The Monocle House

This is what has affectionately come to be known as The Monocle House:


It still has the dogtrot style with the home office hanging off the back:
You can't really deny it, can you?

Dogtrot style

We really enjoy entertaining and bemoan our lack of deck and yard every year when spring comes around. That grousing and this house:


is what led Tai to play around with a dogtrot style. We're not totally sure that this will work in Utah, but it's been a really fun concept to consider.

If we pursued this type of design, we would probably put a home office in the back portion of the first floor, to separate it a bit from the rest of the house.

Early skteches

Time for some pictures.

These are some illustrations that Tai has played around with in SketchUp. (This is also how he spent the considerable time alone while I was working nasty hours at Body Worlds.)

The lot is long and narrow and oriented east-west, giving us great southern exposure. The narrow width of the lot has been the deciding factor in the designs, and the width likely would also limit flexibility in the interior floor plans.

Here are some early sketches, playing with the lines:


Here's a bit of color:


We'll put up a few more in the coming days.

Experimenting

I'm playing around with some of the pre-set blogger templates because the other format was looking a bit stale. Let me know what you like, or please point the way to any suggestions! Thanks.

Architects, etc.

We are in the process of contacting and meeting with architects about the feasibility of our hopes for the lot. If you have suggestions for us, please leave us a link to check out.

We're also going to be talking to some contractors to get a sense of the building market at the moment, which we suspect will be a bit looser and easier to build than it was a year or so ago. Sometimes, there really is a silver lining to the Great Recession.

The first To Do list

OK, now that we have stopped grinning momentarily, here is a bit more information from Tai about why we extended our contract period:

We have until March 23rd to close on the lot. This is mostly because we are going to be in Australia right in the middle of this thing, but for now, what must happen is:

A) we have to get some kind of written confirmation from Salt Lake City, that this lot is indeed a buildable lot. It currently doesn't conform to zoning requirements for building in the zone, but if at any time during it's existence it did comply, then it is grandfathered in. The seller says she had a building permit before, so it is likely buildable, but we want to confirm.

B) We have to arrange for and get financing for the lot.

C) We have to do some due diligence with an architect and a builder to make sure that what we want to do is feasible within our budget.

Once we determine that the lot is buildable, have financing, and think we can do what we want to do, we will close on the lot.

After we have closed we need to let the lot loan age for 90 days so that we can "refinance" it into a new loan that will cash out the previous lot loan, provide a construction loan and the permanent loan at the end of construction. This works out well because we will need those 90 days to get designs we like, get them bid, make adjustments and get a building permit.

We will have to put 30% down on the lot, and with the refinance into a one-time construction loan, we will need to have 10% of the whole cost in equity, which the 30% would count towards and take care of. We will end up with 20% down, but if we were to try to do the one-time loan from the start, we would have to have 25% of the total, which is just slightly beyond our grasp, so this all works out fine.

Financing has gotten a bit more difficult in the last few months, but rates are definitely good right now. Wish us luck.

Under contract

Aaaaand...we JUST went under contract!

We're going to be a bit cagey with some of the specifics for now (so as to not jinx ourselves!), but we can vaguely tell you that it is an infill lot east of Liberty Park in Salt Lake City. Our contract period is a bit longer than most because we want plenty of time to take care of financing and to determine beyond any doubt that the lot is buildable. If all goes well, we will close on the lot in the second half of March. (Rest assured that when the time is right, you won't be able to shut us up on the details, though.)

We are quite, quite thrilled, more than a little scared, and in awe of the amount of work that this might take.