Meeting Reports

Some significant information has come out of our latest meetings. We met with our neighbor Dennis and his partner about building our home. We came away from that meeting discouraged. We were told earlier that they were going to be within a price per square foot that made us excited, but when we got the actual price breakdown it was significantly higher. They added taxes which made it higher. More drastically the price per square foot they quoted us included the basement, which they are not going to build. Why are they charging us for something that they are not building? They had some reasons, but none that we really feel are valid. So, they said they would look at some things and rework the numbers. We have almost entirely ruled them out, unless they come back with something really looks good. It would have been nice to have someone to build the whole thing for us, but I guess we will probably save a lot of money being our own builder/contractor.

Thursday we met with UBuildIt. Earlier they said over the phone that they were really happy with how the price was looking. But I was sceptical since our meeting with Dennis. When we got in there to meet with them, we found out that the price they calculated after getting bids from all the subcontractors was much more in line with our expectations. Then we found out that UBuildIt had allotted us more generous amounts of money for things than we think we need. We think we can build it for even less than UBuildIt allotted. So, we are definitely leaning towards UBuildIt. My dad is worried that UBuildIt may not give us enough support for the fee that they are charging us. I think their fee might pay for itself based on the quotes from subcontractors that they showed us. We need to talk to them and see if we can't get something in writing for them to visit the construction site a little more often.

I need to talk to James Lane and see what he will charge us, and what he would be able to offer. One little red flag that has come up is that he said Ybarra Concrete was a good company to contact for our basement, but they are actually out of business. That makes me wonder if it's been too long since he's done this. Maybe he won't be able to get the kind of prices from the subcontractors that UBuildIt can. UBuildIt claims to only use subcontractors that they know and trust. If we go with James Lane, we won't know what subcontractors are good and trustworthy. Maybe UBuildIt doesn't really know the subs like they claim to?

So, unless Dennis comes back with something spectacular, it looks like it's down to UBuildIt or brother Lane. I would say UBuildIt has the edge as of right now. But I was giving the edge to brother Lane last Saturday, so things might change.

We would love to get your input and feelings on this Grandma.