Build schedule - looking for feedback

[Innovate1]

Should have my permit in about a 10 days for 1600sq ft house with walkout basement and attached 2 car garage. Also 30 x 40 detached garage. Thinking about schedule and want to be closed in by winter. November average low here is 37F so would be nice to be done with most except outside by then, especially concrete.

I threw this schedule together. It's a rough first cut but I wanted to get some feedback on it - things missed or out of order or unrealistic time allowed. On the current house we lost a lot of time between contractors so I need to do a much better job of scheduling this time around.

Task Start date Duration
Survey 12-Sep 1d
Excavation 16-Sep 3d
Survey
Foundation 23-Sep 5d
Framing 30-Sep 5d
Under slab plumbing/conduits 30-Sep
interior slabs 7-Oct
Trusses on framing
Roofing 7-Oct 5d
Backfill/rough grading 7-Oct
Doors/windows 14-Oct 5d
Outdoor patio/porch/ driveways 14-Oct
Install main electric panel 21 oct
siding 21-Oct 5d
Deck and stairs 21-Oct
Interior framing 21-Oct 5d
wiring 28-Oct 2w
rough plumbing 28-Oct 2w
insulation 4-Nov 1w
drywall 11-Nov 1w
Interior finish carpentry 18-Nov

 

[Stuart in MN]

Who is doing the work, a contractor or yourself? Are you acting as a general on the project? I can't comment on the increments, but the overall time from start to finish looks pretty aggressive.

 

[joes169]

I'm a concrete and masonry contractor for 20+ years, and we've been involved in a few hundred new house builds in that time. I think your schedule is overly aggressive for a tract builder who does 100 homes a year and has a pocket full of subs they owe money to. Assuming you're a one-time, DIY gc, in one of the most labor short, strong economies since the baby-boom, I think you're off your rocket
Double, maybe even triple or quadruple, your expectations, and you might be getting close.

I'm not trying to be rude, but most trades are full for the season, and far more likely to take work from established gc's than a homeowner this point in the season. Not to meantion, you seem to have a lot of tasks out of order.

 

[dw1]

I just finished building a house, I subbed a lot of mine out and did a lot of it myself, I have friends in the construction business that I had been trading with over the years and was able to collect on, it took me seven months, I built a 1600 sq ft house w/ 580 sq ft attached garage, 9' ceilings and full unfinished basement. I took out my building permit and tried to orchestrate all the subs ect. Rain and Mother nature doesnt play fair. Is 3 months your time frame?

I would definitely apply for a building permit now since you are in a big city, it took me two weeks to get my building permit and it was given to me in 2 steps, foundation only and then had to resurvey and then re apply and get full building permit MOE, read what Joe said above, he is speaking the truth, if I wasnt really Good friends with my excavator buddy, he would have never stopped business and dig my basement and he was good friends with the basement wall/ foundation guy, everyone around here is super busy.

 

[JoeMcGov]

I'm a concrete and masonry contractor for 20+ years, and we've been involved in a few hundred new house builds in that time. I think your schedule is overly aggressive for a tract builder who does 100 homes a year and has a pocket full of subs they owe money to. Assuming you're a one-time, DIY gc, in one of the most labor short, strong economies since the baby-boom, I think you're off your rocket
Double, maybe even triple or quadruple, your expectations, and you might be getting close.

I'm not trying to be rude, but most trades are full for the season, and far more likely to take work from established gc's than a homeowner this point in the season. Not to meantion, you seem to have a lot of tasks out of order.

This ^^^. The number of days of "nothing" will fry your mind.

 

[MushCreek]

Around here, you'd be lucky to get started by November. I built my own house, but hired a few subs for certain tasks. There were months of delays. Right now, it's hard to get a sub to even return your calls. Then there's weather.

 

[jbwilkins]

We build 5000+ a year and typically have a 100-120 day build cycle, that's not including weekends.......We've also got onsite management 40-60 hours a week to make sure things are occurring as they should......We can push out a model in 3 months, but that's multiple crews/trades in the house at once and working weekends and we pay for it......

You've got zero time built in for weather, if you're required to have inspections those guys have their own schedule, especially if you're building a 'one off' project not close to other construction.....Do you have permit in hand? If you're in a large jurisdiction with lots of regulations you could be looking at months to get a permit (it could be immediate too, just depends).......

