Between 705 & 1200 SQ/FT The Garage at The Place in The Valley (Garage Condo 45x23x20)

@dkroth - It feels too stressful right now to be a dream. I can't wait to close and then start the mezzanine build. Once that is completed I will start to feel like I am living the dream.

@djones1a - The inspections are due to start the week of August 8th. The closings can start as early as August 15th. I'm stressing about the inspection because I know there is the issue with the back wall and the lights and who knows what else. I'm doubtful that closing for us will occur on August 15th. I am sure some of the other owners that have unmodified storage units will close that week.

@tomwalker154 - Thanks for the support. Was that your first post? I feel honored. Do you have a project you are working on?

Greg_STL said:

@jay8s & metalhead140 - Thanks for the positive support.

@md21722 - No firewall per say ... But the drywall is fire rated and the studs are metal. There is also the sprinkler system. The service panels are nuts but there are 36 units with twelve meters on each bank of service panels. The power is three phase. The basic unit is fitted with only 100A because some people will be using these as storage only. I upgraded mine to 200A mainly because I have an electric on demand hot water heater getting installed. I really will only be doing simple brake jobs, tires swaps, and oil change kind of work in my unit. I need to do rotors and pads on my car now and am trying to decide if I can wait or just do it in my current residential garage.

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Very cool on the power! I looked in my area and most were advertising a 60A service though some well North of me were ready for "build out"

I'm ready to move in!

This is great. Look forward to every post.


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Today is a Saturday. But with only a few weeks till inspections, I figured some work would occur today. My wife and I drove down to The Place. I looked through our little window and took a couple pictures of our unit that appears to have been painted today. I leaned on the door and the door handle moved. Surprise, surprise, I could look inside today.

The first thing I could see is that the lights are rotated 90 degrees from the drawing and not spaced equally. I believe the build print had the first light centered at 5 feet from the front wall and space 10 feet apart after that. The spacing as shown is much less for the first two as both lights are inside 15 feet. Since the second light is rotated, the center of the second light is closer to 13 feet. I'm sure they are going to say that the lights had to be rotated to miss the HVAC. I'm ok with that but they need to be spaced better. I re-ran the light distribution tool and it says the light centers should be at 5.7 ft and then 11.2 ft each. The first photo shows that the second light in has to avoid the support for the garage door. I think a spacer should allow this.

I do like how the HVAC turned out. Everything is above the trusses over the future mezzanine. A joggle was needed to get around some truss elements but that occurs outside the envelope of the mezzanine. There are vent screens on the ends and two additional vents along the length of the main run.

The final thing your will notice is the paint. I'm am disappointed. They went with the standard color. I expected them to either paint it the color code I specified or to leave it primer and discount the paint. The whole concept of a customized unit seems to be lost on the contractors.

Inspection is going to be more fun than I wanted.

One last post today on a more upbeat note.... A picture of the car that caused us to head down this path to find a nicer space to work and store over the winter.

I made a quick trip to Earth City Friday. Thought about coming by to take a look. Unfortunately, we were up to fetch several milling machines purchased at auction and the riggers on site were a bit slow. By the time we had everything tied down it was to late for any sight seeing. We have a plan in the works to come up to Shapiro Metal Supply for some machining materials. Will contact you before hand for the grand tour.

Bib Overalls said:

I made a quick trip to Earth City Friday. Thought about coming by to take a look. Unfortunately, we were up to fetch several milling machines purchased at auction and the riggers on site were a bit slow. By the time we had everything tied down it was to late for any sight seeing. We have a plan in the works to come up to Shapiro Metal Supply for some machining materials. Will contact you before hand for the grand tour.

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Let me know also would like to meet both of you guys and check this place out. A friend owns a bar real close to this building.Lol

Hi Greg. That place looks great.

Hopefully the contractors were just using up some left over paint as a primer. I had a 1/4 mile stucco wall built once and they painted it mint green instead of the tan I specified. I ran out there yelling WTH!? and they quickly explained what they were doing.

