So, this guy was basically an insurance salesman… How did he ever feel entitled to $2M worth of home?
[quote=ucodegen]
They spent $250,000 of their savings on design and grading.
Again.. a loan is not savings!! That is also a lot of money for design and grading.. are they trying to grade the entire 5.6 acres? [/quote]
I was struck by that also. But it actually might be a realistic figure. I’m more than a little familiar with the challenges of hillside development. (We built a companion unit on a sloped hill.) I assume this “grading and design” included the following:
* Architect
* Civil Engineer
* Soils Engineer (soils report in the beginning and to certify any compaction along the way)
* Structural engineer
* OSHA certified grading contractor.
The last kicks in (OSHA) if there are footings of a certain depth or if retaining walls are a certain height. 5 or 6 feet from top of wall to bottom of footing. If you’re building on a hillside, you have big retaining walls to secure the building pad. A lot of “A” contractors are not OSHA certified – so it kicks the price of the grading up a bit. (We needed it on our project because of our retaining walls.)
Our project was MUCH smaller, and my husband did the architectural design. But we were out around $30k in engineering (structural engineer(s)/civil engineer/soils report) and permits before we even hired the contractor that hired the grading sub… And grading wasn’t cheap.
