the plans are automatically approved and we get to move forward with working docs (the version of the plans that include electrical, structural and plumbing that a contractor can build from). If someone comments, then we have to schedule and have a hearing with the town to listen and respond to any comments they have. Typical comments can be sun/shade or privacy issues.

Putting up the story poles ended up costing me $4,456.08 which comprised of $946.08 in material and $3,510 in labor ($65 x 54 man hours). I should have bidded that work out to multiple contractors as I bet I could've had it done cheaper but oh well - live and learn.

A First Time Submittal..

As we approached a design that we were happy with, we were asked to select some finishing materials. Those materials needed to be put in with the submittal so that the town could see what they were. They included:

• Exterior Colors - We walked around the neighborhoods looking at countless houses, thumbed through paint color books for historic homes, and flipped through countless exterior photos on Houzz. We figured out that we wanted to pick three colors - a primary color, a trim color, and some kind of accent color.. These two in particular influenced our early design choices (and you can see our attempts at painting samples on the back of the current house)..

Greenlake Custom Home

(notice the green paint underneath the blue in the below photos?)

Countryside Makeover

Ultimately this later one is the direction we went..

Primary - Benjamin Moore Weekend Getaway 473

Secondary - Benjamin Moore Cloud Nine OC-119

Acent - Benjamin Moore Newburg Green HC-158

Primary - Benjamin Moore Van Deusen Blue HC-156 (blue main house)

Secondary - Benjamin Moore Cloud Nine 2144-60 (white trim)

Acent - Benjamin Moore Storm AF-700 (gray accents)

• Roofing - Another educational experience was learning about roofing products. We knew we wanted a long lasting 50 year roof but after that, what? So we went to look at products at a distributor, narrowed down our choices, and then found some real life houses with the products on them before settling on a product. I was very conscious of the fact that whatever I picked I was stuck with probably for my life (yikes!).. Ultimately, we felt that a lighter product contrasting with the main house color would be best. Something long the lines of what was already on the house. Here are some shots from a nearby new construction of the product we thought would look best..

Gaf Timberline Ultra HD Birchwood

• Exterior Lighting - This one was easy.. we just thumbed through craftsman homes on Houzz and told the architect to pick exterior lighting "like that".

Once selected, the architect put everything together in a package and sent it off to the town for review and approvals.. This is what it looked like at this stage.. 

We were pretty happy with it except for the porch which we'd have liked to have done more with. But the architect continued to steer us towards limiting modification of it to pass the town architect's critical historic eye. We would have also have liked to have had gable roofs instead of hip roofs however again the view from the street needed to maintain the historic look so the hip roofs stayed.

But, a month later we got our response and the town architect wasn't thrilled with some things...  sigh...

The Early Design..

After an initial payment, my architect came out and measured the existing home, created it in Chief Architect, and scheduled a meeting to start the design process.

Now what I wanted on my initial wishlist was..

• 2nd story master bedroom with a view and lots of windows towards the nearby mountains from both the bedroom and bathroom
• master bath with 2 sinks, stand alone tub, stand in shower for 2 w/bench, enclosed toilet area
• large master bedroom walk in closet
• redo the floorplan to incorporate a great room with lots of windows towards the rear/mountains
• open up the floorplan
• all bedrooms should have walk in closets, not regular closets
• laundry room
• pantry
• coat closet near entrance
• good sized deck area in back with pergola
• craftsman style

My town is rather strict with it's rules and regulations and worse yet, my home was considered historic since it was built before 1940. That meant that there would be restrictions around what I could or couldn't do and the town architect would ultimately need to approve the design. The perception was that I had strong limitations to what I could do with the existing front of the home.

The initial designs were rough going, trying to accommodate what we presumed would be the town's wishes. How do you preserve the historic nature and look of the house while slapping a large addition and even a second story on it (short of putting it all underground - you don't!)? The front presumably had to be kept similar to what it already was, meaning I couldn't mess with the roofing (hip roof) or porch or windows much. That made for some ugly early designs after incorporating my wish list..

On our second visit we decided to move one of the bedrooms on the 1st floor to the 2nd to create some better symmetry and balance. We also spent some time on the interior spaces, cleaned and opened up the front porch a bit more, and put in a fence along the property line to show relative size. If you look closely, the front porch fence was altered to more of a fence style and the roof was raised to give better visibility to/from the windows.

the great room looking through the kitchen towards the front door

The great room looking towards the back of the house. To the right is the dining room and to the left is the family room with fire place.

Things were coming along but we were not yet ready to submit anything to the town for approval. The symmetry still bugged us and we felt the outside of the house was still too ugly when viewed from the front..

