by At the end of the last post I mentioned that I would be meeting with an electrician to discuss adding a 240 volt line for the cook-top. That meeting changed a lot. We had a really good chat and he was kind enough to educate me about permitting. He walked through the house and pointed out a number of things that I should be aware of, but most importantly made me realize that I really needed to get permits for the work I have been doing. Many people proceed with interior remodels without permits, but they really shouldn’t. In my case, the changes were so significant that I really needed to follow the process and have proper inspections done. Even though I have no plans to sell the house, one never knows if that will change. If I do decide to sell, the massive renovations that were performed without permits/inspections could cause problems.
This may seem rather obvious, but I was following Chris’ lead on this and he did not want to go down that road. After my discussion with the electrician, I understood that I was skirting the system, and I was not comfortable with that. I decided it was time to set it straight. So I started looking into what was required to get permits. I called the permitting office and they filled me in. I could sign an owner/builder affidavit that allowed me to be my own general contractor (GC), with the understanding that I was responsible for hiring fully licensed and insured contractors. For work I would do, I had to apply for permits myself. The idea of having to wade through the bureaucracy was not appealing, so I started to entertain bringing in a general contractor to manage it and even hand off some of the work. Although this would cost considerably more, the benefit would be that the work would get done sooner and I should be able to move in before the end of the year, thus avoiding the need to renew my apartment lease.
I contacted three different GCs. One fellow, we’ll call him GC1, was busy but would call me the following week to discuss further. I made appointments to meet the other two. The first fellow I was to meet, GC2, was late. I eventually texted him and he somehow lost my information. My text was what allowed him to find it (?). So he eventually showed up and we did a walk through. As we spoke, I got the impression I only had half his attention as he seemed more interested in his phone. Although he claimed his firm could do everything I wanted, I told him I had other GCs to speak with before I made a decision. As you might guessed, I did not choose him. He did not make a good first impression. The next fellow, GC3, did make a good impression. I liked him and was happy with everything he said. The next step was to bring his engineer in to get drawings together and discuss the plan. I still intended to do as much of the work as possible, but we would figure out who would do what. I told him I would get back to him, as I still had one fellow (GC1) to hear from. GC1 never got back to me, so I let GC3 know that I wanted to work with him. We made an appointment to meet again, and he would bring the engineer with him. To make a long story short, the engineer canceled three separate times. GC3 was embarrassed and was genuinely apologetic. He was going to find another engineer and get back to me. More than a month later, I have still not heard from him. I’ve been abandoned.
Around here, this industry has a reputation for not being reliable. It’s sad, but I’ve heard so many stories about this. So I decided to look further into what it would take to apply for the permits myself. This would require creating construction documents or something deemed acceptable. So I would have to learn a software drawing tool that would allow me to produce such documents. I started learning SketchUp. I’ll get back to that later.
In the meantime, I wanted to do something in the house, so I turned my attention to the garage floor. I expected to do that near the end of the renovation, but since it did not require permitting, I decided to move forward with it. I decided to hire someone to do the work so that I could continue learning SketchUp. I was really happy about that decision because I was delighted with the result.
I moved all the stuff from the garage into the house in preparation for the guys who would be doing the job. I chose an epoxy covering with “full flake”. This would seal, protect, and provide a non-slip surface.
The process began by grinding down the concrete surface and filling any cracks.
Next they applied the base coat, starting with the perimeter then filling in the middle.
Once the base coat was down, it was time to apply the flakes.
They started by distributing the flakes around the perimeter then worked on the middle, from the back to the front of the garage.
After fully distributing the flakes, this is what it looked like.
That was left for about an hour before they started on the clear coat.
Here it is after the clear coat was finished. I love it!
And here is another from inside the house. You can get a better sense of the gloss from the clear coat as it dries.
I left the garage door open a bit until the next morning. I could walk on it later that night, but did not. I decided not to walk on it until it was safe to drive on it, which would be three days. I’m happy to report that this job exceeded my expectations. I’m so glad I hired someone to do this.
This job only took about three hours to complete. I was amazed. My neighbor came by and ended up having them do the exact same thing (color and all) to his garage floor. It did take a couple of weeks before they were able to do the job, one of those weeks due to bad weather. During that time I was busy learning Sketchup, starting by modelling the way I wanted the garage to look. Here is what I came up with.
In the image above there are a couple of wall cabinets sitting where the A/C air handler sits (not modeled). I don’t have a spot for them, so I just put them there for now.
Before putting the other house on the market, I was going to replace the kitchen cabinets to entice buyers. So I purchase the cabinets at the end of 2019. Almost two years later when I finally put the house on the marked, housing prices took off, so my agent felt there was no need to replace the cabinets. As a result I decided I would use them in the garage of this house, which is what you see above.
These cabinets required assembly, so after the floor was done and drying, I used the time to assemble the cabinets and move them into the garage for the time being. The first one always takes the most time because I’m figuring it out. I started with the 24″ base cabinet (B24), shown below. Notice all the other cabinets in boxes in the background.
The next day I assembled the 15″ and 18″ base cabinets (B15 and B18). So getting faster.
Once B15 and B18 were done, I moved them into the garage into the position I will eventually attach them.
The next day I assembled four cabinets: two 30″ base cabinets (B30), the sink base cabinet (SB33), and my first wall cabinet (W30). I moved these into the garage and placed them along the wall opposite to where they will go because I will need them out of the way so I can frame the wall upon which they will be attached.
The following day I assembled W15, W24, W30, and the first 18″ pantry cabinet (P18).
I was missing the 24″ pantry cabinet, which is supposedly on its way, so I only had the second P18 left to assemble. I did that the next day. The missing 24″ cabinet (P24) will fill the opening between the two P18s.
There was a lot of cleanup to do after that, which I got to promptly. Now I am in a holding pattern, with respect to work inside the house, until I get permits. I’m busy modeling the house with SketchUp, which will require a lot more work as I add detail. In the meantime, here is a sneak preview.
The above image is of the overall floor plan. The garage details shown earlier are not part of this model. I will keep that separate. Below is detail of the plumbing (see past post for the actual work). I intend to capture this sort of detail for all the changes I have made and will make. This will take some time, so I will pick away at it until I have modeled everything I feel is needed by the permit office. Even then, I’m sure they will ask for more. It will be a learning process.
I’m not sure when I’ll be able to resume work on the house. My priority now is to continue modeling and get my permit applications in. How long it takes to get approval is a big question. It will probably involve some back and forth. Hopefully the next post will shed more light on this process.
nuntawob 