Good luck on the finish and closing. Sounds like you're already in love with the place.

I'm really starting to chuckle at the lack of foresight (ha, punny) into installing those security cameras above the rain canopies. It's essentially reduced their FOV to about half or less of what it should be. Can't see the front door of the clubhouse, can't see the doors of any of the units inside the gate. I wouldn't be surprised one bit to see them relocated in the near future because they're effectively useless.

@Bib Overalls and djones1a - I'm not sure I'm comfortable about giving a tour of a facility that I technically don't own yet. Besides, as my next post will show, it may not matter. The gate and fence may well be up and locked starting tomorrow. There is the open house - otherwise it would have to wait until after I close.

@Skeetobite - I can only hope you are correct on the paint. I love your house and garage set up. I can't even imagine the time that you put into just keeping the maintenance up to date on your compound.

@TurboEuro88 - The developers have admitted that the camera locations were a mistake. They are just waiting for the last rain canopies to get installed and then relocated the cameras once. I personally am voting for under the canopies but a much larger goose neck in the current location could work as well.

The gate was installed today and the posts were planted working around to the back of the building. It should not take long to get the rest of the fence done, so today may have been my last pictures inside the complex until closing. I was told they were holding off installing some items in the units until the gate and fences were up (like my wifi ecobee thermostat). It may not be locked up tomorrow but I really do expect it to be locked up by the next day. The security cameras are also live now.

So, I would expect few if any pictures over the next two and half weeks and then a large album at the open house on August 13th. The owners will have some car **** there supplied by STLMotorcars. STLMotorcars is an Aston Martin, Bentley, Bugatti, Lotus, Lamborghini, Maserati and Rolls Royce dealership but they also usually have a number of other exotics on premise. They have a nice cars & coffee once a month. I saw my first Porsche 918, first Ferrari 488, and my first Bentley Bentayga at a C&C there.

Very good.Hope all goes well at closing.

Coming along nicely. Can't wait till mine gets done in my city, developer is expecting October 31, 2016 possession. 24' by 50' (similar to yours)

buy a drone and fly in there to take update pics. i don't think i can go that long without seeing progress on this. lol

Boost Creep said:

buy a drone and fly in there to take update pics. i don't think i can go that long without seeing progress on this. lol

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That would be a Very Bad Idea, as the building is immediately adjacent to a fairly busy airport with constant corporate jet traffic.

Soooo ... the fence has not been finished ..... yet. The pictures that follow have been from the last two days. I didn't get a chance to post last night.



There does not seem as much happening on the outside - I think mainly because they are working on the inside. The steel posts were capped off. A small detail but they look better.




The final grading is occuring around the sidewalk and the front bio-retention area. It is interesting that the soil that is put directly around the retention area is a different type / color. I thought this little walk behind front end loader was neat.





Many of the units getting finished have lights on. This one is behind my unit and it has four sets of lights and has been painted in a grey color. I saw this and went to look if my unit was a different color now. I looked but really could not tell anything in the dark looking through a drywall dust encrusted window. The camera wouldn't even focus tonight. My lights are not hooked up yet - no light switches even. So there is hope but I just don't know yet....



The club house had these edge lit signs up by the bar. No counter tops have been installed yet. It makes me wonder who will be the first owner to make a custom neon light in the shape of the place logo.



One last picture - I posted a picture of my wife's 997.2 C4S last time. I think if you look through the past pictures you can see her Eos as well. This is my Audi TTS. All three are modded at some level or another - although that is limited to exhaust and wheel spacers on the Porsche. ((You may also have recognized the RAV4 in several posts - that is our "appliance" vehicle - the one you need to pick up mulch or drive in 6 inches of snow.))

You are fastly becoming another one of my GJ idols. TTS is wicked.

