Friday, May 23, 2014

Drywall Installation - First Floor

The last time we were through the house it was for the pre-drywall walk-through with Bob our PM, this time my wife and I went over on a weekend, which the PM does not typically work.  In this case we stopped into the model home, to talk to our Sales Rep to get access into the house.  It had been a while since we had been over to the model, so we ended up getting into a long talk and catching up with our Sales Rep.  She confirmed the tentative closing date of June 20th, its getting closer and closer and seems to move faster each day.

The model home is also a Florence Model, so we took a few minutes, with the use of a borrowed polka dot measuring tape, and took some measurements for curtains.  After a pass through of the model it was on to our future home.  Upon arriving we came across the house all closed up for the first time and the driveway was installed.  The driveway and garage is sized for two cars tapered as it approached the street to a single car apron.   

Picture of the Ryan Home Florence Model being constructed with driveway installed
Driveway Completed

It is tough to see entirely but there is a decline from the house to the front a slight grade of approximately three percent allowing water to run off and move as much water away from the house as possible.  The trench is filled in where they buried the electric and it looks like they leveled out the rest of the yard a little, but much more work to do there towards the very end to finalize the landscaping.

Upon entering the house its a totally different feel with the drywall up no more seeing through the walls, but rather really getting to feel the end product. Once again I took whole lot of pictures, so I will be taking you through the house in a few posts, this time I will divide them up by the floor, this first post will be for the first floor, called the main floor on Ryan Homes' floor plans.  In the subsequent two posts I will take a look at the second floor and finally the basement.


Picture of label on sheet rock indicating a half of an inch
1/2 Inch Sheet Rock
Not much to see in the above picture, but I wanted to show the label I saw on the walls, indicating the half of an inch sheet rock.  Important to know for future, in case there is ever a need for removal and replacement of the walls in future projects.

Living Room / Foyer


The first room we will look at is the living room and foyer, essentially the front entrance way to the house. On the Ryan Home floor plan this area is noted as two rooms, part of the open floor plan, but in reality it really is one room providing the gateway between the back of the house, the front door and basement access.

Living Room - Looking to Back of House
Living Room - Basement Entrance
The first two pictures above take a look from the front corner of the living room, looking towards the back of the house.  You can see the basement entrance towards the right in both pictures.  One of the offers available to us was a deep discount on the finished basement as long as we used Ryan Home's mortgage company NVR.  The deal was too good to pass up, so this path will be used to access that part of the house.  The one thing I noticed with the drywall is applied horizontal runs rather than vertical, which comes across as a straight line through the center of the wall, looks very clean with the lines covering the screw holes.
  
Foyer (Living Room)
The front door as seen above, is the standard door on the homes, at least in our development is the the three panel metal door, with the top panel being a window.  In front of the door is the foyer, mentioned earlier, it the area from the wall on the right where the basement stairs.

Living Room
The living view from the other angle and the nice double window, the room looks really big from this angle.  

Powder Room / Coat Closet

Between the front of the house and back of the house on the main floor is a small hallway containing a powder room at the end and a coat closet on the right.  This is the half bathroom in the house, and only one on the main floor.  This house does have one and half more than our current house so that will be a wonderful addition.  The doorway is the exposed two by fours from which the door frames will ultimately sit.

Powder Room
Powder Room / Coat Closet

Family Room


Once again I was amiss in my duties to capture photos of the family room, and only grabbed on view.  The picture is from the morning room looking back to the family room.  The ones I missed was from the stairway into the room and from the back corner towards the hallway up to the front of the house.  Since the family room, kitchen and morning room make are in a big open arrangement the picture taken from the other end of the family room really shows the kitchen.
Family Room
Here is that other view which shows the corner of the family room where it meets the base of the stairway from the second floor.  The window on the left is one of the two standard windows in the family room.  The morning room can be seen in the far left.

Family Room looking towards the Kitchen

Kitchen


The kitchen is one of the most important rooms in the house for its value and it purpose.  The kitchen in the Florence model is a great setup, the optional items in it allow you to set it up in many ways.  The kitchen sits between family room and morning room.  In the following views you can see the drywall in the kitchen as seen from both rooms.
Kitchen - View from the Family Room
Kitchen - View from Morning Room
The kitchen sink will sit along a half wall that divides the kitchen and morning room, featuring a morning bar above it.  In the picture below you can see the wall that will be behind the cabinets.  One thing to notice is the outlet which looks to be there by the plumbing, this must be for the garbage disposal unit.  The yellow wire I assume will be for the dishwasher.

Kitchen - Sink Area
One option we chose in the kitchen is the recessed lighting which we saw before the drywall went up, we now can see it with the ceiling in.  This will look really good, we chose this when we saw the default option in the catalog of kitchen options presented by Jackie our sales rep.

Kitchen - Pantry and Recessed Lighting
In the corner just off center of the above picture the angles room is the pantry, great size and sits between the counter and the refrigerator.  The refrigerator will be situated in the space just to the right of the pantry door opening.

Morning Room


The morning room was the most expensive option we added to the house but we felt it was a must have. Any opportunity to add additional square footage to the house as part of the initial build try and fit it into the budget.  An addition later one will cost much more, require an architect and leave a lot more room for issues.  
Morning Room - View from Kitchen
On top of the added space on the main floor the morning room comes with the added basement storage and the double window in the master bedroom.  The best feature though is the triple window and the light it allows into the open floor space.


Morning Room - View from Family Room

Laundry Room / Garage


The laundry room bridges the kitchen and the garage, which is a nice feature over our current setup with the laundry in the basement.  A small room it has a doorway on each side of the room.  The door separating the garage and laundry room is a fire door, and was already hung.  The door to the kitchen is a standard door, which is yet to be hung. 

Laundry Room - View from Kitchen
Laundry Room - View from Garage

In the final room, if it could be called that on the main floor is the garage, Ryan finishes with drywall, the walls which share a wall with the inside of the house, the one facing the outside is only finished around the electircal box.  This can be seen a little bit in the picture below on the right side you can see the exposed beams.

Drywall in The Garage
The garage being about two feet taller than the other rooms of the house required two full runs of sheet rock and a portion of a third which can be seen by the lines of spake separating the sheets on the wall.

Garage Up Close
Coming next will be a subsequent post featuring the drywall covered second floor.

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