Wrap Up Stuff

Looks like the builder finished the last punchlist item today.

Last week on Monday we met with everyone and generated the "final punchlist" - it had about 8 things on it. There were a handful of things that we had on our punchlist that the architect seemed to think were done well enough (or that trying to fix them would result in a worse product). They installed the back door deadbolt and sealed up some of the cracks in the wall end caps.

Later on in the week they addressed each of the items (though not all to everyone's satisfaction). The screen door was installed, though the latch didn't work properly. The countertop bridge piece behind the range got installed. It had seams, but the installer said that if he did it seamless it would probably crack with the movement of the house. But it looks 100 times better. One of the big things that the architect was pushing for was having the front of the fridge flush with the surrounding cabinetry - it was sticking out an inch or two. They removed drywall in places where the fridge had pieces sticking out in the back, and a long vertical strip for the water dispenser tubing. But they still had 1/4" showing on one side, and 3/4" on the other (which would tell you that the fridge wasn't in straight).



I bought some stainless steel switchplate covers for the kitchen - the architect had mentioned that they would sit tighter on the tile, and make the area look less cheap than the plastic covers. Got most of them at an electrical supply house and ended up spending under $20 for every receptacle and light switch in the kitchen.

This week on Monday I walked through the kitchen with the architect's PM. There were just 2 items on the list after that - screen door latch, and getting the fridge flush.

On Tuesday the builder swapped out the latch for one that worked properly, and did some more work on the fridge. They replaced the electrical receptacle with a smaller box, but still couldn't get it back further. The architect told them to take out all the drywall behind the fridge, and to put some thin trim materials instead. I couldn't tell if they were suggesting the trim would go outside of the fridge, framing it (just in case you got a flashlight and tried to look along the edge of the cabinetry?), or maybe behind the whole thing instead of drywall (though I don't think this is the case).

Wednesday they made the final attempt at getting the fridge flush. It's not 100% flush, but it's better than it has been and Is pretty darn close. We gave the builder the final check.

There's still a handful of things for us to do:
Get shelving for the laundry area.
Use putty to seal up a gap in the boards at the back door transition.
Get a wood fill pencil and touch up the re-used pocket door (some pre-existing scratches, some new holes from the demo).
Try swapping out the light trim kits in the living room and see if it gets a little brighter.
Make sure that the tops of doors (new trim) is painted, and touch up if needed.
Touch up the paint on the framing of the screen door - there are some dark spots showing through.
Figure out what to do about the steel switchplate covers in the kitchen.

So, the SS wall plates were installed, though we're not too sure what we think. While they do cinch up tighter on the tiles, they also stick out more, visually. The plastic ones kind of blend in with the color of the tile, and the SS look a lot different. I think we're going to swap back? Anyone want a good deal on a handful of SS wall plates?

Remainder of Week 11

TUESDAY

No one came out to do work.

One thing that had been bugging us was the installation of the range. They had installed a trim piece behind the slide-in range, but it didn't quite make it all the way to the backsplash and the back wall. I did a little investigation, and it seems that normally there is a piece of countertop that fills the gap behind the range. The trim piece that they used was supposed to installed for cases where you are replacing a free-standing range with a slide-in, and don't want to install the countertop piece.

So I sent an email to the architect, asking about it. But then I decided to send one to the builder when I thought they might try and add the other row of tile to make the existing installation look better.


WEDNESDAY

They installed the remaining cabinet hardware, installed the lever for the exterior door (the deadbolt still isn't in yet), and installed the hardware on the new pocket door.

We noticed that they bought additional flush pulls, presumably for the existing pocket door, but didn't install them. This is kind of annoying because the pulls weren't cheap, and I specifically told them that if they weren't going to install them on the existing door, not to order the extra pair. Add that to the fact that they ordered 5 extra cabinet pulls, and that's about $100 of hardware that was unessecarily spent out of our allowance. And when I got the quote for the cabinet pulls I even told them that I wasn't sure about the quantity.

They sealed up the vents on the microwave, and it no longer sounds like a jet airplane. We're a little concerned that the hole that was cut for the venting was way too big, and the tape is the only thing that is keeping it from really leaking air.

They reinstalled the collar around one of the vent pipes in the laundry room. Apparently they are using some type of rubber instead of the plywood that the architect specified. And it's stuck on there off-centered, with a bunch of spray foam. It looks pretty darn unprofessional, not surprisingly. And that part was done by the VP/co-owner guy.

They indicated that the countertop guy will be out on Friday to install the bridge piece to go behind the range. I don't know, but assume, that the architect talked to them and told them they needed to do that. It's noce to be out of the middle of things like that, but a shame that I have to be in order to get things done.

