Talking Money

We had our fist meeting today with a bank about financing. I am not a financial person anyway, in true Kathy (my mom's) tradition, all I know about money is how to spend it.
Naturally, I find the world of financing a house completely overwhelming anyway. Add to that of course, the fact that we had this meeting completely in German, and well, I was left needing Joern to explain the whole thing to me again.
Today's meeting was to meet with the lady we would be working with for our mortgate- she is in charge of mortgages for self-employed people, which is Joern. She was very informative, and patient with me, willing to answer all my questions.
As far as I understand, our mortgage would actually be split into three different loans. The government allows all new homeowners 100,000 Euro in a low interest loan. The positive is the low rate. But, these loans are 10 year loans. The positve being that after 10 years, we can pay off the loan, if we can afford it. The negative is that if we want to continue after the 10 years, we'll have to lock into a new interest rate- this is good if the rate is low in 10 years, this is not-so good if the interest rate is high in 10 years. Oy!
A second place type of loan we will take part in is a building society loan. The nice thing about this loan is that it is not available at once, but in a series of stages. This protects the builder in case something happens, and work is not completed on the house- which of course, I really hope we won't be in this scenario.

There were a lot of numbers, and a lot of words that I wasn't certain in their meaning, but we made it through.

We have a few more documents to get to the bank, and of course, we have to get our building lot approved. The good news? A mortgage much higher than we would need would be doable for us. This means that we should be able to find a monthly rate that is liveable for the amount we need.

DROOL!!

When one is building a home, one spends copious hours at the computer developing an Inspiration file. Mine lies between a binder and some pictures saved on my computer.
My plan after Wednesday is to compile all inspiration pictures, including mood boards, into a more concise notebook I can hand over to the architect, and later, to my designer.
But, I had to share these ultra-droolworthy pictures I found Dornob.

A wine cellar has been my absolute dream for years. I probably fell in love with them when I visited my first wine cellar in a French vineyard in college. And then, I found the Gewölbe Keller in Joern's Oma's house. Swoon! A Gewölbe Keller is a storage cellar that very, very old German homes possess. They were used for the storage all items, mainly food, that would need to be kept cool and relatively dry over a long winter. Joern's Oma's is relatively small, and was used mainly as storage for root vegetables, but a few bottles of hard cider found their way into the cellar as well. We visited one Gewölbe Keller in a house from the 1400s. It was HUGE, and had a very Pottery Barn-esque feel to it, as I could just imagine a dining room table and walls lined with wine.
Unfortunately, we probably won't get too much of a wine cellar in our new home- the best I can hope for is a wine fridge in the cellar. But, this may be something to put on our list for our next home :)

In other news, I'm struggling to design our guest room. Obviously, if people are traveling from other countries, or even other cities, to visit us, I want to provide visitors with a comfortable, relaxing place. I am planning a photo wall in the guest room, of various places we've been. But now, I am also in love with adorable bird pillows, like this one from Target:

My mom would be most shocked with this decision, but maybe my cousins too, as they know that I am absolutely afraid of birds. But, I think these little ones are just so adorable! I am also planning on purchasing Pottery Barn's Audrey Bath Towels for our guest towels, which go with this expanding theme:

I'm just trying to figure out how to tie together birds and pictures of vacation locales without overdoing the room and stressing out our guests!

The final offer

We received our final house offer last night. Oy! Their price is way more affordable than the builder or the other pre-fab company. Okay, not way, way more, but about 30,000 Euro less- the price of the kitchen.
We're still waiting until our November 4th meeting with the town about the building lot. Until then, we can't make any decisions on the house.
We have some time now to investigate this company more. The first pre-fab company (Finger) has amazing references. Joern's friend is building with Finger, and now, the brother of the friend is also planning on building a Finger because he is so impressed with his friend's house. Finger has incredible customer service too- which is something that is rare in Germany, and even more rare when it comes to home building companies here. But, they're the most expensive option.

