Whew!  The outlets on either side of the fireplace are being moved -- no extra charge, provided the wiring running to one of the outlets doesn't need to be spliced.  We'll have to go back to the drawing board if that's the case.

Another few hundred dollars saved, too; a much larger builder bundled purchasing of some of our materials in with a much bigger job, giving us a discount we hadn't expected.  This has happened a few times now; it's definitely worth networking to find out which builders have the big discounts and whether purchasing can be done cooperatively and collaboratively.

Second coat of mud is going on the drywall tape inside the house; taping and mudding start in the garage tomorrow; primer coat of paint late this week or early next week; hardwood flooring delivered this week or next to stabilize to ambient room temperature and humidity. 

Little things are starting to chip away at the schedule, though.  If I hadn't put the pressure on the project manager today, he'd have added a week to the schedule.  He was going to wait to have the hardwood delivered AFTER the primer coat had been applied; since the waiting period for the wood to stabilize is a week to ten days, I had to press for the flooring to be stacked in the warm and dry basement until the primer is finished.

The goal is a certificate of occupancy.  It's not about moving into the house, I reminded the project manager; he can take as long as he needs to complete the finish work once we get the certificate.  But we can't get a mortgage on the house until we get the certificate -- and rates are only going to go up from here on out.  Gotta' get that rate locked in soon or we are going to pay for a long time on schedule creep.

And it certainly would be nice to put the savings back in the bank account.

3:53:15 PM    comment []