@55cadillacking - Thanks. I have really enjoyed the TTS. Its APR stage 2 plus with lowering springs, upsized rear swaybar, front camber plates, uprated engine mounts, bigger intercooler, .... The DSG is flashed as well. It makes for a fun AutoX car but is a bit stiff as a daily. I'm actually thinking about bedding it away for the winter instead of swapping in the snow tires like I usually do (since I now have space). I actually feel guilty on the days I drive it in single digits with salt all over the roads in the winter.

@Everyone - Apparently, they are in no hurry to hook up the fence. I was sure that since the posts and gate went up so fast that the rest of the fence would happen almost immediately.

You will also have to forgive the pictures today. I pulled the DSLR camera out and got one photo before the battery died. I check my spare battery and I had never charged it up either. Doh! So, cell phone photos today....

I did see lots of progress today which makes me wonder what I missed yesterday. The sprinkler system was installed around the clubhouse and the outside of the big U shaped building. The sprinklers are installed on the runway side of the building but not opposite of the clubhouse on the entrance drive. I'm not sure if they are not done or decided not to install since phase 2 will actually put a building there. The downspouts also received a treatment of large rocks to help breakup the water flow at spout exit. I'm still not sure if a elbow will be placed on the end of the spout before they are done.









My unit had lights on as well as switches and outlets installed. Progress. I think the color is tan instead of the light grey "first star" color that was picked out. It is just hard to see through the little window. I am actually amazed I can get photos with a cell phone through the glass.




I noticed on the outside of the center building that there were two boxes that looked like wifi access points. Sure enough, I checked my cell and there was a locked wifi site named The Place.




One last little detail. I can see that they are starting to fill the gaps between the different courtyard pours with a caulk similar to what they used on the building wall gaps.




Well, that was definitely a bigger update than I expected to make today.

Thanks for the update!


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Single digits + snow + salt = my life.

I had a social function after work and my wife and I stopped by the place later than usual on the way home. Sorry, cell phone pictures only since this was a target of opportunity stop. All the the remaining rain canopies have been installed. They also had some nice additions to the clubhouse. They added a pool table, a golden tee video game, a shuffle board table, and a couch and chair.





Taking pictures through glass is a skill I have not quite mastered. The clubhouse and all the units were locked up tight but surprisingly the utility closet was wide open. The door was open and at night the TVs for the security system drew attention.




The units do look different at night. The picture below is of my building. From left to right, it is units 24 through 31. My unit is 25 and the brightest by far. Units 26, 28, and 29 are sold and finished out. It is good that I put those lights on dimmer curcuits and also good I'm not paying for electricity yet.

Some Sunday morning pics of a nearly completed facility.....

The outside of the building is ready for landscaping. The green weeds are around a set of manhole covers for the sewer and water connections. I believe that will get cleaned up this week with the landscaping install. The lower 3-4 feet will be painted but potentially not until the landscaping is done?? The fence is not done and I heard that the portion that remains may be chain link. I guess they do not want to put a lot of money into a fence that will be torn down when phase two goes forward. I'm not sure why the sprinkler/utility room is still wide open.




The courtyards basically look done. They are doing some touch up painting on the doors. The caulking of the concrete joints is still getting completed. The concrete also really needs to be swept up. My wife keeps picking up screws and nails off the concrete when we are there. I have not driven into the complex yet because I really don't need a flat. I'm sure it will all get swept up prior to the grand opening on the 13th.

It really does look like a first class facility. You must be so excited.

Found this on Google Maps. A little dated but on the map none the less.

@Bib Overalls- I had found that update to Google maps and posted it on here back around post 266. I've even looked back through my over 1000 pictures and narrowed it down to the first week of April that the picture must have been taken. It is cool. I have been watching my Apple map ap because the satellite photos seems to be updated at different times between Google and Apple. I am hoping to get a different image on the Apple ap that is at a different point in the construction but not completed yet. Eventually, I will get a completed building picture.