The architect/ stone builder is the second most expensive option. What is good about this option is that the architect is here in Stuttgart. He will come and optimize the house for our land. Most pre-fab companies have architects at their headquarters, which means that they are deigning the house, not the house with the land. The builder we would go with has a great reputation. He has built many houses in the area, and they are fortresses. The house will last into the next millenium, and will withstand everything. Germans also really like stone houses in comparission to pre-fabs because they breathe better, so they offer a better living climate. Hmmmm....

This third option is another pre-fab. They are not as well known. We have been to see one of their houses being built, and it seems like good quality. But, we don't personally know anyone who has built with this company, something which worries me a bit.

Someone once broke it down like cars, something which Joern and I know a lot more about. This person said, its like a German versus a Japanese car. Both have good quality, and both will last. German cars are technically percise, and give you an out-of this world experience. Japanese cars also offer superb quality, are reliable, and are good for the average guy. The first two home comapnies are the German cars of housing. The third company is the Japanese car of housing.
Putting it in these terms is good for us, but also makes the decision a little more difficult. We are devoted German car drivers.

In other news, I just got the COOLEST book from Amazon. It is called, Designing Your Dream Home, by Susan Lang. It really helps you get organized, and it is the first English resource I've gotten for building a house. The book is full of checklists and interview questions, things I never would have thought of that really make a difference! She often talks about deciding what items you will be storing in which rooms, before you design your house, so you have a better idea of size and layout of each room. The only bugger is that all the checklists need to be photocopied, I think it would be a little nicer if they were included on CD. But otherwise, I'm excited to get started putting together our binders and checklists!!

Grrr

We're still waiting on the last pre-fab offer. It should have been in last week. We haven't heard from them. That doesn't give me a good feeling. In an economy where people have slowed their building and buying, it probably isn't such a good idea to keep your customers waiting. Leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

We're also waiting to hear about the land purchase. My father-in-law talked to the first selectman of our town, who then went to the building department of our county. We are going to have a meeting with him on the 4th of November. If they say okay, then we can buy the land immediately.

If it doesn't work out, we found a good building lot in Neckartenzlingen (the town next to us.) It is a nice sized lot, and we should be able to afford it. The lot just opened up for sale recently, so we should have a good chance if we need it. Joern will call the owner early next week so we can get our names on a waiting list for the lot.

In other news, I'm going to buy a throw rug for our dining room. I fell in love with it when I first saw it on Young House Love. Unfortunately, by this time, it was no longer for sale at Pottery Barn.
It still exists in rather sizeable quantities on Ebay, so I've decided to get it. After consulting with my designer, I've decided to go with this rug for the dining room:

in pineapple. Although I like the brown a lot, the pineapple is my hands-down favorite, and it will lighten up the dark wood floors a lot. I can't wait to get it!

While we're waiting

While we're waiting for an answer from the First Selectman for an answer to our building lot question, I've been busy looking for design ideas.
I found this really cool website that will keep me quite busy, I can just tell!
They have tons of pictures from all over the net. You can search rooms by color, or style. There is a forum, although it isn't quite as well organized as the Decorating foum on the Nest.
No matter though, I'm really excited about DecorPad. I'm sure it will be useful!

