Layout and Model

We are building Fox Chapel model with brick front elevation D in Pittsburgh.

30 Days: Final Selections

So we had our 30 day meeting with the sales rep. We pretty much were done with our selections. just made a few additions in electrical and upgraded the cabinets to level 2. we always knew we wanted an awesome kitchen as we both love to cook. So I can say its pretty much my dream kitchen. So looking forward to making piping hot food in the kitchen and serving on the island to my family. One thing we wanted to make sure was that kitchen vent is vented outside and not circulated inside. So far in all our meetings with our SR I have asked about this vent as was told that it is a standard Ryan Homes follows. 

Main floor:

1. Ceiling fan prewires in the Living room, Morning room, Study.

2. Prewiring for pendant lighting over the island. Recessed lighting in Living room and Morning room. Our kitchen and finished basement already come with recessed lighting.

3. Santa Cecelia Granite and Wyoming Cherry Spice cabinets in hardwood (so exciting)

4. Gourmet Island (yummy)

5. Elongated toilets upgrade for whole house

6. Elevation D with brick front

7. Standard appliances (Plan to replace later with all stainless)

8. Gas range hookup

9. Updates kitchen faucet to the one with pull out spray front.

10. 4 feet extension to family room, giving us 3 car garage and another pantry.

11. Morning room

12. Study with french doors

Basement:

1. Finished walk-out basement with sliding glass door.

Second floor:

1. Walk-in fiberglass shower in master bath instead of tub

2. Ceiling fan prewire in three bedrooms

Our anticipated date for start of construction is 03/18/15 03/25/2015. The closing would be somewhere in the July we are told.

14 day meeting with SR

01/31/2015

So today we again met our SR to finalize the structural changes to  our house. We also decided on the color of the brick, door and siding. It was a lot of fun for us going through the options. The final exterior scheme we chose was Craggy Mountain brick with Naval color door and Pebble Clay siding.

We also finalized the structural changes that we made. We ended up choosing:

1. Study with French doors.
2. Morning Room
3. 4 feet extension to the family room, which also gave us a three car garage.
4. Gourmet Island ( I am so excited about this one.. I can't tell)
5. Added one window to the family room.

And thats pretty much it. We have our Rite Rug meeting on Monday, February 2nd. I am not too keen on this one since we do not have any budget to add to flooring and will be putting in the basic flooring. But still keeping my fingers crossed.

Craggy mountain brick with Pebble Clay siding and Naval door.

This is what our elevation will be. It will be reversed though.

Guardian Meeting - 01/29/2015

So finally came the Guardian meeting. Guardian is a security company that does all the low voltage wiring for the house. Think about cable, phone, and surround sound, security etc. Thanks to a lot of blogs that I read I pretty much knew what to expect and it was pretty much on the spot from what I have read.

We went with the feeling that we are not going to add any extras and just pick up what comes standard with the house. And after talking to Jeff, who seemed knowledgeable, we realized that we are getting sufficient cable/ phone outlets with the house, thanks to finished basement and study, which add a cable and phone jack each. Guardian now offers standard CAT5 cables, which can be used for either Data or Phone. So that was good.

We just decided on their placement around the house. We have one cable and data setup each in Study, Living room, basement and Masters bedroom. For the rest, we are good with using wifi. I am really glad the address has Verizon FIOS. We have the service for last 4 years or so and are pretty satisfied with Internet speed and all.

Next, he gave us a demonstration about the surround sound speakers, which was really impressive. S and I decided we wanted to have them install the surround sound system in the living room for us.  They provide Klipsch speakers, which were decent when we heard him play at the model house. I asked him if he can prewire the surround sound and he said they could do that for us. But we decided to add the surround sound to living room anyway.

Next he discussed central vacuum, which we were not interested in, so we did not get into the details of it.

Then came the security system part. The advantage of going with their security system is when they install it with the house, its prewired and more reliable. We really liked the security setup but cannot commit ourselves to a steep $45  a month for next three years. We could clearly see Jeff getting disappointed with our decision not to get the security.

at the end we decided on getting a flat screen prewire in the living room and in ceiling set-up for five speakers.

later in the day, we decided to make a trip to Best Buy to check out the surround sound speakers and we were literally blown away by what we could get in the same money that we are putting the on ceiling speakers. OK maybe a couple hundred dollars more. but we called him again to let him know that we wont be adding the speakers through Guardian but getting them to prewire for the surround sound. This is what we really like at Best Buy.

Rite Rug

Wow.. I cannot believe we just had the Rite Rug meeting. It really went supper good. and I came back home very satisfied and happy with the choices we made.

for the most part we stuck to basics. the choices we made are:

1. Upgraded Vinyl flooring in Foyer, powder room, kitchen and the morning room to Station Square. This one looked much better and was more stain resistant. 

2. Tiles for Master bathroom and Hall bathroom (floor only), we have opted for fiberglass walk in shower for master bath instead of the tub.

3. Upgraded carpet to level 1 and pad to 8lbs in the family room for $400.

4. Standard carpet and pad in the rest of the house.

These are our selections

NVR meeting

01/23/2015

Today we met our loan officer  in the Ryan Homes office. She had a bunch of paperwork for us to sign. We were sent a list of documents, most of which we had already emailed to her.

She took time to explain everything to us and answer lots of our questions with patience. We were told it could take upto 28 days to get the approval from NVR, which seems like a never ending wait.

Update: got our loan approval on 02/12/2015. So approx. 3 weeks wait was not too bad.. Yay.. We could also be moved ahead on the build schedule :)

Just my random emotions

I never knew what I was missing in my life until we took a plunge to build our first home with Ryan..

Now i feel why the birds make their OWN nest, tiny little animals find small burrows or why we associate a den with a lion. More than a place to stay, a home gives us an identity, pride, security and above all a place to build memories with our family. Oh how blessed I feel to be able to make my own house. I just told my husband I can't even call it my dream coz this is way better than any dream I had..

Thank you dear god!!

First Time Homebuyers

So finally its time for us to buy our first house.  We have been married for last 10 years and have two beautiful kids 6 and 3. we moved to the USA when my elder one was 6 months old (ahh how time flies). So in the past 6 years, DH finished his loooong training to be a physician (1998-2015), we had another baby and enjoyed in our 1100 sqft two bedroom apartment, which we pretty much outgrew with the birth of our second child. 

So as my husband started his real job in 2015, the first thing we wanted to do was to get a house and let our kids enjoy the endless fun a backyard could bring. 

We were always thrilled with this idea of building a house. On my internet searches Ryan Homes kept popping up and we visited a community sometime in September/ October 2014. Then we realized with our current lease till July 2015, it was probably a little too early to look. So we postponed our search for a while. So around mid January, when we got an email from Ryan, we thought we might go and look into the community since it was a small community in a very good school district and reasonable commute for my husband. And not to forget, they are getting a new Trader Joe's so close to the community ;).

So we went and we saw the community and met the SR. A day later, we drove to the Cobblestone community nearby and really liked the model. Luckily for us, my mom was with us, and she also liked the build and layout of the house. Thats when we decided we are going to build. We are beyond excited since this is gonna be our first home.