They were talking about trying to do the walk-through on Thursday, but were waiting on confirmation from the architect.


THURSDAY

Selected screen door hardware. Not a lot of options - they're all pretty boring, or traditional. Oh well.

In an email at the end of the day they indicated that Friday is supposed to be installation of the screen door, exterior touch-up, and installation of the countertop bridge (in the afternoon). They said they wanted to have the "final walk-through" on Friday. I responded saying it made a lot more sense to have the FINAL walk through on Monday, after they actually completed the work. I then forwarded that email to the architect and suggested that, even though they haven't done anything on 1/3 of the punchlist, we need to do the walk through on Monday. It's not like if we put it off they would actually continue to work on the punchlist - it's like they actually believe they are done.


FRIDAY

They installed the screen door, though it was too wet to paint it. There's still hardware to be installed as well. I went through the punchlist briefly with the builder, and he indicated that a few of the items had already been addressed, and some others may not be able to be resolved as we requested.

In talking with the architect's PM, he indicated that he had not spoken with the builder about the range installation, so apparently they decided to do something about it when I asked.

The builder's VP/co-owner and I met for a beer after I left work. He wanted to talk about what needs to happen to finish the job. Their idea of the final walk-through is to create a final punchlist on a form included as part of our overall renovation contract, and once those items were resolved the project would be finished. It sounds like it is a way to get a final list and stop adding things to it, which sounds fair to me. We talked about some of the problem on the project. He indicated that there were a lot of items where they encountered acditional costs throughout the project and didn't try and pass it on to us. In our opinion, they should have forseen a lot of those items (did any 1950's houses have wall insulation?), others they didn't think through well (installing living room light fixtures before finding bulbs that would meet our requirements), and things that we had agreed to before signing the contract (moving our living room furniture out and back in for flooring), as well as some things that they did actually have to do extra work on (moving the door frame as a result of the vent pipes). I didn't bring these up or argue any points, as it's just easier at this time to get the last few items taken care of and get the job over with. We agreed that we'd l ike to have the final walk through on Monday, and would contact the architect to participate.

One of the things that we talked about was the installation of the range. He indicated that he agreed that the right thing to do was to install the counter piece behind the range. I told him that we appreciated how they immediately agreed to do it and didn't bicker. Of course, while in the middle of our meeting my wife called, upset, and told me what they did behind the range today. Apparently they left the trim piece in place and just glued a strip of countertop about 1/4" wide onto the wall (they didn't even make it a seamless install with the countertops on either side. And there was STILL a gap between the trim piece and the countertop strip. So much for the countertop guy knowing what he was doing.

I tried to describe what was done to the VP/co-owner, but I don't think he was able to visualize it. However, he seemed pretty committed to making it right.


Overall installation of range with countertop strip.



Closeup of gaps and countertop.

Man, we are getting close!!

Photos of Clean Kitchen

Most of the effort in the house today was cleaning-related, and when I got home from work it looked so good that I had to take some pictures.

The builder had suggested that they would be going over the final punchlist with the architect tomorrow, but the architect thought that would be a bit premature. And seeing as they haven't addressed about half of the punchlist items, I'd tend to agree.

Anyway, here's a bunch of photos. Note that a lot of them were taken with a wide angle lens - our house is not really that big!



Kitchen and living room from back of the living room.



Living Room viewed from the kitchen.



Center of kitchen from kitchen entryway.



Looking out back door along countertop.



Closeup of the sink, faucet, and the backsplash tile.



Pantry area and laundry room.



View of sink and range area.



Back door area.



Inside laundry room.



Trim work on windows.



Center window area of kitchen.

Week 10 - Some Punchlist Stuff

FYI - there's some photos at the bottom of this post.

MONDAY

Monday the architect sent his version of the punchlist out to the builder. It was a little more generic than ours, and seemed to leave off a few items. But we would be in pretty good shape if they got through it all.

The on-site guy for the builder sent an email saying that the VP co-owner wanted to go over the list with us. The architect offered to hold the meeting with them, which was our preference. They scheduled a meeting for Tuesday morning.

TUESDAY

It sounded like they intended to start paint Tuesday morning - you would think they'd wait on bringing out their subs to do punchlist stuff until AFTER they reviewed the punchlist with the architect, but apparently not. We sent them an email listing some items of concern - paint flaking off when removing painter's tape, some bare wood on top of door frames not painted. A few other things that we mentioned included that the microwave had a pretty bad tilt to it, and that the range wasn't sliding all the way into the space - the counters were a little to narrow and the screws on the side were white from countertop material when they tried to force it in.

They cleaned up the vent pipes in the laundry area some, though there was still some debris sitting in the tops of the collars.