While the house isn't huge (we average about 2900 heated), I'm betting you'll be lucky to be in it by March of next year....realistically more like June...

Here's how it works out.....

Survey Scheduled for Monday, they no show (overloaded schedule, someone's out sick, whatever...)

Survey Occurs on Tuesday, but now your foundation guy can't start on Tuesday as you scheduled, so he sent his crews to another job (assuming you let him know), they can get to you next Monday, you just lost 4 days.....

Now if you didn't tell your foundation guy that the survey didn't happen and he shows up and can't do the work 1) he's probably going to be ticked, 2) may want you to pay for the dry run/lost revenue, and 3) he'll be back, but probably on his schedule AFTER he's verified the job is ready......

It goes on and on like this...Good subcontractors won't have crews just sitting around waiting for you work to be ready. If they do there's probably a reason they're sitting......

While building a home isn't rocket science, it takes more time and energy than people think.....

 

[Innovate1]

I have an excavator and foundation contractors lined up (I think, their schedule may change as I don't have a firm date for getting permit but we already got the red lines and fixed those issues). I totally agree, having done this once (when contractors didn't seem so busy) that there is a lot of "nothing". Trying to figure around weather - don't want to try to put in foundation in freezing weather. One concrete bid noted winter service was mandatory from 11/1 to 3/31 and would be great if we could avoid that both for cost and quality of material. Maybe put off all flatwork except basement floor until spring?

I realize this is aggressive, even very aggressive. Any suggestions to keep things moving and minimize the "nothing" times?

 

[finn]

I suspect that if you add 12 months to your timeline you may, with a lot of luck, meet that revised completion date.

I would certainly make sure you have other living arrangements in place for this winter, at the very least.

 

[readhead]

If I was a sub and saw your schedule, you are going to share, right, I would would say no thanks. You are manufacturing drama and in this environment no one needs that. You are going to be difficult to work for because your schedule is going to go upside down almost immediately. I’ve been doing this for 47 years and one thing that is always certain is that if things start badly they never get better. For your own sanity rethink the project in practical terms.

 

[RDeMeyer]

I have to agree with the opinions here. We permitted our garage conversion and 4 car garage addition to our house in August of 2018. It wasn't until November that the slab was poured and framing started days later. We just received our final approval in August of 2019. We contracted the entire project and I can't tell you how much time there was nothing being done. Days and sometimes WEEKS for the next sub to get us into their schedule. Granted we had Rain and Rain and MORE RAIN that cost a couple months of delays in getting the slab work done. But the original estimate of four months to complete was simply just a pipe dream. I won't go into the horror story of how badly the contractor managed things but if it can go wrong it probably will and it will always end up delaying the next phase of the project.

 

[Bigblockyeti]

What you're trying to do sounds possible if you completely remove weather from the equation. Problem is, it's busy for all the trades, then there's a multitude of variables completely outside of anyone's control that could pop up and throw a wrench into the whole works. I think if you had an HGTV (or NASA) type budget and were building the entire thing indoors along with double or triple redundancy on your subs lined up it could happen. Outside of that, it sounds like very wishful thinking.

 

[Innovate1]

Everyone is telling me this is way beyond reasonable. I agree it is wishful thinking. But some feedback seems overly pessimistic (4 times that long; add a year; etc). A few people have offered some constructive words - one suggested June as more realistic finish date - I could live with that as at least something to shoot for realizing things may slip from that. The purpose of my email was to try to figure out how to come up with a realistic schedule and plan ahead for subs, plan around winter, etc. I am hoping to do better than my current house that took about 16 months. How to reduce time between subs? One person commented my tasks were out of order - ok, what's the proper order? Which items are out of place? Or does everyone just wing it and hope for the best? I doubt it...

 

[Bluearmflames]

I always found it helpful to fax or email weekly schedules to the trades. Then approx 2 weeks before the trade was to start. I would call and confirm the schedule. The difference is that I was managing 60 homes worth the schedules a day. Knowing your trades and having a good working relationship makes things run smooth as glass.

 

[rayra]

Too tight a schedule. No slack time, no room for error or delays caused by man, machine or weather / God.

