Our first permit-driveway access

Permits, permits and more permits. That will be a running theme throughout this journey. As will the associated costs that comes with each and every person/group/step you have to do. Go figure, right?

Turns out you need all kinds of reviews/permits before you can even apply for your building permit.

So, for the first step of our "construction" a storm water review/permit must be obtained before you displace any land. There is a cost for this. However, all we intend to do at this time is clear some trees and brush so that we can gain access to our property vs parking at the neighbor's. By the way, that sounds nice, right? "our" property vs. "the" property...Anyway, I digress.
But I confirmed that we do not need the storm water review at this point, unless we plan on popping the stumps out, since that would be the action that displaces the land. Which we aren't doing, at this point anyway.
So, the next permit I checked into was a Road Access review/permit. There is a cost for this.
Since our future driveway will turn off onto a county road, the D.O.T. has to receive an application so they can come out and see where your property meets their road, the right of way and what you plan for your access (aka driveway). They then advise you if you need a culvert and how to construct it.

I also called the fire department that will serve us, to see if they would have any requirements for access. So there was that (they didn't really have any requirements by the way, but the Lt. did seem to enjoy telling me about all the pumpers that would fight our fire and how they would set up, etc since we will not have a hydrant-it was actually quite interesting). So, no costs...at this time. But we will need a letter stating they've reviewed our plans, once we have them, before we apply for the building permit, and there IS a cost for that (aka "impact fee"). I will also mention here that we will also need to go to the School District office and have them give a receipt for their impact fees once we have our houseplan. For those of you that haven't done this, it is based on the number of bedrooms in your plans.

Ok, now time for some cool pictures of our progress this past week.

Remember this one from Monday with Alex in our future driveway? He and I thought we had cleared so much brush..
















Well, here is how it looked this evening....
This is our driveway looking towards the main road.





We have so much to be thankful for this Thanksgiving week(end) but especially for the all the help.
Whether it was moving brush, working on the burn piles, running the chainsaw, climbing trees, pulling the rope, bringing lunch or helping with the kids, we really appreciate everyone who came out. We couldn't have done it without you. It's amazing really how much was accomplished with just 2 1/2 days work.


And one last picture for the evening, this is the view from the very back line of our property overlooking the former gravel pit (which is under reclamation). It's so pretty and peaceful, it's one of my favorite spots. Please click the picture to enlarge.

A Board Meeting and A Closing

While we were waiting for the date of the county board meeting to arrive, we notified our attorney that we indeed felt the variance would pass, based on the support of the hearing officer, so we hoped we could propose a closing date just after the official November 18th board meeting date. We had big plans for post closing to clear our driveway before the weather turns too cold and snowy to work (don't peek ahead at pictures below). We felt that if we waited for the Nov 18th date to then schedule the closing that our closing could possibly be pushed til after the holiday and given we have several days off for the long holiday weekend, we wanted to SURE we could close before the holiday.
After some coordination the closing date was set. And Nov 18th came and we headed to the County Board Meeting. We wanted to hear that YES vote first hand. And we did! It was actually pretty anti-climatic but none-the-less, another step to check off the list.
Today, Monday Nov 24th was our closing date.
It was nice to meet the seller and hear how the property had been in her family since 1976. Her father purchased it with the intent to build a home. Then life happened. Some years ago her sister was going to move back from CA and build a home on the lot and that also-obviously-did not happen. I got the feeling the seller was happy to know a nice family would be making it their forever home, or at least that's what I like to think. Realistically she was probably just happy to unload the damn thing!

Now normally at a closing it is exciting b/c you get the keys to your new home but again, an entirely different feel when you are now just the owners of a big piece of vacant land.
We were excited though, so we headed over to the property and for the first time took a chainsaw to some trees and starting to map our vision. The heavy work will be done in the coming days, but it felt really good to actually make some progress towards what will be our new homestead.
Here we are in the snow, our 5 acres of snow! And the last one shows our tree-lined (hopefully meandering) driveway.
So much for getting ahead of the coming winter weather.

Walkthrough?

Yes Jay, you heard me right, I want to do a walk-through before closing. (P.S. Jay is our realtor in case you didn't guess). Who does a walk-through of vacant land? What is there to see? However, being one for tradition or process or whatever you want to call it, I was determined.

Lewis and Clark, better known as Tom and Alex, were our leaders. Liam right behind and then Jay, then me (with James in the backpack). Weather a little soggy but a mild 50 degrees and no precipitation.
Stake to stake, we followed the survey and as we can tell you, nothing had changed since the last time there. Well, except that the property seems bigger somehow when you actually walk the entire perimeter, through the trees and brush, with no path and an almost 3 year old on your back.

The other thing we noted was that the property opens up faster that we originally thought, but that's because there are a lot more trees in the front portion that we first thought. This is good, trees are good. Of course, unless they are big junky trees (read Ash trees) that need to come down. But the house will hopefully be set a bit farther back on the property and the driveway will "meander". Don't you just love a meandering driveway!
Oh, and Liam found a baseball bat, so that was good too!

A special thanks to Jay, for humoring us.


Here is the frontage (remember it's "too short" and required the variance). You can see the pink flags marking where the driveway will be. Also, to the left you will see the for-sale sign; turns out it's not even posted in front of the actual property!

Architects are not all created equal

After the variance meeting we met with an architect which we were first introduced to at a home show. We were very impressed with him and the firm. We were there for a 2 hour consultation.  We walked away with a very formal, very detailed proposal of the scope of work. We walked away with a floor plan that we felt good about, only needing minimal changes. We slept on it.
We made another appointment for an architect that friends of ours used/recommended. One man show, working out of his home. Showed us several plans that looked nothing like we had outlined for him in our wish list. Told us his fees, promised to email them later. Never did. We were there for 15 minutes. We didn't even have to sleep on it. (Disclaimer here: our friends who recommended this architect went in with a plan that was essentially already drawn and their home turned out awesome, so this is not a comment on their recommendation, only that we did not find a love connection with him).
So...about those plans, here's just a sample of what we are thinking...
Farm/country style
2 story
3 bedrooms
2.5-3 bathrooms
Kitchen/Greatroom open concept
Mudroom
Office on main level
3 car garage

Like this

 Or this

or this

Writing this now, I can tell you we will be meeting with a 3rd architect, but I will provide you with an update on that later.