Our project manager. Project managers (PMs) have a tough job. They see us at our best and worst when it comes to our biggest earthly investment. They are faulted for much, praised less than they deserve, and work tirelessly to ensure that our homes meet quality standards, and keep their crews on schedule and safe on site. They supervise the day to day happenings for who-knows-how-many homes, serve as middle person between the SM, loan officers, real estate agents, buyers, contractors, HOAs, utility companies and local government agencies. Our PMs name is Sam and he’s the best. I posted the following on the Ryan homeowners and home builders Facebook group and thought I’d re-post here to give a shout out to our PM and to express gratitude for all the PMs who are doing a wonderful job for our families!
Shout out to our PM Sam Holloway, who always makes time for us to see our home, who never seems to be too busy for us, who didn’t push us to wait until after we close to measure our windows for blinds, who while we were busily measuring the windows, he was opening and closing drawers in our kitchen, marking those that need to be replaced (for scratches, noisy closing, etc), calling up contractors to recaulk and fix minor issues he noticed while waiting for us, who seemed as excited as we are that our heat was on and working well this morning, who follows RH procedure and represents his company well, who is the coolest of the cool, and best PM we could have hoped for! #RHMilan in DC
Measuring windows. It’s pretty simple but a bit time consuming. We measured all 28 windows 😳🙈. Not looking forward to our bill for all those blinds!
So basically we measured the inside width (top, middle & bottom) and height (left, middle & right) for each window. We used this template: https://www.lowes.com/LCI/Planning/HowTos/measuring_worksheets.pdf
We hope to have them ordered and ready to deliver on settlement day.
NVR. My husband and I had just been remarking about how much fun this process has been. We’ve heard people talk about the stress of the home building process, but we’ve not experienced that at all. So many people are involved in this process, yet all has gone smoothly and without much of a hiccup. Until last week. We got a call from our NVR loan officer asking questions about my husband’s tax status. Granted, it’s a bit out of the norm, as he is a pastor and has a kind of dual tax status, but we thought after explanation it would be quickly resolved and things would continue moving along smoothly. Well, underwriting wasn’t happy with our explanation and wanted us to make changes that would set our closing back from mid- November to potentially early December. Of course at this point, our current home already has renters standing by to move in on December 1, and all the balls are in motion for our original settlement date. Plus, we have guests coming to visit us over Thanksgiving to celebrate with us in our new home. Stress levels rise. Prayers go up. Phone calls and emails fly back and forth. Long story short, after much communication from our loan officer to our SM, to our real estate agent and mostly to the Lord for sustaining grace and trust in Him that all would work out, we reached a workable agreement with our that allows us to keep our November 18 settlement date! Woo hoo! Relationships with all parties are still intact and we are more than pleased and very grateful and excited. A little turbulence but all is well.
Paint and granite. In the midst of a rocky week, our home is coming along so nicely! They’ve finished painting, installed the granite and plumbing fixtures, poured the driveway, and put in the hardwood flooring. We met our next door neighbor, who informed us of some drainage issues that affect our backyards. He’s been working on getting it fixed and we’ll be following up as well to see if it can be addressed before they do final grading and grass in our yard.
Here are some photos before the flooring was installed. With drywall and paint and cabinetry in, the house looks so much bigger and very much feels like home!
Building Our Milan in DC 2016 