@Everyone - Not a lot going on with the outside of the building. I received the following update from the developers:

As of 7/29/2016

Accomplishments this week
o Received Temporary Occupancy on Wednesday for Buildings and Lounge
o Installed irrigation
o Finished canopies
o Started up some HVAC units in the Units
o Punch-list performed on Thursday
o Electric meters set in Units 8, 9 and 16

Work Planned for upcoming week
o Finish sliding gate
o Install Landscaping
o Start-up irrigation
o Paint bottom of walls on Building B
o Install last section of downspouts
o Finish caulking of site concrete
o Finish Punch-list
o Finish start-up of HVAC units in the Units
o Close-out permits in the Units
o Finish repainting man-doors

Major Milestone Targets
o Owners inspect units after August 1, 2016 – currently being scheduled

So, it sounds like there will be final piece for the downspouts. The also installed the key pads for the gate. The keypads are positioned on the left side of the entrance and exit so the driver can enter the code from the driver seat. It does mean you have to drive on the left side of the road on entrance and exit. That is a little odd but the alternative would be to have a median that would make getting RVs and Trucks through the gate difficult.




The counter-tops are still not installed in the clubhouse but they did get some new cabinets near where I assume a TV will be installed. I'm sorry for the crappy picture but I still haven't learned to take pictures through glass well. I really need some sort of soft cone to block the ambient light. Then again, hopefully in just a couple weeks I can close and use my code to go into the clubhouse....



We have not been called to set up our inspection time yet. I know they would like to have the inspections done prior to the open house on the 13th so it really should be happening soon.

Lots happening all of a sudden... My wife and I sat down last night and made a list of all the things that we thought were issues or needed to be addressed during the inspection. We figured it was coming soon and we might not get time to think if they asked us to show up the same day. We made a list of about a dozen items that we would want to understand. Not all are really issues, some are just verification of things that we could not check without access to the units.

Surprise! I got to work today and I got an e-mail that they wanted to set up the inspection. We set up to talk on Friday afternoon and I warned them that I would send them my list when I got home from work. By the end of the day, I think I got confirmed that the two main developers, the architect, the owner of the principal subcontractor, the subcontractor project manager, and the jobsite superintendent were all going to meet my wife and I for the inspection. Wow. When I got home I sent the list that my wife and I had compiled. I gave them the option to push the meeting off if they wanted to fix things before the inspection. I haven't gotten a response yet but they probably had left work by then too.

So I ate dinner than wandered down to The Place to see if any of the landscaping was installed. Nothing was happening on that end but there were people working late to clean the exterior of the units with a power washer and clean the windows. Surprise number two for the day, the doors were not locked. So I was able to get a closer look at some of the details.
Unfortunately, I was able to confirm that some of the items are real issues. Everything is fixable but I really am not looking forward to having to talk through it on Friday.

Below is a shot I have not been able to take from outside the unit. I have a couple questions for those of you with large doors. When they installed the garage door opener, they took off the chain loop that allowed manual opening of the door. In the event of a power failure, there is a small pull chain that un-hooks the opener from the spring. Then there is a small rope that just dangles from the door that you can use to pull the door down. You can see that they tied the rope up because it gets in the way when it just dangles all the time. I've see these ropes laying outside of closed doors because when it just dangles there it randomly pools inside and outside the unit when the door closes. This unfortunately defeats the purpose of having a rope tied to the door if you tie it up to the door. I expected the manual chain loop to stay with a second sprocket tied to the door opener. The chain loop would spin when the door opened but I don't know that it would hurt anything. What do other people do??? Is there another better solution???



Close up of the ******* rope.



I was also surprised when I got inside that the concrete was not painted around the door. I also expected the lift point for the concrete wall would have been filled in. The concrete looks odd to me because the insulation is offset different on the left versus right side. The insulation was set on the wall when the chain loop was still hooked to the door spring shaft - needing more space for the loop to dangle on the left side of the door. For that matter, why did they do Styrofoam insulation on the front wall instead of a full set of studs. With just the Styrofoam it required that conduits had to be run instead of being able to put the wires in the wall. I all just looks messier than needed. I know I have CDO but am I really the only one that sees these things. (BTW - CDO is like OCD but the letters are put in the correct order).

