Energy Savings---and still waiting for 30 day inspections!

Energy Saving Program!

For those of you already in your beautiful homes and receiving an energy bill.  My husband and I were referred by our neighbor to this program. You basically at no cost can lock your KWH rate for as long as 12 months.  In our case our electric company was charging 9.7 KWH.  We were able to lock for 12 months at 6.29.  Which is a savings of 30-50/mo!  If you are interested visit this website and check your local rates :)

http://mbsy.co/chooseenergy/336947


Update on our home:

We are supposed to have our 30 day inspections this Friday.  Which is actually 45 days!!!  I had to email a few times about this.  Also, I did fill out my survey about our experience.  I didn't give all 10's.  I had a few 8's and 9's.  Only in areas with workmanship and carpet quality.  On our PM in communication I gave a 9 and listed beside in commentary.  That he was overall fabulous! Yet, I think they need someone to assist the PM's after closing with follow up inspection issues.  They have way too many other things going on!!!

Overall, I am still in love with our home.  It is so surreal to say my husband and I are home owners of a new space.  Getting back in the swing of bills though since we went 5 months without a house payment is not fun!! HAHA


Pictures soon I promise!

Ahhh craziness and our first electric bill!

So here we are almost 30 days into our new home adventure.  Things are going pretty smooth.  The major hiccups are over and we are now trying to settle in.  I am the type of person who has to be completely decorated and done the first week of move in. But since we came from a smaller house to a larger house that means more space to fill! The Interior painting and wallpaper is done.  Along with most of the rooms.  Now it's on to the crafting and building.  I have come to the realization though that I need to pace myself haha!! Especially with the holidays around the corner.  It will all come with time.

We are still waiting to hear about our 30 day inspection.  Only a few things need attention.  Major ones would be a carpet replacement in the hallway.  Someone spilled stain and tried to clean it but did not do a good job.  And some trim for our flooring needs replaced due to Scratches and chips.  We have had a few nail pops but are waitig until the 10 month inspection.  Nothing too hateful.

I can say one thing I am a little disappointed about...our electric bill came this month.  It was double what we thought it would be.  It was $124 which we were told by Ryan it would be like 60-80! We have about 2700 sq ft of living space.  Compared to our other house that is pretty decent. Yet,  I kind of wish those numbers weren't shared with us.  Now I feel like we are over paying! Lol.  

Also, for all my scent and candle lovers.  I am obsessed with my home smelling delish.  Especially since we have two dogs.  I love it when people come in and the first thing they say is. Wow it smells amazing! If you are like me check out my website.  I am a consultant with Gold Canyon Candles.  They are made with food and vegetable based wax and have longer burn life and scent life than other popular candles.  We also carry Warmers or scent brix to melt in the Warmers.  I have allergies to certain candles and gold canyon is the only one I can use because of the type of wax.  I currently have an open party so take advantage of the direct shipping at a lessor cost! Feel free to ask me about my recommended scents.  Www.savannaperkins.mygc.com

Also,  for those who have asked......we did receive our incentive even though we used an outside company!!!  We fought tooth and nail but ended up getting it.  I know of others in our community as well who got it!!!

I promise to post pictures this week!

It has been over a week!

Whew!!!!!!!!! So I have been MIA!!! So much has happened since we closed on the 17th.  The painters managed to paint our whole house in 12 hours! We hired a moving crew to move us from storage to home.  Which took a total of 3 hours! Wow totally worth the money. Plus my in laws paid towards the move as our house warming gift so that helped immensely.  Everything was moving along perfectly until......our previous living room furniture was delivered. Mind you I based my paint colors off of our furniture.  I bought a new sectional from Ashley for upstairs and we were placing our couch love seat and recliner we just purchased last year in the basement.  News flash to us that our basement door was only 29 inches wide!!!!!!!!!! Our couch is 34 inches wide and 32 inches high.  No maneuvering what so ever! So as of now we are selling our couches to purchase something that will actually fit down the stairs.  Ughhhhh

After getting situated Saturday we started to hear a humming noise that had been going the whole time we were moving.  At first we thought it was the a/c.  After some investigation we found the culprit!!!  Our door bell had a short and was giving off serious heat.  In order to shut it off we had to shut the breaker off to the front room.  We contacted our PM and he scheduled the electrician.  Unfortunately, we couldn't use that front room at night or our powder room since the breaker was off for almost a week.  

Next order of business.  If you have a basement get a dehumidifier right away!!!!!!  Our PM had told us he was purchasing us one as a gift so we held off waiting.  Well it took about a week and they dropped it by.  Since we don't have furniture downstairs we really hadn't been down there.  Well shock of our life we go down to show our basement Find green mold/mildew on the baseboards!  I had to take a moment and breathe without freaking out on someone.  Our PM came over right away Monday morning and said it was a surface mold which is good.  It's caused by moisture and grows when there is no air flow.  Since we had the house painted and closed the door it caused the growth.  A little Clorox wipes and a dehumidifier did the trick.  I am so thankful for our PM and SR because they have really helped us with several things since closing.  We have had a few other issues not worth mentioning but they all have been resolved.  

