It's Official

[DukeCanBuildit]

Got a lot done the last 10 days. The whole house is painted (except the 2 baths) a neutral beige which we had in our last house and really like the color. I’ll do some accent walls later after we decorate and get rid of all the blinds and replace them with cellular shades. The kitchen came out exactly as we wanted and with the wall cut down and the red gone the whole area looks huge now! The door pulls are on order (brushed nickel) and should be here later this week which will finish off the kitchen. The kitchen hardware is getting expensive seeing this is the second set of cabinet pulls & knobs I’ve bought this year (between the 2 houses) and have spent almost $1,000 on them. We’re trying to find a backsplash tile now which I think is the hardest part of the finish. We’re just looking for something subtle and are leaning towards a 2"x4” brick subway mosaic tile.


Before:

After:

The island is 48" x 111" so now we have a much nicer/larger area.

I hate wall brackets (knee wreckers!) so I had them add metal reinforcement inlayed under the overhang. They're epoxied in and polished smooth so you can't even feel a ridge.

Looking great Dave. Good call on that breakfast bar. It looks much better and they did a nice job relocating the electrical service. That’s an Interesting solution to not using corbels under the overhang.

Sponsored

 

[AzScorpion]

Looking great Dave. Good call on that breakfast bar. It looks much better and they did a nice job relocating the electrical service. That’s an Interesting solution to not using corbels under the overhang.

Thanks. I did an air switch (button to the right of faucet) for the garbage disposal so you didn't have to open the base cabinet door every time you wanted house it. I hate those darn brackets you always bang your knees into them. lol

I wanted to go a little larger for the island top but that got pretty pricey. This size (48") was one solid piece and no seam in the far corner which looks so much better. Now Annie can see the tv from the kitchen. She's only 5' tall and could barely see over the other one. lol

 

[rang19ca]

Looks good Dave. I bet you are ready to retire, Ha Ha. Sure been a lot of construction this year.

 

[AzScorpion]

Looks good Dave. I bet you are ready to retire, Ha Ha. Sure been a lot of construction this year.

Thanks Chuck! I retired a 1 1/2 years ago and painting the whole house makes me glad I did. lol Don't know how I did it for 42 years!

 

[fjwlobo]

Thanks Chuck! I retired a 1 1/2 years ago and painting the whole house makes me glad I did. lol Don't know how I did it for 42 years!

Easy

WE were YOUNGER and that spring in OUR step could bounce back a lot faster AND easier.


Just slowly getting out of bed and standing up straight after doing something strenuous (STUPID) the day before can be painful.

By the way, the house is looking good!!!

 

[AzScorpion]

Easy

WE were YOUNGER and that spring in OUR step could bounce back a lot faster AND easier.


Just slowly getting out of bed and standing up straight after doing something strenuous (STUPID) the day before can be painful.

By the way, the house is looking good!!!

Thanks Fred!

Oh, you're not kidding! Some mornings after working on the house it's a chore getting out of bed and those first couple steps are like...Whoa

 

[DukeCanBuildit]

Thanks Fred!

Oh, you're not kidding! Some mornings after working on the house it's a chore getting out of bed and those first couple steps are like...Whoa

I even make them getting into the chair.

 

[Tracy Bowman]

For all of you who stayed along with me on this journey thanks for being there! A few of you (who know just about all of what went on) really helped me keep my sanity and I appreciate that. So much has been going on since we got back from our second trip I just now had time to explain all this. Hopefully it makes sense as I'm on very little sleep now with this air mattress we're on. lol



I’ll try to keep it as short as possible but there were several things that led up to our decision. Yes, we did up sell the house and while it wasn’t an easy decision it did get easier as more and more things either got messed up or we just didn’t get what we wanted. I hired this builder because he was a small company and only built 5-6 houses a year and that’s what I was looking for. Someone who'll spend time with us and on the job site and attention to details. Well he ended up getting super busy and never was around (had 19 houses under contract) and I was the one doing all the work and good thing I was in the trades for 42 years and have built several of my own houses. There were so many mistakes especially with the electrical and plumbing and he never caught them, I did. Can lights in the wrong places, can lights in the master bedroom ceiling where there weren’t supposed to be any, lights all wired to the wrong switches and some not wired at all like the nightstand outlets. The 2 outlets by the nightstands were supposed to be switched as you enter the room so you can turn the lamps on. The garage was supposed to have 4 LED strip lights. 2 in the front and 2 in the back and they roughed it for can lights. I did catch this but it wasn’t worth waiting days for them to come back and redo them. What’s worse is I gave the electrician a 5 page detailed list of where we wanted lights, extra outlets and 2 and 3 way switches for certain areas and he messed them all up.