So, I was sure there was a better way. It didn't take long with a google search to find out that LiftMaster makes openers that retain the manual floor length chain for emergency operation. As a matter of fact, they recommend it for tall doors and only recommend the J for smaller doors. I snapped the comparison of the J to the GH but there are also H and JH versions that retain the chain. Just duh.

As far as the rope goes, I've instances in commercial installations where a rope end is tied to the bottom of the door and somewhere midway up the opening (on the outside of the track, obviously) so that it's reachable when the door is opened but won't coil up on the ground when it's closed, as you've pointed out. I haven't been able to find a photo to demonstrate this, but you may need that rope since you won't be able to reach the door to close it if it's open and you lose power.

We made it through the inspection. I was seriously stressed out but they basically agreed to fix the items that I asked them too. The garage door opener will be swapped out for an H opener with the chain. It was nice to see the air conditioning was running when we got inside.

The grand opening is only a week away. Still no landscaping and the fence has not finished yet. I saw that they had saw cut some small trenches for sensor lines by the gate. I think at one point it was discussed that there would be RFID tags to allow entry and exit without using the keypad. The counter tops were installed in the clubhouse bar area. Since the clubhouse was open, I took some photos. These are a tad better than the ones I've taken through the glass.

Congrats!!! I can't wait to see how you progress from here. I am looking forward to seeing this in person next weekend at the open house. I'll have to seek your unit out.

Keep up the updates. Looking great.

The garage door I have is a balanced sectional door that runs vertically along the wall (In other words, you can open it and push it up to more or less any position and it stays at that position.) I suspect yours is also balanced, yours just runs horizontally along some of the travel. I have the same rope on mine (I'll try to remember to post a picture for you that shows how it's supposed to be attached to the outside rail; the way it's attached on yours won't work well, as you've pointed out). The rope is there to pull the door closed when open, otherwise you won't be able to reach it.

If yours is balanced, I believe you don't need the chain on the opener to open the door. I have been told by LiftMaster that the J opener works for it because it is designed specifically for balanced doors and it exerts positive pressure to maintain it closed. If there is a power outage you'll be able to decouple the opener from the shaft and push the door open manually (because it is balanced) and pull it closed with the rope. I've yet to purchase the opener, so I am curious about your set up. I want to make sure I have not been led astray by LiftMaster support and really need a GH instead of the J they have told me I need.

It's been very interesting following your thread and updates.

Do you know any of the other tenants? Hopefully there will develop a sense of community with the common clubhouse. I guess that's a risk by buying at the front end. First class facility and should be a great place for your auto adventures!

@alberto - I imagine it is balanced. But with a 14ft tall there is no way to lift it higher than your arms reach. I might be able to push up to 8 ft - might. My wife is 5'4" so I'm doubting she can even push it that high. She might be able to push it up enough to get her Porsche out but if we buy a taller SUV she could get stuck. Maybe you could "throw" it up higher before it stops but it is a big door.

So with a 14 foot tall door the rope needs to be at least six feet long to just dangle to 8ft. I think that is what they have done now and the puddling of six feet of rope is annoying. If you tie the rope on half way up then you need a little over 7 foot of rope and it would only have a small amount puddling on the ground. Tying higher or lower than half way would require more rope and more rope laying on the ground when you close.

In the end the rope is just not a very elegant solution. I upgraded to the H (not GH) and still think that is the the correct opener for a door that is taller than one can reach when it is open. Now, for an 8 foot tall door, I would get the J.

@wasfast - We met some of the owners over a year ago when we bought in but I doubt I would recognize them. I did meet two owners while walking the construction site. I think one of them backed out. The other one shares a back wall with us and was driving a Hemi Cuda - I think. I sent all the owners an email at one point with this thread and my Flickr album. So, it has been hit or miss so far but I think once we close that we will start seeing and getting to know people.