Renovation Decision Making & Affordability

My initial thinking was that I probably had just enough money to redo the floor plan and to do an addition of some kind. My dream was to perhaps even add a 2nd story, but I wasn't sure just what I could afford. I needed to figure that out and I didn't want to borrow money to do it. I also needed to learn about how this whole process works. I'd never done anything like this before :-\. We started to walk around different neighborhoods taking photos of homes we liked for ideas.. 

The architect I ended up choosing did this new construction that I liked nearby.. That's how I found him.

It doesn't look it but this was a renovation that involved remodeling the inside, extending the first floor, and adding a second story. I thought that it was very nicely done especially the interior.

This one is more or less identical to mine but they put a full basement underneath and preserved much of the historic look.. The town might force me down the road to doing something like this due to it's historic nature even though it's not really what we want.

I thought about how to save money on such a project. Perhaps be an owner builder and work with the contractors directly. Perhaps do some of the work myself (i'd done some projects with my brother the past few years such as adding hardwood floors and painting).

So I started learning.. I figured I needed to learn something about construction, architecture, town permitting, and design. Here are some of the things I began spending a lot of time doing..

• watching DIY - Renovation Realities, Rehab Addict, Sweat Equity
• watching HGTV - Sarah's House, Property Brothers, Income Property
• reading websites and books on being an owner/builder such as www.boyh.com
• poured over floorplans on various websites for ideas and to see if i could simply buy a floorplan.
• visited my town's planning department
• went to a couple of home renovation shows in my area and started talking to builders about the process
• explored various ways of financing such a project (out of pocket, equity loan, construction loan)
• my town offered a historic homes architect tour where I got to visit 5 different historic homes that had been renovated

Ultimately, I decided i needed an architect and a builder. That I wasn't going to try to manage such a project myself. The funny thing about both is you quickly learn they come in all shapes and sizes. Some builders are larger with their own offices and staff including everything from a receptionist to their own architects, finance, and project managers. Some are smaller without any real office or overhead.

Architects aren't much different. I met everything from the new kid with a master's degree from a good architecture school with a few years under his belt to the firm with it's own office and multiple architects working for it.

I spoke to 5-6 of each with a variety of sizes and not surprisingly, those with the overhead were more expensive while those that were younger or didn't have the overhead were less expensive. Give my limited budget, I decided to lean towards that sweet spot of someone that seemed competent & trustworthy but without all the overhead that i didn't want to pay for.

I have to say that the architects that came out all were quite different. Some had great qualities such as bringing great materials, explaining the process, listening, providing input, and showing competence. Some had the reverse qualities. Prices ranged from what seemed inexpensive (under $10k) to the outrageous (Around $50k) despite all of them essentially offering similar services. 

Ultimately, two in particular stood out and I chose one and plopped down my initial couple of thousand to start the design..

Property Armageddon!

So... 

I started off by demolishing the entire property. The fruit trees, the sheds, the concrete planter and wall along the front, the hedges, the ivy, and anything else that i could do to turn it into a dirt lot. After all, I need to install a fence! And I had dreams of more modern landscaping, a lawn in front and back, an area in back to entertain, perhaps someday even a pool..

The before..

front

back

right fence.. theres a newer section and an older one

backyard.. looking to the left

looking back at the house from the garage.. note the concrete planter

left side of the house.. more fruit trees

right/driveway side of the house

The fence.. Getting a new fence line put in was an interesting experience. Besides getting quotes for such work, you also have to negotiate with your neighbors to see whether or not they're willing to pay for half of the job. In my case, the backside neighbor was willing and even reached out to me first (note the condition of our shared fence and that the rest of his property is in much nicer condition. The second was only willing for the section that was dilapidated (note one section was in good condition and newer). The last neighbor of mine was a business who was only willing to pay for 1/3rd because they were happy with what was already in place (effectively an old cheap wire fence heavily overgrown with ivy).

In short, i had to pay for anything that they wouldn't if i was really interested in replacing the fence. The entire fence ended up costing me $3875 for my share and I found the best prices came from the lumber companies that did the installations presumably since they got good pricing on materials.

For the trees, the price estimates that i got varied wildly from around $1400 to $7500. This often seems like the case when getting estimates for things. I ended up paying $1400 to remove the trees, $1200 to demolish the sheds at the back of the property, and $1600 to remove the concrete wall up front and to level the property.

The during..

Demoing the shed was a pain.. My brother and I did it with a sawzaw

The metal shed got sold on craigslist.. The buyer tore it down and picked it up..

The fenceline going in.. It took 2 days

The after..