We're Changing Our Address!

I officially change our address online with the USPS.

The post office will only forward your mail for a year after you move, so you need to make sure to notify everyone of your change of address.

Here is a list of the most important people you need to notify of your address change:

- Family & Friends

- All financial institutions (banks, credit card companies, loan companies, etc.)

- Cell phone provider

- DMV (to change the address on your license)

- Voter Registration

- Doctor (if you will no longer be using the same doctor, make sure to get a copy of your medical records)

- Insurance providers

- IRS

- Employer

- Vet (if you will no longer be using the same vet, make sure to get a copy of your pet’s medical records)

- Schools (if you have children)

- Magazine subscriptions

- Alumni associations and any organizations that you belong to

Also, make sure to change your address on your luggage tags.  If your bags go missing on your next vacation, you don’t want them to be sent back to your old residence.

To help ensure that I change my address with everyone, I have been making a list for the past couple of months of the companies that I receive mail from.  All the ones that I need or want to continue receiving mail from, I add them to my list for notification.

Is there anyone important that I am forgetting on this list?

Hello New House!

Well, let me start off this blog post with apologizing for not posting last week.  I promise I have a good excuse though.  After a long week of going back and forth with the bank on employment issues, we finally closed on our house on Thursday!

There are still a few small touch-ups that they need to do in the house (fix our granite backsplash and do some painting/cabinet touch-ups) and add a new gate to the fence since we're still having the flooding issue, but it's officially ours!

The builder agreed to fixing our landscaping and I'm so much happier with it.  The took out the huge bush in front of the window and added some smaller ones.

The also added a magnolia (my favorite tree) to the front yard.  I can't wait until it starts growing and blooming!

While they were at it, they also added some rose bushes around our water pipes so I wouldn't have to worry about it.

The inside of the house turned out gorgeous.  The builders did a fantastic job.

We don't have the movers scheduled until September 5th, so we have about a week and a half until we move in.  We're slowly moving some boxes over though and I'm working on painting a couple of rooms.  

I'll try to get some posts scheduled for the next few weeks, but please bare with me if there's less posts than normal while we get settled.

House Updates

Oh my gosh.  I'm so excited because our house should be finished by the end of the week.  I'm so excited to see everything after it's been touched up and complete!

The cleaners went in yesterday and cleaned up some, but there are still some repairs to be done so they'll have to come out again.  Everything is so shiny though!

Also, the fence installers started headway on the fence yesterday as well.

House Updates

After we returned from vacation, one of the first things we did was head over to the house to check on the progress.  The builder had ensured us that the cabinets would be fixed before we returned, so we were excited to see them.

The first thing that we noticed when we walked into the house was that they finished the wood floors.

I was very pleased when I walked into the house to see that our kitchen was almost completely finished!  All the cabinets were fixed, they installed the appliances and sink, and added the granite.  They only things left to complete are to add the faucet to the sink, attach the water to the dishwasher, and add some crown molding to the tops of the cabinets.

They broke one of the pendant lights which you can see in the above picture.  They have a new one on order so it should be fixed soon.

One of my favorite features of the kitchen is our trash drawer.  It has two trash cans included, one for trash and one for recycling.

I'm so excited to start organizing this kitchen!

They also fixed the cabinets in both of our bathrooms as well as added the countertops.  No sinks in there yet though.

In addition to the cabinets being fixed, we received some resolution from the builder on our other issues.  

They have reconfigured our fence and we're going to have to pay a few hundred dollars more.  I'm a little disappointed that our fence is going to be more expensive now, but I'll be very happy to have it installed when we move in.

They're also going to give us some additional options for how our posts on the front porch are going to look.  I'll be happy with anything compared to what we have now!

Why We Decided to Buy a New Build

We've been asked a lot by family and friends why we decided to build a new house instead of just buying a pre-owned one.

When we started searching for our next home, we didn't automatically start looking at new builds.  We looked at about 25 pre-owned houses before we stumbled upon our future house.  Looking back on it, I'm glad none of those pre-owned houses worked out because buying a new build was one of the best decisions we have made.

Here are my ten reasons I'm glad that we decided to buy a new build:

1. Everything is New - We don't have to worry about something breaking down a week after we move into the house.  Every single thing in the house is new and has a warranty (our builder actually provides us with a 10 year warranty).

2. Energy Efficient - Our house is green certified, so we have extra insulation, Low-E windows, Energy Star appliances, and a tankless water  heater.  We can enjoy living in our house and have a lower utility bill while we're at it.