5 days until the public open house! The pace today was fast and furious finishing out lots of items that seemed to be on hold because of the weather. The landscaping is going in! You can see both large trees and smaller plants getting located. The edges of the planting beds have been defined giving the indication that there will be grass as well.







The final segments of the downspouts have been installed - both in the courtyard and around the perimeter of the building.




The fence is finally being installed as well - although it is not done yet.




The gate area has had some work done and/or getting done. They cut the concrete for sensors to open the gate. The keypads were pulled down and the footers were re-poured. I'm not sure what was going on there.




The clubhouse is getting all of the TVs installed. And I mean all. I appears they are going with a 4 TV wall instead of one big TV. I've only been showing this on my plans for over a year. I don't know whether to be insulted or flattered. I see four separate channels (TBS, TNT, USA and History Channel). To my knowledge that takes 4 satellite receivers. I had planned to go the streaming path with 4 PS3s for multi-player full screen Gran Turismo racing. The internet situation may not allow that. I'll take flattered and I'll also see how their set up works before I buy my equipment. They also have 1 TV by the entrance between the bathrooms. The final large wall got some huge Lamborghini wall art. The clubhouse is really looking sharp.





You can see some temporary tables and easels that are getting set up for the open house (Cars & Coffee). The developers also contacted me to see if it would be alright to show my plans (the PowerPoints and architect drawings) in my unit during the open house. Since I have posted everything here I did not see a reason not to. I also suggested that they pull about 50 of the >1100 photos from my flikr album to use as a TV screen saver. I thought some perspective buyers might like to see the build process. Saturday looks like it will be fun.

I love this whole place! Sounds like you have some ambitious finishing plans for your av setup.

Greg_STL said:

@alberto - I imagine it is balanced. But with a 14ft tall there is no way to lift it higher than your arms reach. I might be able to push up to 8 ft - might. My wife is 5'4" so I'm doubting she can even push it that high. She might be able to push it up enough to get her Porsche out but if we buy a taller SUV she could get stuck. Maybe you could "throw" it up higher before it stops but it is a big door.

So with a 14 foot tall door the rope needs to be at least six feet long to just dangle to 8ft. I think that is what they have done now and the puddling of six feet of rope is annoying. If you tie the rope on half way up then you need a little over 7 foot of rope and it would only have a small amount puddling on the ground. Tying higher or lower than half way would require more rope and more rope laying on the ground when you close.

In the end the rope is just not a very elegant solution. I upgraded to the H (not GH) and still think that is the the correct opener for a door that is taller than one can reach when it is open. Now, for an 8 foot tall door, I would get the J.

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Ahh, yes, I didn't think your door was that tall. Mine's 10 ft and if I give it a good push it'll fully open. And yes the rope is an entirely inelegant solution. I may have to follow your lead and get an H opener (they seem to be about $100 more than the J) when I do go ahead to buy it so I can also get rid of the ugly rope. Glad you mentioned it.

4 Days To Grand Opening! Things are starting to look sharp with the landscaping.






The gate and fence look completed now. The chain link fence is not as nice as the wrought iron looking entrance fence - But, the chain link is just a temporary fence that goes away when the second phase of the complex gets built. The keypads were removed and a new blank faced post was installed. I do not know if the RFID tags interface to those black faces or if a keypad still needs to be installed. The posts protecting the fire hydrants were painted yellow as well as the stand alone water faucet. The down spouts also were painted to get them all the same color (look back a couple posts to see that they were two colors before).






The security cameras are getting moved to under the rain awnings. There is some clean up that needs to be done on the upper wall but these will be much more functional located lower.



At this point, the exterior of the building just needs to get the darker paint on the lower 4 feet and have some grass planted. They might do some small areas around the club house with sod but I would expect most if not all of it to be seed. And they need to sweep the courtyard - I picked up another drywall screw today. I'm sure there is some more clean up here and there like the old security mount locations but it is basically done.