The builder mentioned that they were unable to find a cat door that would fit in the pocket door. The problem is that there really can't be much in the way of trim sticking out, else it would hit the frame every time you tried to slide the door open. They asked us to look. I had about as much luck as they did. There was actually one place that said they could modify one of their doors to work. Of course, it was a $150 cat door. We decided to pass.

WEDNESDAY

The cabinet guys were supposed to come out to replace the doors that were off color, but they didn't make it. One of the things that keeps bugging us is that the builder always implies that we asked the cabinet guys to replace those doors - it was the cabinet guys who suggested it. And every time it comes up we tell them it was the cabinet shop guys. It just seems like we're getting set up for something.

The painters came out and did some of the punchlist items, but didn't really fix all of them. They didn't fix the columns on the end caps the way that the architect requested, and the seam is still a bit visible. Plus they didn't paint all the bare wood on top of the door frames, and the new window sill looks a little rough - literally. The also painted the vent pipes in the laundry room, which looked nice. It looked like there were puddles of paint on the tops of the pipe joints - I guess it was easier to glob a bunch of paint in there instead of actually cleaning and painting them?

They had reinstalled the microwave to correct the tilt, but it was still pretty noticeable. Maybe it wouldn't be a problem if we never were to cook hot dogs in the microwave (I can just picture them rolling to the front of the microwave and staying there). They seemed to imply that they just couldn't get it any better than that. Doesn't seem like a good answer.

We also noticed that the microwave was venting into the kitchen, instead of up through the vent piping. Seems like a lot of problems for supposedly professional installers.


THURSDAY

A few times earlier in the week the builder had said that the trades would be working most of the day on Thursday. Last week wife had made plans to have a friend come by the house in the morning, but then cancelled the plans when we heard the work schedule.

Of course, no one showed up in the morning to work, and there was no message to tell us they wouldn't be working.

In the afternoon the appliance guy came by to look at the microwave trim piece that was damaged, so they could order a replacement.

The builder's on-site guy was talking to his boss, and it sounds like they don't think they can get the fridge in further, to fit flush with the cabinetry. My wife pointed out some of the paint issues with the window sill, but they hadn't realized there were still issues. Ditto on the tile work - when they did some repairs the grout color was darker, plus there's a few areas where it doesn't quite look right.

They confirmed that when the microwave was installed there was a piece that wasn't installed properly to allow for external venting.

The cabinet guys didn't make it out.

FRIDAY

The cabinet shop came out and installed the remaining door fronts, and they look REALLY nice. They made some drawer front alignments, but there's still a handful that are a little off and need to be adjusted.

The appliance guys changed the venting on the microwave. The first time we used it scared the crap out of us since it was so loud! We were freaked out and were looking online for reported issues with this microwave being particularly loud. This thing was literally as loud as a vacuum cleaner. You had to raise your voice when talking with someone else in the kitchen. After some investigation, it appears that they didn't really take care of resealing the venting when swapping the piece to make it vent externally. There are huge air gaps in the piping, which is probably where most of the noise is coming from. Seriously, is it that hard to check your work, boys?

The good thing is that, whether on purpose or not, they got the microwave pretty level. It may not be 100% level, but visually it looks level, and things don't seem to roll around anywhere nearly as easily as they did before.

The countertop guy came out to trim the counters, to allow the range to sit properly. It kinda looks like they cut chunks out of the counter - not exactly the slight grinding that I was expecting. If everything is seated properly it may be OK. But it is not seated properly - it's actually a little crooked. One of the rear feet (that we told them about before) is at an angle, and the trim piece in the back is clearly closer to the wall on one side than the other. Also, if you look at the back of the range you see the bare wall where they stopped tiling. Seems they should have put in another row.

They built some small collars around the floor where the vent pipes go through the laundry room floor - this was one of the things the architect suggested, and we asked them to do in exchange for not making them redo the cabinet door hardware. Sadly, it only lasted a few hours, as it broke apart by nightfall... And those puddles of paint on the joints in the vent pipes - cracking.

Responding to requests from our legions of loyal readers, there are a handful of pictures below.


View of the overall kitchen, from the living room area.


The wall of windows, and the cool trim boards around them.


Wall with range and microwave.


Back door, in its new location. Still waiting on hardware (and screen door) - what you see is from our old door.


Pantry cabinets and the laundry room.


Painted vent pipes in laundry area.

And now some of the stuff that's not so good.


Check out the tile work in the corner - not aligned, different orientations, etc. You can't really see in the photo, but the grout color there is a little different, too.


This is where the back of the range doesn't quite meet the wall. And where it comes close, there's no tile.


Busted up collar on one of the vent pipes. I'm not sure what they used to build it, but I don't think it was what the architect suggested.