Waiting game

Last night, we went to the model home park, yet again. This time, we met with the architect who've we met with a few times before. The last time we met with the architect, I wasn't so excited about his plan, yet was also having trouble realizing that the floor plan could change. I've thought a lot about the last meeting with the archtiect, and realized that I was being a bit inflexible. When we met with him again last night, we showed him the possible sliver of land that we may be able to purchase. He was able to draw up a rough sketch of how the house would fit into the property, and it was really nice. He even was able to optimize the land so that we would have a decent yard and discussed changing the floorplan to get the best view.
It was really interesting working with an architect, who has driven to our site a few times, and who has worked extensively in the area.
Wow, it is hard to make a decision. We have an appointment to go into contract with the pre-fab company, but I'm not sure now that they are the best for our situation.
This architect would be also our project manager, which would mean that he would organize all the different workers for our home. He would oversee the entire building project, and ensure that it was all running well. Even if we use our own sub-contractors, he would still oversee everything.
What I really like about working with the architect is that he would oversee and organize the entire process. With the pre-fab company, the company would be responsibe only until it comes time for the cosmetics, like laying the floors, installing the plumbling, etc. The architect would coordinate everything.
Another thing that is really nice about working with an archtiect instead is that he can really optimize our building situation. If we ended up building on a flat lot that was large, I would probably go with a pre-fab company hands down. They are slightly more expensive, but they also put up, very quickly, a great house, made out of wood! I don't know why, but I love the idea of having a wooden house.
If we decide to go with this architect / project manager, we would be building a traditional stone house. According to Germans, these homes offer a preferable living climate and you don't have to worry so much about airing the house(oy!)
I also really feel like this architect would be able to design the best house to fit our building lot. The pre-fab companies also have their own house designs, and if you want some other design, be prepared to pay- a lot. We like the flexability of working with an architect and a German stone house.
A big difference: payment. With the prefab company, we would just sign a contract, and the company would then take over the responsibility for getting the permission to build, planning the house, you name it. With this architect, we need to pay for the plans, and need to pay him to go to the town hall to get permission to build. The good thing about this with the architect though is that the first contract you sign with him is just through permission to build, and not a binding contract to build a house. I don't know what happens with a pre-fab company if you sign a contract with them, and then the town denies your building plans.
We're leaning much more heavily now towards the architect/ building project manager.

Tonight, we met with Mr. Builder. He spoke with the selectman of our village a few days ago. The selectman said that we could use part of my in-law's property and part of the building lots to build, as long as it doesn't appear as a third building row (Joern's aunt's along the street, our house, my in-law's would all be in a line.) We looked at the drawings, and from one side, the house absolutely fits, but from another view, it doesn't.

Once we have formal plans, and have signed a contract with someone, our request to build will go to the town council, who will ultimately decide whether or not we can build our house where we want to build. Tomorrow, my father-in-law, who was able to talk the town council into a whole bunch of "rule breakers" with their house 30 years ago, will go to talk to the first selectman, to see if he can get the selectman to fully agree. This would be a huge step.

So, for now, its all a waiting game. We have to wait to see what the selectman says, then sign a contract with either the project manager or the pre-fab company,and then wait again for the actual permission.
The good news? According to the project manager/ architect, now that we've made a start, if we get the permission, we can start working on a time-line!

The next price offer

We sent our houseplans to four builders, three pre-fab companies, and one architect. We also gave our houseplans to Mr. Builder.
We now have formal offers from two pre-fab companies, the architect, and a rough estimate from Mr. Builder. After receiving the offer from the first pre-fab company, we were set to throw in the towel with another pre-fab company, which was actually the first company we were interested in. Then we had our meeting with our sales rep. from Finger tonight. Turns out the price is under the last quote.
We were given the price "turn key" ready, but we will probably only have the house completed technically, leaving us responsible for interior painting, flooring, purchasing the bathroom fixtures, and interior doors. Really, I'm okay with this, because I have specific painting requirements (ie. American unbumpy walls.) I also think that if we aren't married to the builder to provide our wooden flooring, tiles, and interior doors, we'll have more options. Plus, our representative reminded us that every time the builder provides a service, we have to pay not only for the service (like laying the tile,) but also for the cost of travel and overnight stays. Obviously, we can save some money here.
We left with huge smiles on our faces! The house is big and beautiful.
We are waiting to hear back from the last pre-fab company. We must get a detailed price list from the architect.
Right now, we have tentaviely set up a meeting for October 12th, Columbus Day, to sign a contract with FingerHaus. By signing a contract, we are permitting FingerHaus to go to the town hall and request a building permit for the house. Without a house and a builder, we cannot request a building permit.
OH MY GOSH, I am absolutely amazed. Once the ball starts rolling, especially if we go with the pre-fab, it rolls incredibly fast! I can't believe its really going to happen, we're really going to build a house!