House Update #3
Subject: House Update 3
Started 3-Oct-98
Well, its been a busy time, in Poway, my home town.
We have been told that the SDG&E power poles will be put in "real soon now", and that the next door neighbors will have 'something' for the city in the near future. I can't wait. They are the hold up right now, if you don't count the fact that we don't have a complete set of blueprints...
The water meter is in, and that was a bit of fun all on it's own. The city came out one morning and cut the pavement where the meter was to go. They were ready to do the install, and a main broke somewhere else. We never found out where the other break was. Shortly after that a city crew came to re-pave parts of the road out in front of the school district main building.
While the water crew was off fixing the main break, the road crew resurfaced the road, and paved it nice and smooth. First of course they had to remove the nice cut, fill it, and make a very nice fix to the road.
I found the road crew fixing the cut, and I asked them about the water meter which was due to be put in "any day now." The head of the crew, you could tell, he was leaning on the shovel, said that he would call the city engineering department and find out about it. They fixed the road anyway.
A couple of weeks later, I called the engineering department, and asked what about my water meter. They looked up the service order number, and told me about the water main break, and that it should be installed "before the end of August, or in the first couple of weeks in September, at the latest."
I checked each day I went to work, watching for work to be done. Finally, in the first week of September, I saw some people out digging a hole in the road. I stopped to ask about what was being done, and they said that a water meter was being installed. I said, 'Finally, my water meter." We had a nice talk, and I went back to the house to tell Katherine that she needed to get the camera and take some pictures.
When she got there, they weren't too keen to have their pictures taken while working. She told them that we are building a house, and they thought that was really nice.
Update 12-Nov-98
Full house plans are out for bid.
The SDG&E people haven't done anything. So much for 'real soon now.'
The 'next door neighbors' don't have anything for the city yet.
BUT:
The people 'down the hill' from us have submitted plans to build a 2700 square foot addition to their home. This is bigger than we are building in total, and they already have about a 1500 square foot house.
We really do think small. (And different.)
The water meter is interesting in that, even though the usage is zero units, the bill is about $18 per month.
Katherine called and asked about this, and they said that it was because the meter was 'turned on.' When asked how much to 'turn it off' the response was that it cost nothing. When asked about how much to turn it back on again, again the cost was nothing. Silly city. They didn't tell us that the meter was 'on' when installed. The explaination for the charge was that it was for maintenance of the meter. Should anything happen to it, it would be repaired. At our cost. Some insurance that is.
The person at the city canceled the bill, and turned off the meter.
We are now awaiting the first bids from the contractor, to find out how much we have to remove from the house to get it built.
We do have an estimate on the grading of the pad/driveway from the end of the shared driveway to our house: $30,000.
The actual cost of the grading will 'most likely' be less than that according to the engineer who drew up the plans. I sure hope so.
This is called the 'bond estimate' and is calculated for the city. We must post a bond for $30,000 to the city. They then hold the bond until grading is complete. At that time they return the check to us.
The idea is that we can run off to Hawaii and not return, and the city can finish the grading to City Standards.
More later.
-barto
