What! No foundation? This is what our reaction was when we found out our excavator, who we thought was also doing our foundation (because of the way he wrote his quote), informed us that was incorrect. We had felt good about his price. Now we had an invoice for almost double the amount and it DID NOT include the foundation or the finish excavation. Jer told him he felt like he was going to be sick.
We haven’t heard from him since, except for his invoice. He wouldn’t return our calls, text or emails. That left us to hunt for another contractor, which seem to be sparse in this area and to figure out how to finish the septic and excavation. Finally, we found someone who was a little more reasonable in price and who would build our foundation and frame the house.
The man who’s been leading the project has been great. We met him the weekend they finally had the forms up for the foundation. You could see the wheels turning in his head as he watched us work to unload our trailer of the first load of lumber for the house. I think he could see my lack of strength to help Jer lift, so he stepped in and helped us unload.
We had caught on that people in the area assumed we were rich, which might have led to some price gouging. After all, after seeing our huge solar panel rack, of course we must be rich, right? But this SAW us... a couple trying to make our dream a reality on a tight budget.
He informed us the excavator was three inches off on level and we needed to gravel all around the edges of the foundation forms, inside and out, which required our manual labor. One of the most important footings for the house was also missed. I did a lot of the digging on a four-by-four-by-four area of dirt for the framer, while Jer worked to unload a third load of lumber we had brought to the property that same weekend.
The following Monday morning at 4:30am, they poured our foundation, to the chagrin of our neighbors. We did receive their complaint via text but we had no control over how the framer scheduled things. Plus it was in the heat of summer. Oh well, we were thankful it was done.
Progress!!!