Marbella Update - 12/13/2005

This picture was taken from the (almost) the end of our street which is still unpaved. Heating and ventilations were completed last Friday 12/9. The downdraft for the stove was installed in error in the kitchen. Black tar was sprayed in some areas where there will be doors. Exterior doors were delivered on Monday, 12/11/2005. Framers came back to cut the wood entry ways to rooms. Basement doors, Master Bedroom exterior, Kitchen exterior and temporary front doors were installed on 12/12/2005. Soffits were painted today and the air cleaners were installed today. The plumbers were scheduled to come this week but Jeff said that if they don't show up this week, they will most likely not to show up for the rest of the year.

HVAC 12/6/05

12/06/05 Installed grey fabric on roof to prep for composition roof shingles. Installation of duct work for heating/ventilation continues. Met Jeff our project manager today and voiced my communication concerns. The kitchen window was finally covered with sheathing.
12/05/05 Started the HVAC upstairs. Lalo the window installer came back to put sheathing around the windows with arches and the grey paper. 1 Family room window, 2 master bathroom windows, front door arch, 1 in rear boys room are still missing. I asked Lalo to take a look at the bend window frame in the sunroom which he fixed.
12/03/05 Installed fireplace in family room. Noticed a broken window in the family room and broken stair landing (to second level).
12/2/05 Completely finished roof sheathing. Windows incomplete.
12/1/05 Met Lalo, the window installer. He said he needs to get all windows installed to get paid tomorrow, Friday. At the end of the day, all sunroom windows were installed.
11/30/05 Sheathing completed. More windows were put up. The kitchen window was finally framed.

Sheathing 11/29/05

Sheathing continues to the right side and the back. When I left at 5:30 pm part of the sun room was done, most of the right side and the back was done. The two windows in the master bedroom, and the windows in front boy's room were installed. Very little progress was made in the installation of soffits. One of the steps to the basement stairs broke (already). I brought water and propel to the workers and was very much appreciated. I met Onisimo who spoke a little English and together with my little Spanish and his little English and with his house plans on hand, he agreed that that the kitchen window should not be present. Also, I told him that 8 ft doors go in all the lower level rooms and I showed them were this was specified on the plans. Hopefully, he can help me get this thing resolved since Jeff and Jeff had not been able to communicate this part to the workers, urgh.

Sheathing 11/28/05

They finished framing the upstairs on Saturday. The stairs to the upstairs was completed early today (before 8:30 am). They started sheathing, installing the soffits and putting on the windows in the gameroom and in girl's bedroom. I pointed out to the workers that the kitchen window was a mistake and needed to be covered but apparently my Spanish was not good enough. Who knows if I unknowingly told them to bake a dog or empty the cat. The workers were surely chatty with me when the husband isn't around. The other men were talking so fast in Spanish and I haven't got a clue what they were saying. Once in a while I would hear the men say "Senora".

Marbella Update - 11/24/2005

Even on Thanksgiving, the workers are working. The roof is pretty much up. They were adding reinforcing wood once I got there around 1pm today. Today, I took pictures from the backyard of the house as well as from the 2nd floor so you can see the view.

Marbella Update - 11/22/2005

Framing continues. They have started working on the 2nd floor but could only go so far without getting another delivery of wood. Yesterday we noticed that they were framing doors for 6'8" when they should be 8' doors on the 1st floor. We raised this to the attention of our sales manager, Jeff, and also to our new construction manager, Jeff. (Our older CM was apparently...fired.)

Other interesting news...they've opened up new lots across and next door to us. The lot premium for the lot immediately to our right (when looking at the house) is priced at $75K. That's $40K more than ours. This lot is smaller than ours and slightly lower elevation as well. So...this and the fact that they've raised the base price of the home and some options is making some good returns on our investment! :-)

Here is an updated picture taken as of around 2pm today.

Framing has began 11/18/05

11/18/05 - Wood was delivered yesterday, chalk marks were done on decking. Framing actually started first thing this morning.

11/17/05 - They removed all the trees in the backyard (3 or 4 scrawny looking cedar oaks). They also brought in tons of large rocks and fill from across the street to fill-in the backyard. Without the trees, the back looks huge! Those cayotes, foxes, rattle snakes, scorpions etc. can now wander thru the backyard. Yikes!

After the decking was done, I took this picture from the future family room. Check out our view from the backyard. We are overlooking the bird sanctuary which is acres and acres!

Marbella Update - 11/16/2005

1st floor subflooring is complete. This is a major milestone since now they can begin framing to start the process of making this really looking like a house! There was a fresh delivery of lumber for framing 1st & 2nd floor! So...we should start cranking now!

Additionally, the laborers started working on the staircase that goes from the 1st floor down to the basement.

Marbella Update - 11/15/2005

11/11/05 Completed framing of basement, esp. below sunroom.
11/12/05 The trusses were put in and completed.
11/14/05 Cement was poured on the garage floors.
11/15/05 Subflooring is being installed and forms around garage floors are being removed.

Similiar neighbor's home

Our neighbors, the Roberts, closed on their home 10/28 and moved in on the 29th.

Outside Elevation

Copy of the outside elevation.

Basement Framing

11/3/05 Outside basement walls were framed.
11/8/05 The footings for the garage were poured and the steel plates were welded in on the basement floors.
11/9/05 The garage floors were prepared with steel mesh, plastic and sand. The steel posts were put in on the basement floors.
11/10/05 The steel beams for the basement were put in.

Marbella Update - 11/8/2005

No new pictures for today. But they have poured the footings for the garage floor and installed mounting plates in the basement for the poles that will hold up the main beams constructed out of steel. These steel beams will hold the trusses that hold the subflooring.

Other interesting news of today is Toll Brothers releasing their year-end fiscal results. You can read the article here: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051109/bs_nm/construction_tollbrothers_dc

Marbella Update - 11/06/2005

Here are some select photo's of our house being built to get you up to date.

This image shows what our back yard view will look like. Our property backs up to a huge bird sanctuary. Where we had no privacy with our house in Washington State, we will have plenty of it here.




Here are the footings just after being poured.



This next picture shows the basement walls being formed. Inside the form is steel rebar for added strength!




Here you can see that the basement walls are complete and they are now pouring the basement floor. When this is all done, we will have about 9 foot of headroom in the basement. Plenty of headroom to put in a fully finished ceiling if/when we ever intend to finish it.


Here they are starting to finally frame the basement. In this picture, the basement is about 85% framed. I caught a mistake early on where they forgot to install the moisture barrier between the basement floor and the sill plate. I'm glad I caught it early. Otherwise they would have had to rip it all out and start over.

Marbella Building - 11/05/2005

We are having our dream home built by Toll Brothers in Austin Texas. Since entering into contract, we've heard some good things and not so good things about the builder. Basically, we will need to keep on top of them to make sure they do things right.






This is one Marbella. This picture was taken when it was about 1 month away from completion.











This is closer to what our house will look like. Note the additional windows to the left of the front door. Ours will have a large center window then 2 smaller windows to either side.