Culture
Recycles dryer sheets
- Joined
- Apr 15, 2007
- Messages
- 491
Do not read if you are unwilling to face my whining throughout a long post :
I will leave aside the messy details, but my wife refused to set a budget for our new retirement home, stating that she was willing to spend whatever it took to get what she wanted (in fairness, my wife has always been reasonable in the past when it came to purchases). Over my objections, this was what she told the builder. We are close to having the house done at this point (one month late with likely one month still to go), and have spent 143% of the original cost we were told for the house. We are at 200% of the cost of the used homes we were looking at to start with.
This is after removing the outdoor kitchen, natural stone flooring throughout (tile used instead) and vaulted ceilings with wood trusses which were in the original pricing. The house is substantially complete and I do not anticipate any significant additional cost, mainly because there are no more upgrades that my wife can make at this point without tearing something else out .
My advise to you? Never, ever, build a house without an iron clad (not one penny more) written maximum budget agreement between everyone involved; both spouses and the builder. Our builder has artfully ratcheted up the cost over and over again using one of two arguments:
1) This was not the in the contract. True on 100% of the occasions this has been raised, but he told us up front everything we would need to finish and move into the house was in the contract. Oh, you wanted the trees cleared from the site before we start constructing the house on top of the trees? That was not in the contract, I assumed you were going to clear the lot. Oh, you wanted the trees we just cleared hauled off the site instead of being left in a 30 foot high pile in you backyard? That was not in the price I gave you for clearing the trees, I did not realize you wanted them removed. Rinse and repeat 20-30 times. The contract should have included some statement similiar to "contract includes all labor and materials needed to construct a complete, functional house on the existing site."
2) "Do you really want to cheap out on ________ when everything else you have done is so nice?" This has worked very well with my wife, because as you make more and more upgrades, the argument makes more and more sense. Don't you want to gold plate that last door knob?
I would divide the cost overruns about equally between the two techniques. While the quality of the construction is reasonable, I would not recommend my builder to someone else.
Yes I am bitching, and I should be happy that I can afford a very nice, very beautiful new house in a very nice neighborhood. However, at this point I such negative associations with the new house I do not want to move into it. My wife and I are unable to even talk about the new house anymore as it starts an unpleasant argument every time. If I could get my money out of it, I would sell it. Unfortunately, it is only worth about 85% of what we have spent on it (too many non-recoverable upgrades) and I would have to divorce my wife . Marriage involves many compromises, some more painful than others. This one is as painful as all of the previous ones combined together.
If it make a difference to anyone (I do not think it does), my wife earned 50% of the dollars going into the house.
I will leave aside the messy details, but my wife refused to set a budget for our new retirement home, stating that she was willing to spend whatever it took to get what she wanted (in fairness, my wife has always been reasonable in the past when it came to purchases). Over my objections, this was what she told the builder. We are close to having the house done at this point (one month late with likely one month still to go), and have spent 143% of the original cost we were told for the house. We are at 200% of the cost of the used homes we were looking at to start with.
This is after removing the outdoor kitchen, natural stone flooring throughout (tile used instead) and vaulted ceilings with wood trusses which were in the original pricing. The house is substantially complete and I do not anticipate any significant additional cost, mainly because there are no more upgrades that my wife can make at this point without tearing something else out .
My advise to you? Never, ever, build a house without an iron clad (not one penny more) written maximum budget agreement between everyone involved; both spouses and the builder. Our builder has artfully ratcheted up the cost over and over again using one of two arguments:
1) This was not the in the contract. True on 100% of the occasions this has been raised, but he told us up front everything we would need to finish and move into the house was in the contract. Oh, you wanted the trees cleared from the site before we start constructing the house on top of the trees? That was not in the contract, I assumed you were going to clear the lot. Oh, you wanted the trees we just cleared hauled off the site instead of being left in a 30 foot high pile in you backyard? That was not in the price I gave you for clearing the trees, I did not realize you wanted them removed. Rinse and repeat 20-30 times. The contract should have included some statement similiar to "contract includes all labor and materials needed to construct a complete, functional house on the existing site."
2) "Do you really want to cheap out on ________ when everything else you have done is so nice?" This has worked very well with my wife, because as you make more and more upgrades, the argument makes more and more sense. Don't you want to gold plate that last door knob?
I would divide the cost overruns about equally between the two techniques. While the quality of the construction is reasonable, I would not recommend my builder to someone else.
Yes I am bitching, and I should be happy that I can afford a very nice, very beautiful new house in a very nice neighborhood. However, at this point I such negative associations with the new house I do not want to move into it. My wife and I are unable to even talk about the new house anymore as it starts an unpleasant argument every time. If I could get my money out of it, I would sell it. Unfortunately, it is only worth about 85% of what we have spent on it (too many non-recoverable upgrades) and I would have to divorce my wife . Marriage involves many compromises, some more painful than others. This one is as painful as all of the previous ones combined together.
If it make a difference to anyone (I do not think it does), my wife earned 50% of the dollars going into the house.