Owner's Bath Decision

Roman Shower vs. Upgraded Bathtub 

Tough decision to make.

The model home of the Lincolnshire that we have visited (as well as the model on the Virtual Tour) has the upgraded Owner's Bathroom with the Roman Shower Layout. With this option, you get two separate vanities and a linen closet, but there is no tub. We selected this at first because we don't usually take baths and we thought we'd really like having our own corners of the bathroom and a linen closet. The shower is just slightly bigger than the standard shower pan and there is a seat as well as two shower heads. Plus, if we really wanted to take a bath, there will be 3 other tubs in the house, albeit much smaller than a Master's tub would be. 

Another equally priced upgraded option was the "Soaking tub and Shower w/ Seat" Layout. With this option, you get a huge nicely tiled tub (my husband is 6'2 and can fit comfortably in this tub without having to bend his knees), and a standard shower pan that has a seat built in We initially declined this layout because it combines the vanities into one and you lose the linen closet. Plus, we don't frequently take baths. The SR tried to give us a verbal description of what this option looks like, allowing us to see a sample of the tub in another model and showing us the floorplan diagram, but it was hard to visualize because the online pictures and the model here in our town only display the Roman shower option.

We were very happy with our Roman Shower decision until our Rite Rug meeting. We were told that, due to the lack of 90 degree angles in the roman shower, we would be unable to have shelves added, as opposed to what the standard shower allows. Also, the Level C tile that we are paying for it confined to the shower and a nice rim around the shower door, but it's a lot less tile than if we had the tub, which would showcase our tile and listello all around the bathroom, for no additional cost. 

I called around to other developments that had Lincolnshire models and found one a few states away that actually had the upgraded bath / shower combo. That development's SR was kind enough to take the time to take pictures of their bathroom and sent them to me. It actually looks very nice!

So - fellow Ryan Homes bloggers - I would love to have your input - which option would you select? Roman Shower - sacrificing a big soaking tub, but gaining a linen closet and separation of vanities. Or Bath / Shower upgrade option - sacrificing a linen closet and separation of vanities, but gaining a very nicely tiled LARGE bath tub.

Thanks for the input in advance!


 

Paperwork Galore!

Hello!

Sorry for the delay in posting - life has been quite busy outside of the home building process (as if that wasn't enough)! However, I added pictures of the Lincolnshire Model Home to the blog - be sure to check them out! I will be adding our final Structural selections and Flooring choices within the next day or so.

When we signed our contract, our SR warned us that "from this point on, everything that is discussed will be in writing." He was not joking! We have made several trips back to the office to sign / initial various change orders and sketch diagrams of different parts of our home.Tomorrow we will be going back to sign another form to re-emphasize that we do not want our kitchen granite to extend into a lip border (I plan to do my own backsplash after closing).

I was even surprised by how many papers we signed at the Rite Rug meeting, including different forms just to acknowledge that we understood how to clean and care for each type of flooring - Vinyl form, Hardwood form, and a Ceramic Tile form. Glad we have a binder to organize everything. I guess it is good that they are so detailed in their documentation.

More to come soon! Hope everyone's build process is smooth sailing!

Selections Overload!

Choices, choices, choices....and more choices!

So, tomorrow is a BIG day for us! We will be meeting with our SR for a Selections Meeting. Truth be told, this is our second attempt at a Selections Meeting. We met a week ago and were so undecided with all of the additional choices and optional upgrades, that we bailed after 3 hours and decided to "try again" after we had some time to really think about what we need vs. what we want vs. what we don't need or want. Fortunately, I had scheduled that first meeting early enough that our deadline for structural selections isn't for another few days.

We live rather far from the model of the Lincolnshire, so it makes it a little difficult to get back and forth often enough to really visualize what would look good in our home's layout.

We did go by the model again this weekend and came up with our tentative game plan to expedite tomorrow's meeting. Feel free to give any input - it will be interesting to see if we actually stick to these decisions tomorrow when we have to put them in writing. 

Did anyone else have any trouble making decisions during this phase?

OUR GAME PLAN

STRUCTURAL DECISIONS: 

Upgraded Owner's Bath with Roman Shower (struggling with the idea of not having a soaking tub, but I've literally taken a tub bath once in the last 8 years and the roman shower is slightly larger with two shower heads)

4-foot extension in family room and basement 

Bonus room

Gas Stovetop
 
Extra second floor bathroom (Jack and Jill style, for our twins to share)

Elevation A - full front porch, all siding. Comes with a metal roof over the porch.

Finished basement rec room + full bathroom

NOT finishing the extra rooms x 2 in the basement (one is a "media room," the other is a gigantic "Home Office" - we will finish these on our own)

FINISHING UPGRADES: 

Fireplace Granite Surround - Venetian Gold

Kitchen Cabinets - Maple Espresso 

Kitchen Granite - Santa Cecilia

Interior Hardware - brushed nickel  

Owner's Bathroom Cabinets - Maple Espresso 

Owner's Bathroom Counters Granite - Santa Cecilia Light

Secondary Bathroom Cabinets - Tahoe Cherry Bordeaux 

Secondary Bathroom Counters - White cultured marble

EXTERIOR HOME COLORS

I can't even begin to describe how difficult this choice is for us. The color that our neighbor has is a very light, grayish color, so we can't choose that. However, it seems like there are a billion color combinations of siding, shutters, door, and brick choices that we can choose from. Very overwhelming! We narrowed it down to a combination with Navajo Beige siding and another combination with Khaki Brown siding, but that was at the end of the long meeting and I think we were just ready to go. So, tomorrow, I will start the siding decision all over again.

This is what we narrowed it down to: 

 

 

I will also ask about the color combo for this house we passed in the other Ryan Homes neighborhood. It really caught our eye!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wish us luck!!

Welcome

Welcome to Our Home Building Journey!

Thank you for visiting our blog! We have spent several weeks exploring the blogs of our fellow Ryan Homes families who built beautiful houses. So, we decided to begin our own blog, with the hope that our experience will be helpful for future families that are building. We are also hoping that others will also share advice that will help us along this journey. We have already had several questions in the first week since we signed our revised contract! Luckily we have an awesome realtor that has been extremely generous with her time and input.

 

We selected the Lincolnshire Floor Plan. If the blogs are any indicator, we are one of 3 families in this country that selected this plan. LOL.... Maybe the other "Lincoln'ers" are just hiding out. This picture is NOT our house - but it is a Lincolnshire with with the full front porch elevation we selected.

 

This is a first floor master plan. We concluded that the layout was very unique and something fun for us to try for the next (hopefully) 10 years or so. We considered the Dorsey Hall and Jefferson Square plans for a LONG time, but the Lincolnshire had the BEST basement layout for our needs and had interesting nooks and build options that we thought would give us a type of creatively styled home we had never lived in before. Plus, the morning room is the largest of the plans and the ceilings are 10 feet tall, which we loved! I will post pictures from the model home soon. 

As we are beginning the selections process, we realize there are some trade-offs for the aforementioned benefits. Nevertheless, as long as they don't compromise the "feel" of the living areas of the home where we will spend most of our time, I'm ok with them! 

So, enjoy our journey with us! We are truly excited and blessed to be able to share this experience with you all. This is our first time blogging and it will be a work in progress. 

We were so excited to see the SOLD sign on our lot the week after signing - Let the games begin!