We are moving along now that the rains have stopped for the time being. This has been one of the coldest and wettest winters on record I can remember for a long time. The weather has caused numerous delays, but when the weather was good, my brother could not help due to his "real job".
That being said, we have seen significant progress to our dream home across the bay. The siding has gone on beautifully with our budget taking a significant hit. The original budget of $15,000.00 is shot and we are looking for creative ways to extend what we have left. We have borrowed against our retirement and are now looking to sell a piece of property we own with a view of the river. This property was our original "dream home" site until Christopher found Raccoon Retreat in Fairhope. Hopefully a new real estate agent and a new house hunting season will help us to achieve our goal.
The Hardiboard siding is beautiful and relatively easy to install. The Hardiboard is a concrete/paper fibers composite siding with excellent longevity and beauty. It paints and holds paint very well and for a long time. We put 12 inch boards alternating with 2 inch strips to give the board and batten effect. Given the cost, we probably should have gone with 12 inch boards alone put into another pattern. We put architectural shingles on the gables that add a lot of charm to our cottage on the eastern shore. However, this all comes with a price and our jaws dropped when we found out the beautiful shingles were $10.00 each! Each gable takes about $900.00 worth of shingles! This almost doubled our estimate of siding when combined with the stainless steel staples and other fasteners used to attach the boards to the house. They say hindsight is 20/20 and maybe we should have researched a little more when making our house covering decisions.
A side note, when my husband found out the cost of the siding he made a decision to not put the architectural shingles on the back gable of the house. This made me a little upset as we already had 2 of the gables done with them! That being said, when told of our tax refund Chris acquiesced when I requested that the back gable be done as well. I cannot help but feel that we will both be happy when it is all said and done!
Next week the metal roof will go on. ($2,500.00 cost & $1000.00 labor)
Hopefully by then we can have finished the electrical rough in (I am concerned about our electrical skills, maybe we can get our son to help!).
Next step is to get the spray insulation done.
Once all that is in place we can fly with finish work on the inside!