One main concern was I had a tankless hot water heater installed and the plumber put the gas shut off valve at the end of the flex pipe where it goes into the unit. It’s supposed to be at the hard pipe supply line because if there’s a failure you can turn off just the gas to that unit and not the whole house. Several things were installed wrong, they ordered the wrong LVP flooring (color and product) which we caught the night before they were going to instal it. That was another 2 week delay getting the correct flooring. Then they installed it at the wrong angle after going over this several times which direction we wanted it. The front porch rails (there wasn’t supposed to be any rails at all) were installed wrong. We wanted black wire so you can see through it and not obstruct your view of the lake across the street. They installed white pvc posts and rails which doesn’t look bad but again, not what we specd out. The deathblow was the yard. He knew from the first time I contacted him I did not want grass! I wanted all stone for easy maintenance and when it came time to do the yard the new estimate for the stone was $10,000 more than the original estimate. His excuse was he doesn’t use the landscaper that originally quoted it and this guy is more. This was another problem throughout the build with stuff being overcharged. I paid out of pocket for anything extra from the original estimate but almost every quote was way more. Not just 3-5% (which isn’t unusual) but 20-35% higher. There’s so much more but you get the gist and while some of you know the whole story there was still much more that went on that I was to frustrated to discuss. Much worse happens in life but this was a weekly fuster cluck that just kept getting worse with every passing day. I was afraid to ask Annie “What else could go wrong” because something else always did.

We were so disgusted with everything that when we finally closed on the house we already had the realtor ready to list it the next day. I wanted a quick sale to be just done with it and while I could’ve made a lot more money I just wanted out! While it looked great we didn’t get what we wanted. I never had this problem building my own houses back east in fact I always wondered why people would say it’s the worst experience they've been through. Now I know! Besides the weather had really changed a lot here and the storms were getting worse and worse. 5 tornado warning it 3 weeks and it seemed like every week there were 3-4 days of flood warnings. All our friends there said this wasn’t normal but they did say things were starting to consistently get worse. We’re good with this and I mostly feel bad for Annie because she’s never had a new house and this whole experience was a nightmare but she 100% agrees it was time to move on. To quote the great Fred Durst “Life is a lesson, you learn it when you’re through”. Amen to that!!

So back in late February/early March I started looking for alternative options and everything kept leading us back to Arizona. Lot’s of sunshine and no real natural disasters per se but there was no way I was going back to that heat island in Phoenix. After researching the whole state I contacted Phil @P. A. Schilke about his area in Green Valley. Phil was super helpful (much appreciated Phil!!) and gave me the lowdown on GV so we planned a month vacation there from mid June - mid July to see the area and how the weather was. It’s at 3,000’ so it doesn’t get as hot as Phoenix and the best thing is that it cools down night unlike Phoenix where it’ll still be 106 at 10pm. Even when it hit 108 by 7 pm it was already down to the high 90’s and with the dry heat that’s easily doable and mornings were low - mid 70’s which are perfect. It’s a small city (24,000) with just about everything you need right there and we met so many friendly people. It’s mostly a retirement community with most communities being 55+ and a ton of amenities. Luckily we sold the house in 4 days and continued to look online and decided to go back for another month or so to look at houses. That’s where we were last month, looking at homes and found a nice one that had a ton of updates done to it. New roof, windows, kitchen, water heater, water softener, most appliances and so much more. Besides some cosmetic stuff (we don’t like the paint inside or out) I think I have it in me to do it one more time. lol This couple took super good care of the house and fixed or repaired anything that needed it and with top of the line stuff. Roof has a 30 year membrane, windows are lifetime warrantied new appliances all have extended warranties and everything is transferrable (one time) which is great. Really the only thing we need to buy is a new stove and dishwasher.They’re 10 years old and white and the fridge and microwave are SS and are new so we want them to match plus we want a gas stove. There’s also a nice view of the Santa Rita Mountains from the back yard and the Mst bedroom.

It’s super clean and not just “we’re selling our house clean” I mean clean as in eat off the floor clean. They might even be more OCD than I am if that’s possible. The house inspector even commented on well the house is and only found 3 small things. A blind that the cord was broken, one sink stopped that didn’t work and the plastic guide that holds the drain tube for the water softener line was cracked. Not bad for a 20 year old house! We’re closing on October 30th and plan on leaving here on the 28th. Good thing most of our stuff is still in boxes and it’ll finally be nice to unpack everything. So here we go again and hopefully this will be it. Even though they just had the kitchen remodeled we didn't really care for the quartz and I hated the sink and faucet and it has a two tier (pony wall) bar. So on top of all this we're redoing it all and that's scheduled for the Monday (4 days) after we arrive. Like I don't have enough going on.

So much for keeping it short.

So sorry you & Annie had to go through all that, AZ, and so glad ya’ll found another home in an area you like. God bless you both!

 

[AzScorpion]

So sorry you & Annie had to go through all that, AZ, and so glad ya’ll found another home in an area you like. God bless you both!

Thank you darlin'. God bless you all!

 

[DukeCanBuildit]

So sorry you & Annie had to go through all that, AZ, and so glad ya’ll found another home in an area you like. God bless you both!

And God bless you Tracy.

Even if you do have a Santa Cruz. Kidding!

 

[Tracy Bowman]

And God bless you Tracy.

Even if you do have a Santa Cruz. Kidding!

Nothing will ever be able to replace my Ranger!
God bless you and your wife, Duke! Merry Christmas!

 

[DukeCanBuildit]

Nothing will ever be able to replace my Ranger!
God bless you and your wife, Duke! Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas Tracy and thank you. Since we moved into our new home, things have been easier for her. I sure hope you get to enjoy some oysters and crackers on the tailgate of Ol’ Butterscotch soon! God bless you!

Sponsored