15 McHugh: Day 13

Holy nutz. If you aren't going to build a house turn-key, you should acquire project management skills before jumping into this. I have huge lists of phone numbers, estimates, dates, square footages, etc. It's a lot to manage, and that becomes apparent when talking to contractors who ask you questions you don't really know the answer to, but should.

So yeah, many delays. We were late getting things moving ourselves, so we dropped the ball on a couple of things. For one, the local truss company, Pro Truss, is booked up for the next 3 months, so we had to put out our plans to other towns for quotes. Pain in the ass given the distance. This should have been done long ago. Also, getting a certified contractor has become a problem again. The original guy is running very late (can't help us until mid November!) so we've started looking elsewhere. We found another certified guy, and this weekend he'll let us know if his team can take our project. They are currently doing two commercial buildings using RewardWall, and they can only take on one house before the building season ends. Hopefully ours!

In the meantime, Nicole and I have been searching for the best prices on various things we need: appliances, flooring, faucets, etc. We found a fantastic little store in Hare Bay called Jesse Collins and Sons. Highly recommended! They have a large stock and must move a great deal of it quickly because their prices are great. We are buying 1600 sq.ft. of BEAUTIFUL hardwood there, and so far their appliance quotes are the lowest. Chester Dawe in Gander has pretty good flooring prices too (recently bought out by Rona) so check out those guys before you buy.

TPC