 

[rayra]

Everyone is telling me this is way beyond reasonable. I agree it is wishful thinking. But some feedback seems overly pessimistic (4 times that long; add a year; etc). A few people have offered some constructive words - one suggested June as more realistic finish date - I could live with that as at least something to shoot for realizing things may slip from that. The purpose of my email was to try to figure out how to come up with a realistic schedule and plan ahead for subs, plan around winter, etc. I am hoping to do better than my current house that took about 16 months. How to reduce time between subs? One person commented my tasks were out of order - ok, what's the proper order? Which items are out of place? Or does everyone just wing it and hope for the best? I doubt it...

Don't project your own ignorance on other people, just because you don't like what they are telling you (presumably from having more experience than you).

For starters, if you are trying to beat the winter, you had best focus on completing the outer shell first and foremost, 'dried in'.
You need your interior walls before you rough-in all your utilities.
You don't need the deck until the primary structure is done.
DO some rough dimensional lumber stairs early, if they will facilitate your build, leave the finished stairs for when the deck is done. About the time your finish carpenter is there.
You also ought to re-examine your build sequence from the viewpoint of your subs. group or arrange their tasks so all the like-kind work can be done in one stint by the relevant sub, instead of trying to have them come out more than one stretch.
Your finish / trim carpentry should come nearly last, when everyone else is done banging around the place.
and there's no goddamned way you are doing slabs, backfill AND roofing starting on the same day.

you need to re-appraise everything you are trying to schedule. **** takes TIME. There's a rhythm, an ebb and flow in each trade, to include the sequence of order, delivery, time of day for grueling work like slab pouring and roofing, short days to fetch more materials or forgotten tooling or equipment.
It isn't a TV show where they pretend to do things in three days. Slabs take time to cure for their strength. You can walk on them in less than a day, sure, but you sure **** should not be putting any load or stresses on them for WEEKS.
Lastly, you need to read up on stuff like MS Project, Project Workbench or other project management software and concepts like 'critical path', lead times, built-in holds or buffer time. And GANTT charts. They'll at least help you understand the interconnections and schedule conflicts inherent in building a structure and the real time requirements you seem to have utterly ignored.

And on top of it all, you seem to imagine that you can lock in all those subs to dance to your extremely too-tight schedule. You'll obviously never dealt with the trades. A bunch won't show, or slip a schedule due to their own problems or perceived better money-making opportunities.
And your schedule leaves zero time for mistakes or re-work. Or inspections, will there be any and do you think they'll be sitting at your job site eagerly waiting for a trade to finish, to sign off?

I don't know if it's your ignorance, or autism or what, but the process doesn't work anything at all like you imagine it does. Not in the real world.

 

[paredown]

While building a home isn't rocket science, it takes more time and energy than people think.....

Word.

Just finishing a kitchen reno that was supposed to be done by end of June--I want my summer back!

I won't bore everyone with the taie of woe--but (as usual) it involves busy subs, the gc jumping the gun on a few things so sequencing wasn't the best, the fact that everyone you would actually want to work on your house is busy, delays for critical materials... etc, etc.

My personal annoyance--I spent half a day yesterday rehanging u/c lights that were put up before the stone guys put in the backsplash (for the second time), and then spent the rest of the day carefully leveling and attaching the two dishwashers, that the plumbers (who are good guys) attach to water and drain--but tell you that they don't drill any cabinets or lock them in place...

 

[Hollywood D]

It took 6 months to get mine done for a 24x30. That included concrete, framing, electrical and roof. No finish work or insulation inside. I did that myself.

 

[Innovate1]

The main goal is to be under roof and closed to weather by the time weather gets bad. That's around mid November.

That means ( I think), in rough order but probably not exactly in order.
Excavation
foundation
framing
roofing
Installing windows/doors
Siding
Roofing

If we can get the basement slab in that would allow basement interior walls to be framed. That could wait but in my current house the concrete was shot in through open door/window openings before the doors/windows were in so that needs to happen before it is closed to weather. And the under slab conduits and plumbing (sewer) need to be in before the basement floor is poured. As I recall on this place I put the meter base up and the main panel after the framing was done in the basement but before the siding. It would be very beneficial to get to the point of having siding on through the winter. If we use zip board I have been told that stands up to weather pretty well so that is an option.

As I see it the additional items to fit into the above are:
Under slab plumbing (sewer)
Water between buildings which is under slabs
Natural gas? This typically comes in at rim joist so that can be done later but not sure about between buildings
Electric conduit between buildings (comes up inside through slab)
Possibly meter base and main panel
water supply from street?

