We just found out we were approved by the DOB.  We have picked our contractor, signed contracts and are really to go, right?

Wrong!  Next up, little old lady neighbor who is “concerned” about us demolishing our shed as her 50 year old shed is attached to ours.   She’s all lawyered-up.  We have a meeting to battle it out.  Hopefully, it won’t cost us too much.  Ha ha ha.  Technically, she could take us to court and that would be costly for all of us but let’s hope it doesn’t get to that.  I (and “I” say I not “we” here) am going to lose my mind if this project doesn’t get started.  My better half remains calm in a crisis.

New Motto

You may recall we were fixing up the 3rd floor rental unit for us to live in after we sold our condo.  Now that our closing is imminent, we have come to our senses and rented an apartment (across the hall as it turns out) because we can’t live in a house with a gaping hole and no heat and sometimes no electricity or water and let’s not forget rodents.  We will still plug away at the rental unit and hopefully be able to move in by the end of the year.

We have made some progress but the going is very slow.  A little bit of progress keeps us sane.  We primed the small room.  Our goal was to paint the entire ceiling and walls but realized that the previous contractor had not sanded all the plastered areas as we would have liked and there were still some cracks in the walls that needed touch ups.  Here are some before and afters of the small room.  It is the one white clean room in the house, my happy place–just don’t look at the floor.

Well almost.  It is never that easy with the DOB.

While our plans were approved and stamped, the plan examiner would not enter the approval in the computer system until we increased the cost of construction listed on our plans to a much higher amount thereby having to pay additional fees to the DOB.

According to our expeditor the following is our next course of action:

1. We increase the listed cost of construction and pay the additional fee.
2. Hire a contractor registered to perform Alteration Type 1 work.
3. Hire a company to perform the special inspections (this was new to us).
4. After we hire the contractor and inspection company, our expeditor will prepare forms to  submit to the DOB and obtain a work permit for the general construction and structural work.

Why isn’t anything easy with home renovation?  We are still in the process of bidding out the project to contractors.  We are down to two choices and most like it will come down to price.  We are back to picking out design elements and fixtures like sinks and toilets.  While it was once the fun part, now the reality has set in that we are going to actually have to pay for these items, our expensive tastes are getting a rude awakening.