3. Safety - Our house is up to code and doesn't have lead paint, polybutelyne piping, or asbestos.  One less worry when we're already stressed enough with finding a new home.

4. Less Immediate Out of Pocket Expenses - Our builder included a lot of upgrades in our house, so we didn't have to shell out a ton of money immediately after moving to make upgrades.

5. Being Able to Customize - We picked out all the finishes in our house from the cabinet color to the carpet style.  We will not have to do any changes to the house immediately because it was designed with our choices in mind.

6. Modern Layout - We have a very open floor plan with tons of light.  We also have tons of storage, which is great for a growing family.  We were hard pressed to find both of these in older homes.

7. Excitement of Watching it be Built - Watching our house being built from the ground up is one of the most exciting things we've ever done.  It's so much fun to go out there once a week and see all the changes that have been made.

8. Technology Smart - Our house has a built in smart box that is wired for high speed cable and internet.  We don't have to worry about the cable company having to come out and do additional wiring to get our service started.

9. Landscaped Yard - Our yard will be fully landscaped for us when we move in, so we don't have to worry about fixing bad patches in the yard or trimming any overgrown bushes.

10. Move In and Guest Ready - After we close, we can move in immediately.  We can also invite friends and family over without having to worry about doing any repairs.


Have you ever built a house from the ground up or bought a brand new build?  

House Updates

This past week has been an exciting and stressful one in regards to our house.

We scheduled a meeting with our project manager on Friday to look through the house and found a few issues.

The biggest issue is that a lot of our cabinets are incorrect.  The master bathroom cabinet only has 3 drawers instead of 4, the guest bathroom cabinet was missing drawers completely, and two banks of cabinets in the kitchen were supposed to be a bank of drawers instead of cabinets.  Thankfully the builder got on this issue really quickly and the cabinets will be fixed by the end of this week.

We also found some smaller issues that we're hoping will get fixed just as quickly.  We're missing a hose bib on the outside of the house and the posts on the front porch look weird (we're not sure if they'll actually fix this issue or not).  Also, they were planning on connecting our fence to our neighbor's fence, but when we were out there we realized that their fence was inside their property line so this is not possible.

I did bring back some pictures from our meeting though!

They actually installed the windows in the garage door wrong, so the project manager fixed them while we were there.  The windows are now two semi-circles instead of mismatched like they look in the picture above.

I can't wait to show you pictures next week of the corrected cabinets with the granit installed!

This is the desk area.  It will have the same granite as the kitchen.

This is the mudroom area.  The door you see to the left is the door to the garage, so it's easily accessible as you walk in.

This is the incorrect master bathroom cabinet.  When it's finished, it will have two smaller drawers and two larger drawers.

This is the incorrect guest bathroom cabinets.  When it's finished, it will have two small drawers above the cabinet.  The builder was also talking about making this larger because it looks too small for the space.  Not sure if they'll be doing that or not.

The exciting news from the meeting was all the plans they have for the house this week.  By the end of the week, they plan to have completely finished the wood floors, installed the new corrected cabinets, install the granite in the kitchen and office space, install the laminate countertops in the bathrooms, add shelves to all the closets, install the under cabinet lighting in the kitchen, and possibly have the sod and landscaping complete.

We also got the best news of the day while we were there!  The project manager hopes to have the house completed in the next 3 weeks!  So as long as there are no issues and the bank doesn't drag their feet, we'll hopefully have the keys to our house before Labor Day weekend!

Laying Tile

We were lucky enough that they left a door open to our house, so when we went to visit the other night we were able to go in and take some pictures.  What was really exciting was that they finished tiling the bathrooms and laundry room!

This is the tile in our master bathroom.  I can't wait to take a bath in that tub!

The tile in our guest bathroom looks the same, but it's a tub/shower combo.

We picked a darker tile to use in our laundry room and they used smaller tiles in a staggered brick pattern to give it some more interest.

We're Officially Locked Out! And We Have Lights!

We knew the day was coming, but we sad when we went up to the house the other day and all the doors were locked.  Now we have to schedule an appointment with our realtor to get inside the house.

I did peek through the windows though and noticed that they hung the lights!

It looks like we're going to need to lower the light in the dining room, but not really sure how to do that.  Anyone done it before and can offer advice?

The lights on the garage were also hung up.  I think they will look really nice once we have the black door as well.

They also did the pillars on the front porch, but I'm not such a fan.  The white part seems really small compared to the rocks.  I need to contact the builder to see if there's anything they can do to make them look better.