I have used MS project for other things and know about critical path and such - not an expert but know the basics. At this point I have a rough idea of the linkages but I don't have enough understanding of the times and linkages to put together a useful schedule. Also trying to predict how long to get someone in to do a job seems sort of like trying to nail jello to the wall. The jobs themselves go fairly quickly but the wait may be long. I just googled "timeline for building a house" and got lots of hits. Need to do some reading...

 

[Innovate1]

I have dealt with the trades just enough to know that "We are a man short today because he had to see his parole officer" isn't that unusual. That's a direct quote that happened to me. LOL!

 

[Tracs]

I have dealt with the trades just enough to know that "We are a man short today because he had to see his parole officer" isn't that unusual. That's a direct quote that happened to me. LOL!

Then you should know that there is no way tradesmen will be able to follow your schedule.

 

[K13]

Its a week before Sept 1st and you don't even have a permit yet. If you haven't already booked subs for excavation (firm dates) and foundation I would guess at best you will be into October before the first sub is available to work on your house. You will not be closed in by Mid November.

 

[matt_i]

I don't know if concrete contractors work year-round there, but if they stop late-October like they do around here (or other stop date) you should probably consider yourself lucky to just get the concrete work done. The concrete guys I worked with were booked solid in Sept/Oct and I just got lucky enough to have a 1-day easy cash job needing no prep, just show-up-and-pour.

 

[jetnow1]

I did an addition last fall, the concrete was to be done by Oct 31, they finally poured the slab just after Thanksgiving. A month late before we did a single nail. Keep in mind that productivity is much lower in the cold, days are shorter,
and drywall etc. require heat.

 

[hedtedjr]

Not sure what the lead time is in your area, but I am a builder in Central NH and we a literally booked until next June at this point. Granted we are a small mostly custom build company, but if you don't already have your builder lined up you probably wont get one before your deadline.

 

[scottydosnntkno]

Should have my permit in about a 10 days for 1600sq ft house with walkout basement and attached 2 car garage. Also 30 x 40 detached garage. Thinking about schedule and want to be closed in by winter. November average low here is 37F so would be nice to be done with most except outside by then, especially concrete.

I threw this schedule together. It's a rough first cut but I wanted to get some feedback on it - things missed or out of order or unrealistic time allowed. On the current house we lost a lot of time between contractors so I need to do a much better job of scheduling this time around.

Task Start date Duration
Survey 12-Sep 1d
Excavation 16-Sep 3d
Survey
Foundation 23-Sep 5d
Framing 30-Sep 5d
Under slab plumbing/conduits 30-Sep
interior slabs 7-Oct
Trusses on framing
Roofing 7-Oct 5d
Backfill/rough grading 7-Oct
Doors/windows 14-Oct 5d
Outdoor patio/porch/ driveways 14-Oct
Install main electric panel 21 oct
siding 21-Oct 5d
Deck and stairs 21-Oct
Interior framing 21-Oct 5d
wiring 28-Oct 2w
rough plumbing 28-Oct 2w
insulation 4-Nov 1w
drywall 11-Nov 1w
Interior finish carpentry 18-Nov

Unless your a large tract builder your dates are crazy. And your timelines very off.

Excavation is a half day tops(not counting bring in fill/final grade)
Insulation- my guys can do a 4700ft colonial in a day and a half including blowing the attic

Wiring and plumbing for that small of a house would be 3 days each tops not counting final trims.

Framing id give three weeks with the shop not five days.

Roofing three days tops.

Doors and windows maybe two days tops.

I build a lot of houses, from small specs like this to large 1mil+ customs. The shell and exterior can go up very fast, but it’s the inside that takes the most time. Many clients think once the drywalls hung that their weeks away from move in. In reality drywall is about the halfway point in a build. There’s still 1000 little things to do, from cabinets to trim to filling and caulking the trim. Which can’t happen while the floorings going in. Which can’t happen while trims going up because of dust. Which has to happen after hvac is in for humidity. But the painters won’t start until the trim is 100% done.

I sub some guys to a large local (think pulte/mattamy) builder and even they can barely push four months on a small 1600ft box they build 30 at a time.

