Monday, October 4, 2010

More Electrical News

If it seems like I am only ever updating on the electric progress, it's because it's the craziest process ever. I could just wait and say "Oh look, the electric is on." and never delve into the meat of the issue but I think that would do you a disservice. For those that have dreams like ours, that want to take the role of building from scratch into your own hands, the honest truth is what you need.

We are still about a third into getting the electric turned on.

We have the permit. The application is in at the electric company. What has taken us so long (and by long I mean hours of phone calls. Hours.) is finding an electrician permitted in our teensy county and that also puts up electric poles. We finally found someone and his rate isn't all that bad. We're looking at $450 for the meter, pole, box and installation. The price for the pole and delivery alone from the one company that sells them was almost $250. I don't think another $200 for maneuvering a twenty four foot pole into a hole in the ground is asking too much. Really, I don't know how we'd do it otherwise. And I'd rather pay him the $200 than spend it in co-pays when we drop it on ourselves.

The other problem has been the electric installer finding the monuments that mark the border of our property and our neighbors. The problem is he can't find them. In order to get the service to our side of the street, he has to put up a pole in the 10' easement between our plots. I've had to have the company we bought the land from mail over the plat map which took time. The electric guy will be going back out tomorrow hopefully, to see if he can now find them with the map in hand. If not, more delay will occour as we try and find them, call the real estate agent if we can't so he can try and find them and if he can't get the original survey company back out to find them or put them in if they didn't do it to begin with.

All this takes T.I.M.E. the biggest commodity we're dealing with right now. We have too little of it and life is demanding too much. As of Monday Rob lives and works in Gainesville. He's staying with a friend. Hopefully, we can get the shabin ready by the end of October.

3 comments:

  1. One step at a time I suppose. {{{HUGS}}} Did you get the car situation squared away then? Are you here with no way around? I hope things start turning around sooner rather than later. With the weather change it would be perfect timing to be getting some of that work done.

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  2. No car yet, but hopefully in the next couple of days. Trying not to get ripped off, but we don't have a lot of time. I've been borrowing my stepdad's truck, but I had it for weeks, need to return it ASAP.

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  3. I also spoke with the watershed people and the health department about our plans for rainwater recycling, greywater treatment via a small constructed wetland, and humanure composting. I certainly didn't get a resounding "NO", in fact, no one seems to know much about it either way. I think I have a pretty good mental picture of what needs to be done. It will be a little rough, but none of these will be outrageously expensive. We'll need a permit for a well, but other than that, we should be good to go.

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