Entries Tagged 'budget' ↓

Yesterday afternoon we had our much anticipated budget review with the entire team for the 100K House. Scott from Level 5 Construction had taken the past two weeks to come up with a comprehensive estimate based on the most recent design of both homes in the project.
I knew we were exceeding our $100K budget with […]

Recently I’ve received a few recommendations to check out an alternative to SIPs that uses light gauge steel to give insulated panels structural integrity rather than sheets of OSB. The most local company that provides such a product is the ThermaSteel Corporation located in Virginia.
Some of the touted advantages include the following:

Using light gauge steel […]

I am heading out the door now for a weekend getaway but have a quick update on SIP quotes for the project. I have received quotes from four of the seven companies I requested bids from. I have agreed not to disclose exact pricing from each vendor at this time so for now I will […]

You may recall our Preliminary SIP Mfg Evaluation in early December. After speaking with the various manufacturers about their basic process, product and market differentiators I owed them more detailed plans to give us a quote for the two homes. I just finished contacting the manufacturers and delivering the plans to each of them for […]

Yesterday we made the decision to go forward with seeking LEED for Homes Silver rating on both homes in the 100k house project. If you remember in this previous post we were still grappling with this decision due to its uncertain impact on our tight $100K construction budget.
What solidified this decision was an informal meeting […]

I got an email over the weekend from ISA suggesting a new roof design for the 100k house that would be more economical than the existing two-tiered, flat roof with windows in between the two sections. Our final plans will be sent to Level 5 for bidding tomorrow so I quickly agreed that this was […]

It’s been a while since I’ve given an update on our financing situation. The previous posts on financing have been some of the most popular posts from the blog to date so I can assume that many are hungry for more info on the topic.
When we left off last, we had been rejected by the […]

As we get closer and closer to finalizing our plans and trying to nail down construction costs, we will need to make a decision on whether or not to go after LEED for Homes certification for both homes. LEED is a very controversial topic right now and I don’t plan to debate the issue from […]

I just came across this article by Daniel Akst in the Metropolis magazine via the LamiDesign Modern House Plan Blog. It is very relevant to this project and the difficulties of building, financing and developing modern homes in the US right now. The text is a bit small but it’s worth scooting your face a […]

A few days ago we received our second quote on a radiant heating system from Don Vance at Radiantec. The quote was for an Open Direct System whereas the first quote was for a closed system that would require a bit more hardware. Radiantec came in at just over $1,200 for everything but the heat […]