If your not a builder, and whether your doing it yourself or hiring subs, and this is a ‘custom’ house for yourself/you designed, anticipate a year minimum.

Framing in the fall/winter *****. Rain snow etc. Heating a basement with no roof on the house/insulation ***** ($1000+ a month).

If you have friends in the trades, LISTEN TO THEM. If everyone is telling you it’s going to take X time and you think it’ll take Y, trust me their not lieing to you their trying to help you.

 

[scottydosnntkno]

Everyone is telling me this is way beyond reasonable. I agree it is wishful thinking. But some feedback seems overly pessimistic (4 times that long; add a year; etc). A few people have offered some constructive words - one suggested June as more realistic finish date - I could live with that as at least something to shoot for realizing things may slip from that. The purpose of my email was to try to figure out how to come up with a realistic schedule and plan ahead for subs, plan around winter, etc. I am hoping to do better than my current house that took about 16 months. How to reduce time between subs? One person commented my tasks were out of order - ok, what's the proper order? Which items are out of place? Or does everyone just wing it and hope for the best? I doubt it...

When everyone is telling you something you don’t want to hear, perhaps you should listen to everyone.

Your a thousand miles from me, I have nothing to gain or lose from your job. But I will give you advice to help you from losing your *** based on my years of experience.

My very first new home build, after being a remodeler for years, went almost 50% over budget because of delays, underestimations and carrying costs of taxes interest etc for 16 months over anticipated timeframe. I put every dollar I had or could borrow into it, and managed to escape breaking even(is no profit for two years of my life and fronting two hundred thousand on top of the banks 400). But, it did land me a second similar home they I built for almost double the price, made a couple hundred and started my business to where it is today.

If you don’t regularly build houses with consistent subs, you CANNOT physically build a house in 6 months. Period. Let alone three like you think.

 

[Innovate1]

Fair enough. I admit the original time line was insane and appreciate the feedback. I am willing to listen - that's why I asked in the first place. I realize I am just one guy and don't have much (if any) pull on subs who, if they are any good, probably have repeat customers with more pull.
Would appreciate some input on my revised order of things and what could be done in the winter. Hoping to at least get the foundation in as the spring is pretty wet here. I did some work on the existing house before there was any heat and and it was no fun.

 

[dw1]

Should have my permit in about a 10 days for 1600sq ft house with walkout basement and attached 2 car garage. Also 30 x 40 detached garage. Thinking about schedule and want to be closed in by winter. November average low here is 37F so would be nice to be done with most except outside by then, especially concrete.

I threw this schedule together. It's a rough first cut but I wanted to get some feedback on it - things missed or out of order or unrealistic time allowed. On the current house we lost a lot of time between contractors so I need to do a much better job of scheduling this time around.

Task Start date Duration
Survey 12-Sep 1d
Excavation 16-Sep 3d
Survey
Foundation 23-Sep 5d
Framing 30-Sep 5d
Under slab plumbing/conduits 30-Sep
interior slabs 7-Oct
Trusses on framing
Roofing 7-Oct 5d
Backfill/rough grading 7-Oct
Doors/windows 14-Oct 5d
Outdoor patio/porch/ driveways 14-Oct
Install main electric panel 21 oct
siding 21-Oct 5d
Deck and stairs 21-Oct
Interior framing 21-Oct 5d
wiring 28-Oct 2w
rough plumbing 28-Oct 2w
insulation 4-Nov 1w
drywall 11-Nov 1w
Interior finish carpentry 18-Nov

