Transition: Design Phase to Construction Phase

We’ve transitioned from design phase to construction phase in the last 2 weeks.  We’ve selected Santa Cruz Green Builders as our general contractor and we did our due diligence in setting up an agreement.  Now when you drive by the house it looks like a construction site — the temporary fence is up, porta potty and dumpsters are in place and you hear the noise of deconstruction going on during the day.

Last month we donated the couch, bed, dining room table and chairs, dresser, microwave, tv and stereo to a nonprofit organization called, Furniture for Families.  Then in the last 2 weeks we had a fire sale on Craigslist for the refrigerator, stove and oversized desk.  The house is now empty.

Our building permit application submitted on 7/26/2011 had many milestones.  On 8/4/2011 it was approved by Green Building, then Planning approved it on 9/6/2011.  We went through 3 rounds of “comment and response” exercise with CSG Consultants, the external plan checker contracted by the Building department and finally approved on 11/21/2011.  Public Works approved it on 12/7/2011, then it took another few days for the building department to calculate the fees and everything.  So after 4.5 months of follow-up and $6K later our permit was issued.  Phew…