Our neighbors are all so nice.  They always wave and say hello.  I am waiting for our pool key to arrive so we can take advantage of the clubhouse and meet more people.  I will attach some photos of that we have so far interior wise.  This week our blinds should be installed and we have invisible fence coming out to quote for our dog fence.  Since closing we have painted hung some photos.  And today the wallpaper installers came and finished our accent walls and bathrooms.   Thanks to my mom for the fabulous gift of wallpaper and the installation!! I love everything about my home so far. :)

Accent gray and main walls are green

Peppery (red/orange) accent in morning room

Fresh paint

The other accent wall

Movers :) aka my sister and her boyfriend 

My new sectional and the couch we have to sell lol

My son loving his room.  And having all his toys back!  His room is a blue :)

My first morning k-cup :)

Breakfast time :)

Some of my art selections 

Morning room

Main living area coming along...

Kitchen

Another view...

My daughters room and her accent wallpaper wall...I love!

So cute!

She picked her colors

My powder room wallpaper. It is a shimmer pattern.  So pretty! I love animal print

Our master bath.  The wall paper is coral! It is sooooo pretty In person. 

We are still working on other rooms so I will be sure to post =]

WE CLOSED!!

Yesterday, at 3 pm we finally started signing papers for closing.  After 100000000 documents we are officially the owner of our home!! The exciting news for us is that Chase will actually be servicing our loan.  Which we bank with them so that put me at ease.  So thankful we were able to lock at 3.375 and receive the lender credit.

We basically found out the evening before what our amount to bring with us to closing would be.  It was $300 less than they estimated since we found a cheaper homeowners insurance.  Well sure enough 4 hours before closing the title company received a call from Ryan homes saying they noticed a $200 required survey fee was not included in the FEES!! So the title company searched the contract and found wayyyyy in the back a small section that says a $200 land survey is required.  Which our bank does not require that since you pass all other certifications.  So sure enough we had to bring more money to the table for closing.  It was still $100 less.  But a survey fee is kind of annoying if you ask me!

We took the kids last night for the first time since they seen the framing of the home.  They were so ecstatic running around screaming and flipping through the house.  My 3 year old and the stairs will be very interesting.  He already is acting like the HULK jumping off of the 4th step.  The basement has become his wrestling zone. 

The painters arrive this evening to start painting and hope to be done by tomorrow evening.  The interior design lady will arrive Friday to measure the rooms we are doing the accent wallpaper walls in. We have the moving crew set for Saturday.  Along with the cable company arriving on Saturday evening.  Things are starting to move along.  I will post pictures of our accomplisments after this weekend.

Tomorrow is the day!

Today we had our pre-settlement walk thru!  It was absolutely amazing and almost a tease.  I can't believe how fast everything has went these last few months.  I am so thankful for our families who have really went above and beyond letting us stay with them.  Our closing is set for tomorrow at 3pm!  As most of you know we went with an outside lender and we were able to lock our rate at 3.375!  We also received a lender credit of 1.7 which almost picked up all of our closing besides our HOA fees!  We still haven't heard what our exact number was to bring to closing.  So hopefully today we will get something.

Our walk thru was  fairly simple.  Our PM had already went through and marked the walls with blue tape.  When we went through we only noticed two other places that needed a touch up.  I am in love with our appliances.  We chose the black.  Which really look nice with our kitchen cabinet selection.

I took a picture this morning...the sun was so bright you really can't see the pretty shutter color.  More pictures to come tomorrow.  We are handing the keys over to our painter in the evening tomorrow so they can start our paint!

Quick Note-  Make sure to shop around for homeowners insurance! We got a great deal with our Friend through Meridian Insurance.  Our yearly premium is $300!! Which is $25/mo.  We originally had $45.  We compared the deductibles and coverage and they all were the same if not better. It's also a great way to save on the house payment!  We did have to combine our Auto insurance to get this deal.  But we were still saving tons.  Our previous car insurance was through USAA.

Best piece of advice I have on this whole is experience is to shop rates and never settle for something because you think you got the best deal.  Sometimes investigation and a little bit of research can go a long way.  We have really enjoyed our experience and would do it again!

Green grass grows all around...

And our house is now ready for walk thru!

5 days away!! Tomorrow is Appraisal day!

So here we are 5 days away!! Wednesday we had some strong storms that slowed our siding landscaping work. My PM told our loan officer that he would have everything completed by Thursday night for the Appraiser to come in the morning Friday.  I was really getting nervous since Wednesday we barely had siding.  Not to mention our yard/mud/rock pit had no leveling what so ever.  So my husband went by today at 2pm and sent me this...

We have our shutters and siding!!!

Around 5pm our PM called and informed me that our landscaping was in place.  Our siding and shutters were complete.  Now we were waiting for sod to arrive this evening and it would all be set tonight!! Wow!!! One day can make a huge difference.  I went by at 6.  Still no SOD but I did see our landscaping and seeding in the backyard. 

It is hard to tell but our shutters are an eggplant color and our door is called marooned.  They both have a deep purple hue.  Reminds me of wine :) I really love all the colors we picked!