This was approx. my time frame on building the same size house, as I stated above, it took me 7 months:
Excavation- 1 day to dig my basement
Foundation-1 day to form and pour (all the forms were delivered on a Friday, rained and a wall partially fell in, cleaned that up and set wall forms, rained again, no concrete delivery that day, finally got walls poured, roughed basement plumbing / sump pump in on Saturday, framers showed up one evening and put basement poles and beam up.
Poured the basement floor.
I Had the framers scheduled in advance, they started at the end of the next week, it took them 3 weeks to get my house under roof, there were 4 sometimes 5 guys, they did an excellent job. Framers installed my windows, me and my buddy installed my doors, he is a small GC.
Roofer took about 3 days, lumber company messed up on quantity of shingles and I had to jump through hoops to get 7 more squares of shingles late on a Friday, so they could finish Saturday (Be prepared to do this)
HVAC rough in was a week
Plumbing rough in was about 1 1/2 weeks
I did my electrical after HVAC was done.
My plumbing buddy dug the gas line trench and my electrical service trench, that was about a 1/2 day.
Fireplace company came and installed FP
I had spray foam insulation done, that took a day.
I thought I had my T's crossed and i's dotted but fireplace company didn't like spray foam in the FP cavity, neither would talk to each other, No one wanted liability, so it took me 5 hours to scrape the spray foam out of the FP cavity, the insulators did come back one evening and put batts up in the FP cavity, FP company lined it with Durarock concrete board, they both did a great job. I had 13 contractor bags of spray foam insulation that I tore out.
House set for about a week waiting on drywall guys, also drywall supply company busted a window sliding drywall through it, I had to order a new window, that took two weeks.
Stone guys showed up, they were here about 2 full weeks.
Drywall guys were here about 2 weeks.
Poured front porch and back patio, poured garage floor, poured concrete driveway and 2 weeks later
Me and my buddy did the interior trim and doors, kitchen cabinets, we had a company come in and do the quartz counter tops, none of his measurements were good, it was kind of a mess., no big deal
We changed kitchen sink base late and had to wait a few weeks on a farm style sink base
Painter came in and primed and painted ceilings, walls and trim
I got my electric and gas on inside the house.
Septic System, Oh the Septic System
they showed up a month late, installed 2 -1000 gallon tanks on a Thursday, plumbers hooked up house plumbing to tanks on Friday, waiting on inspection (It had not rained in 3 months at this time, Saturday night we got 4" of rain, about 9:00am Sunday morning both tanks popped up out of the ground, it was a mess, a lot of blame
Did the tile in bathrooms and kitchen back splash, glass co. did the shower door.
HVAC co came back and finished
plumbers came back and finished, I had to make a few trips to change out wrong plumbing trim parts
I got all my electrical fixtures in and set all my appliances (Someone forgot to order the range hood?) that took a couple extra weeks
Insulators came back and sprayed 2" foam lid in attic and then blew in R38 ontop of that. My gas/electric bills are averaging $100 so far, highest one was $120
I got my Plumbing and electrical inspections and then building, HVAC and got my COO, we were living in the barn I built a few years back, so we were on site, which helped a lot.
All in all, it was a lot of work, I saved a lot of $$ and had some help from good friends.
If you are in St. Louis, check out if you have to have a silt fence put up? Me and my wife put up 600' of it, I kept my street clean out front. I had to post a $2500 builders bond with a city dept, they came out and did weekly inspections, (Clean Water Act) I did get all my bond $$ back after I was finished.
I ended up doing an asphalt driveway out to the street, I just did that back in May
I already have my drywall in my basement, I will probably finish it in a year or so, I want to make sure that I don't have any water issues down there.
I did run a 2" pvc conduit from my basement to attic (for future), I have a 4" pipe for Radon (If needed) that is under my basement floor and runs up thru to the attic. I have 2 pvc conduits running under ground that go out to my barn, if needed, I have my septic conduits running underground where they can be seen entering the house.

Good Luck, its a lot of work but definitely worth it.

 

[Innovate1]

dw1, Thanks for the details. Yes, we will need to do silt fence. When I did it before I trenched a small trench to install it but I have seen others just throw it up where it doesn't really do anything.

Noticed you did the basement slab before any of the framing. Seems logical but as I recall we did the floor here after framing the main floor/roof - don't remember if there was a reason for that. Is that the normal order of things?

 

[dw1]

I trenched and installed my silt fence(600'), it was inspected and I also had to fill out a weekly inspection sheet and keep that onsite, I kept up with all mud, run off, dirt, debris getting carried out into the street, the nice lady also suggested that I go to "Silt Fence Class/Dealing with water runoff) an 8 hour Saturday class only given every so often, I was able to use my Excavator buddies license to avoid that. Yes, we poured the basement floor before any of the framing started. My framers were able to swing by one evening, they installed the basement poles and the beams and secure in place, then we poured the floor, the only other thing I didn't mention, I used engineered floor joists, they are lighter, straighter but are not fire rated, there are a few options to obtain the fire rating for them, one is to drywall the ceiling in the basement.

