I still haven’t moved in. Still. Because almost nothing could be done simultaneously in this whole process – the skirting guy was waiting on the trim crew, the trim crew was waiting on the electrician, the electrician was waiting on the power company, the power company was waiting on the water company, the water company was waiting on me to pay them, and I was waiting on the disbursement from my construction loan in order to do that.
A lot of people have mentioned that they’re surprised this has taken so long, and let me tell you, me too. But I will say this much – it probably goes a lot faster if you aren’t moving out to unimproved, sloped land with no utilities on site. I had to have trees cleared, fill dirt brought in, trenches dug, poles set, septic installed and pipe laid, in addition to the normal tasks associated with mobile homes. (pouring footers, connecting water/sewer, connecting electrical, setting a/c, trim-out and skirting)
So, once I finally got the check from my construction loan to give to the water folks, they bored under the street and put in my water meter…
Once the water meter was in, then we could schedule the electric company. They sent out an engineer and then a couple days later, a crew arrived with a bunch of trucks to set the poles and run the lines near the house, so the electrician could then put in the meter and connect power to the actual house. Yay! It was really rewarding to be able to turn on a ceiling fan inside, let me tell ya.
Then, once I could confirm that the house really had power, I could schedule the a/c and the factory trim-out crew. As of Saturday, my home is cool inside, all the siding is on, and it is all in one piece! You can still see a bit of the seam inside where the carpet was folded back, but I think once it relaxes a bit and I vacuum, it’ll blend in better.
Just a peek at the seam! More interior pictures later...
Now that all that’s done, the skirting can be done, and then the inspector can sign off on it… so next weekend I should be all squared away!!!
A few things I’ve learned:
· Despite the fact that they even go so far as to provide a (ugly) shower curtain in the guest bathroom, mobile home places don’t provide towel bars or toilet paper holders. Hmm, this can add up quickly.
· No lightbulbs! ZERO. (Gee, all those recessed lights seemed like such a good idea at the time!) I got the contractor value packs at Lowe’s for now, and will replace with decent bulbs as these burn out. I just wish I’d known to budget for them.
· The trim-out crew leaves behind a big ol’ pile of garbage. It was unpleasant to sort through. I could have set up a tarp or a bagster on an open trailer and left instructions to use it, and to keep the food garbage separate, but I had no idea this was the way it would be handled. So after the crew left, we waded through and sorted. Burn pile, trash, construction debris, burn pile, trash, construction debris, eenie meenie mynie mo… (Shout-out to my folks for the help, and for killing the enormous spider that was hiding in the pile and almost touched me.)
· There aren’t any cable TV hookups. At all. Even if you aren’t going to use traditional cable or satellite - even just to use an antenna - you gotta have coax in the walls. I figured it’d be easier before the skirting is on, to maneuver and see under the house, but it was still a pain. And again, I didn’t know to budget for extra cable and splitters and wall plates. I should have known – I mean, I walked through the house before I bought it, but there are so many things to look for, it just slipped my mind.
· There is a hole in the subfloor for the dryer vent, but it is necessary to cut through the insulation and vapor barrier underneath that, and install a little ducting under the house to vent the dryer outside. Again, I’m really glad I have my Dad, because this is something that I wouldn’t know how to do, and would end up either hiring out or slowly and inefficiently learning to do myself.
