Rainy Day Accomplishments

The lightning storm from last night brought with it a day of rain. Our meeting with the electric company and electrician to stake out the line was canceled, but there was still a lot accomplished today.

Throughout the day I spent over an hour on the phone with various people. I got new savings accounts set up for our kids and talked to a variety of people concerning our building project - including a storm shelter manufacturer, our builder, and a couple of lenders.

The problem with the posts being the wrong type was easily resolved with the builder. After talking to him, he agreed that we had asked for laminated posts and told us he would switch them. He also mentioned that the posts he got in yesterday were supposed to have been installed yesterday, but the delivery was 3 hours late. Probably frustrating for him at the time but a relief for him now. (Just in case you are wondering what the difference is, solid posts can twist and warp over time - which is a huge problem if you have drywall attached. Laminated posts won't do that.)

As far as my phone call with the lenders, I learned that we are not just working with 3 lenders, but 4. The land lender (bank 1 from a previous post) works with another bank. I got sick to my stomach today when I received an e-mail from our home lender (bank 2) saying that this other bank (bank 4 - the one I just learned about) informed them that they wouldn't release the land for the home loan because we were building a home on the released land, and that is what their loan was for. Our home lender (bank 2) let me know they couldn't finance all 40 acres to do it all themselves, so unless we could figure out the land release, we would not be getting a home loan.

I called the land lender (bank 3), who said there was no problem, and then I called their sidekick (bank 4), who had a problem. I did as much smooth talking as I could, and they agreed to release the land. I just have to write bank 4 (who had only talked to people by means of a middle man and didn't know our plans fully) a letter stating our intent to build a permanent residence on their land at some point in time and that this building is only a temporary permanent residence until we get that home built. Now we can try to close this again . . . and just in case you were wondering - the lender's assistant who deals with the land release from our home loan (bank 2) has another vacation all next week.

(edited in July to add - We have now found out that bank 4 also has an investor they are working with in this who is quite slow as well. So that makes 5 investors that need to coordinate themselves to get this thing done!)

Apart from running up town to sign some papers concerning building business, that is all of the building updates I have. I know, not too exciting. But one of my reasons for this blog is a journal for me, so feel free to skip around. :)

Some other things that I did besides building project things were working on new cushion covers for our camper, canning some pinto beans with a newly found homemade refried bean/burrito seasoning (for the purpose of quick high protein meals when things get crazy with the building process), and spending time with my family, of course.

Tomorrow we will try to meet again to get the electric staked out. We are next in line to get water hooked up, and our new posts have been delivered. Hopefully the now saturated ground and filled up post holes will dry up quickly, and we can take some more steps forward.