 

[rattle_snake]

I have no useful advice to share that hasn't been already. I got lucky and had my building up and secured in about 3 months. Even with a lot of planning and sub commitment dates, anything can happen.

In my workplace we call unrealistic schedules a 'cascade of miracles'. They fail 100% of the time.

Good luck. Asking for feedback here was a smart move.

 

[joes169]

I can't give you a full schedule, due to lack of time to type it, and I don't know how the trades like to do things in your area, but I can offer this:

- Your original plan calls for backfilling the same day as pouring the concrete floors. Why not backfill before framing? The foundation walls will need some temp bracing, but it's done everyday on every basement around here. Makes framing far more efficient. You also can't expect them to backfill, grade, pour and finish on the same day, too much going on at once, and at least the basement floor will need inspection pre-pour.

- I would check with your concrete flatwork crew what their schedule is like for winter. We purposely push basement floors off until winter/late fall to extend our season. VERY easy to seal them off, and almost all of them get a temp heater, which you'll likely need to keep frost heave at bay, anyways.

- Concrete stoops are usually the first concrete priority, as porch columns need to bear weight on them, generally. Pour the stoop, and ideally the garage floor, by THanksgiving and you should be fine.

- Skip any exterior flatwork this fall, wait until next spring/early summer. You don't need, much less want, the driveway and patio done until almost everything is done with the house. I resist pouring this stuff on a regular basis until the house is ready for occupancy because I've seen far too many instances where the subs got caulk/sprayfoam/oil leaks,/diesel fuel/you name it on what's supposed to be a brand new, finished product. Mud ***** in spring, but living with the damage for the rest of your life ***** worse.

- Check with your concrete sub on how late in the year they will pour interior flatwork. I have a hard time they all wrap up in late October when we generally work until at least Dec. 1 here. On average, we tend to be 10-15 degrees colder than your region.

Best of luck.

 

[jhrodd]

I built a custom house last year (teardown) about that size with no garage. Broke ground in December so had a head start on the sub's schedules. We got really lucky and it went very smoothly but still took 7 months. I like my own houses to take at least a year so the framing is out of the weather for a few months before insulation and drywall. We work really fast too..
https://vimeo.com/259931863/68f98edd01

 

[Innovate1]

I can't give you a full schedule, due to lack of time to type it, and I don't know how the trades like to do things in your area, but I can offer this:

- Your original plan calls for backfilling the same day as pouring the concrete floors. Why not backfill before framing? The foundation walls will need some temp bracing, but it's done everyday on every basement around here. Makes framing far more efficient. You also can't expect them to backfill, grade, pour and finish on the same day, too much going on at once, and at least the basement floor will need inspection pre-pour.

- I would check with your concrete flatwork crew what their schedule is like for winter. We purposely push basement floors off until winter/late fall to extend our season. VERY easy to seal them off, and almost all of them get a temp heater, which you'll likely need to keep frost heave at bay, anyways.

- Concrete stoops are usually the first concrete priority, as porch columns need to bear weight on them, generally. Pour the stoop, and ideally the garage floor, by THanksgiving and you should be fine.

- Skip any exterior flatwork this fall, wait until next spring/early summer. You don't need, much less want, the driveway and patio done until almost everything is done with the house. I resist pouring this stuff on a regular basis until the house is ready for occupancy because I've seen far too many instances where the subs got caulk/sprayfoam/oil leaks,/diesel fuel/you name it on what's supposed to be a brand new, finished product. Mud ***** in spring, but living with the damage for the rest of your life ***** worse.

- Check with your concrete sub on how late in the year they will pour interior flatwork. I have a hard time they all wrap up in late October when we generally work until at least Dec. 1 here. On average, we tend to be 10-15 degrees colder than your region.

Best of luck.

Thanks for the tips. Very helpful.

I had figured the basement floor would go in after the framing started but in thinking about it doing it before seems to make more sense. What's the normal sequence?

When you mentioned stoops I guess you mean porches (what we call them here.). Would that include the house front porch and the pad beside the detached garage? The house roof has two points of support so could go without support initially. The garage "Porch" roof is small and could be held up temporarily fairly easily but if those can be poured and finished early so much the better.

So by exterior flatwork you must mean the drives, patio under the deck and walkways? That's all that's left.

On heat for the basement what is done? Throw a big tarp over the foundation? Frost heave - Seems impractical to continue to heat the place so how long does that need to be done?

