Cutting Out The Middleman

The first thing we did when we finally receive the insurance pay out , was pay off the existing mortgage . Luckily we only owed a little under $30,000 . So our main goal , from that point on , was to remain mortgage free . Which played a big part in both , the how , and what , we were going to do about replacing our home . So now we're on a really strict budget .






The decision to build wasn't reached easily . It seems that , not only were my husband and I not on the same page , we apparently weren't even reading the same book . It took pretty close to a year , and many, many , trips to view model homes , talk to contractors , going back and looking at things a second and some times a third time .

After consulting with numerous contractors we came to the same conclusion , these guys were just middlemen . Almost all of the contractors we talked to , didn't have their own crews , they sub contracted all the work out . Hmm ...we could do this ! Now all we needed to do was , figure out how.

Most home improvement stores offer material packages , these packages include everything you need to build your new home . You can pick from their plans or use your own . We decided to go with a local, family owned building supply company . Mainly because we liked the salesman . We probably could have saved more money by going with one of the bigger chain stores , but like I said , we liked the salesman . He didn't treat me like some dumb female , and answered my numerous questions in a way that made sense to me . This was important to me , this house building business was foreign ground to me . He didn't have an , oh crap , here she is again attitude , when I showed up , or called , with questions .

As I said before you can either use your on plans , or pick from one of theirs . Some people can look at blue prints and start salivating , I look at blue prints and all I see are a bunch of lines on paper . If you tell me a room is 12' x 12" , unless I am standing in that room , I can't visualize the actual size . So we chose one of their plans , which I tweaked a little .

We decided on a Cape Cod . For practical reasons we also decided to have them , put the shell up . Now , we could have sub-contracted this our selves , and , if our situation had been different , we probably would have . But winter , was setting in .. again , we were both working , and we were living in a 40 year old trailer that was pretty much falling apart around us , and I , flat out refused to sink any money in it for repairs .

So in mid August, two years after the fire , ground was finally broken for our new house .