A few more details would be great.

 

[Bigblockyeti]

Thanks for the tips. Very helpful.

I had figured the basement floor would go in after the framing started but in thinking about it doing it before seems to make more sense. What's the normal sequence?

When I was in the trades in Ohio, the good builders would pour the basement floor after the drywall was hung throughout the house. That meant most of the weight hauled into and installed in the house was done and little else would generate additional movement potentially over stressing green concrete. This was especially important as the "pads" poured to support the beam jacks would have the floating basement floor sitting directly on top of them and that's where the majority of the movement could occur, especially if the floor was poured before framing started. No doubt, it was a huge PITA pouring concrete through a basement window but made for a far more stable and less crack prone slab. This is not the way the big production builders did it, they were far more concerned with quantity over quality, Ryan Homes comes to mind at the top of the list for cranking them out with zero to little effort put into quality.

 

[Innovate1]

I suppose a compromise would be to do the basement slab after the framing and roof are on. It's a partially finished basement so waiting until drywall is up would mean two rounds of drywall work. On the current place we have an atrium in the front with some good sized window openings that made it easy to get concrete into the basement. Don't have that on the current house but it's a corner lot walkout so the concrete could easily come in through the basement patio door opening.

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

too late in the year especially if you do not have subs locked in yet, good luck because everybody is pushing now to get their projects done by the end of the year

I am a mason contractor and I am already starting to plan for the years end and can definitely tell you with as busy as everybody is right now you will not get contractors to commit this late in the year

Hell youll be lucky to even get people to call you back right now

Personally I would just plan to get everything in order for spring time start date, Or have the flat work done and let it sit


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[iowa4x4dieselman]

I am in the middle of a build similar to yours, if you want to check it out (link below) I am having a custom home builder build the home for us, the only work i will be doing is installing the tubes and insulation under the slabs for in floor heating. Our home is 1875 sq ft. with 1250 sq ft garage.

So far we signed a contract in February, work was supposed to begin in April, and the hole got dug around July 4th. Yesterday they set up the trusses, and hope to have the roof done by the end of the week. We do not have a timeline from them as of yet, but were told the process is about 5-6 months. Originally slated for October, but looking like end of year. With no delays and good crews that are on top of it, you could be ok on your proposed timeline, but expect delays. Here it didn't rain for almost a month, but now that i have wood up it seems to rain every other day.


Our steps so far have been
Dig foundation, pour footers, pour foundation, install drainage tile, bring water and sewer lines to basement, run drain lines in basement floor. pour pads for basement jacks, frame up basement, set floor joists, sub-floor, exterior/interior walls, garage walls, trusses.

https://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=406972

 

[joes169]

Thanks for the tips. Very helpful.

I had figured the basement floor would go in after the framing started but in thinking about it doing it before seems to make more sense. What's the normal sequence?

When you mentioned stoops I guess you mean porches (what we call them here.). Would that include the house front porch and the pad beside the detached garage? The house roof has two points of support so could go without support initially. The garage "Porch" roof is small and could be held up temporarily fairly easily but if those can be poured and finished early so much the better.

So by exterior flatwork you must mean the drives, patio under the deck and walkways? That's all that's left.

On heat for the basement what is done? Throw a big tarp over the foundation? Frost heave - Seems impractical to continue to heat the place so how long does that need to be done?

A few more details would be great.

Here, it's rare to pour the floor before the house is dried in, for a number of reasons. Usually poured before insulation or drywall, as there's always at least a little drywall work in the basement. Number of benefits to do it when we do, mostly to have the ability to work through inclement weather, though.

Stoops and porches are the same thing. It's easier to protect small stoops/porches than a whole driveway.

Yes, exterior flatwork refers to non-load bearing, non -essential concrete.

As I mentioned, we won't pump heat into a house (generally) until it's dried in. It doesn't take much to keep the basement warm once you heat it for a few days. Here, a 500 gallon propane tank is generally dropped off and a 50K btu temp garage heater is hung from the bottom of the floor joists. Budget is probably $1-2000 for heat for a winter build, higher on large homes. May seem excessive to some, but how much interest are you willing to spend on your const. loan to save on heat? Either Way, the footings need to be protected from frost heave one way or another, but that's probably less of an issue in St. Louis area?