Monday, February 8, 2016
Exterior Elevation Colors
Yesterday we dropped by the model home because we wanted to take a look at exterior elevation colors. Ryan Homes had a lot of siding color choices and then based on the color you chose you could then pick from several combinations of shutter and door colors. Our final choice was Flint (formerly known as Graphite Gray), Black shutters, and a black door. We for a moment almost made the switch to white siding and navy shutters but we think the gray will look nicer and the white could look dingy in a construction area.
Saturday, February 6, 2016
Flooring/Cabinet Selections at Rite Rug
Today we chose all of our flooring, cabinets, and countertops at Rite Rug in Strongsville. We were dreading this appointment after reading other Ryan Homes blogs about the high costs and limited choices but we left very happy with our decision. I think it helped to temper our expectations and go into the appointment knowing that flooring can be expensive. We had a rough idea albeit arbitrary of how much we wanted to spend and just the hard surface flooring on the first level alone was above that initial amount we wanted to spend. We had thought about waiting to put in our own floors or save money by keeping the carpet in the dining room but with an open floor plan we worried about matching the flooring later. We did leave our appointment happy with our choices and okay with the amount we spent.
Carpet:
On our Palermo carpet comes standard in the dining room, great room, office, stairs, and bedrooms. The standard carpet is Category A and is builder grade carpet with 5lb padding. If you choose Category A there are very limited color choices (I think there were about 6 colors) and the carpet does not have the stain protection factor.
Category B carpet costs more and has stain protection and a better warranty and there were about 30 color options.
There was also the option to upgrade even more to C or E but we didn't look into that as we were trying to keep to a budget. We chose to upgrade to level B throughout the house and we upgraded the carpet padding to 8lb padding in the great room.
Ryan Homes/Rite Rug "zones" the house so whatever carpet choice you make for the great room must also go in the office and the dining room. Any carpet choice that you choose for the bedrooms upstairs will also be the same carpet for the hallway and stairs. We chose a darker color gray tone carpet for the upstairs zone and a lighter gray color for the downstairs zone. I like the color we chose upstairs and would have put it throughout the house but I thought the lighter color gray would match our current sofa better.
Carpet Costs for the Palermo are below. I hope this helps others who are building with Ryan Homes and who like us had no idea what to expect for the cost of flooring.
Hard Surface Flooring:
Next we chose flooring for the rest of the house. Sheet vinyl comes standard in the kitchen, powder room, owner's bathroom, hallway bathroom, laundry room, mudroom, and foyer. You can upgrade the vinyl to Category B vinyl, Luxury vinyl tile (LVT), hardwood, or tile. We chose LVT because it had a wood look for a much better price and we thought it would be easier to clean and maintain with children and pets. We chose one color/pattern of LVT to go in the kitchen, foyer, mudroom, and powder room since it is an open floorplan and transitions from one material to another would have not looked the best. We also decided to put LVT in the dining room because we were worried about keeping carpet clean in that area. The LVT we chose is below.
Carpet:
On our Palermo carpet comes standard in the dining room, great room, office, stairs, and bedrooms. The standard carpet is Category A and is builder grade carpet with 5lb padding. If you choose Category A there are very limited color choices (I think there were about 6 colors) and the carpet does not have the stain protection factor.
Category A Carpet Choices
Category B carpet costs more and has stain protection and a better warranty and there were about 30 color options.
Category A are the 6 at the top and everything else are Category B options
There was also the option to upgrade even more to C or E but we didn't look into that as we were trying to keep to a budget. We chose to upgrade to level B throughout the house and we upgraded the carpet padding to 8lb padding in the great room.
Padding options: 5lb, 8lb, 8lb with moisture barrier
Ryan Homes/Rite Rug "zones" the house so whatever carpet choice you make for the great room must also go in the office and the dining room. Any carpet choice that you choose for the bedrooms upstairs will also be the same carpet for the hallway and stairs. We chose a darker color gray tone carpet for the upstairs zone and a lighter gray color for the downstairs zone. I like the color we chose upstairs and would have put it throughout the house but I thought the lighter color gray would match our current sofa better.
Left: Graystone 513 Pewter
Right: Graystone 510 Cold Water
Carpet Costs for the Palermo are below. I hope this helps others who are building with Ryan Homes and who like us had no idea what to expect for the cost of flooring.
Hard Surface Flooring:
Next we chose flooring for the rest of the house. Sheet vinyl comes standard in the kitchen, powder room, owner's bathroom, hallway bathroom, laundry room, mudroom, and foyer. You can upgrade the vinyl to Category B vinyl, Luxury vinyl tile (LVT), hardwood, or tile. We chose LVT because it had a wood look for a much better price and we thought it would be easier to clean and maintain with children and pets. We chose one color/pattern of LVT to go in the kitchen, foyer, mudroom, and powder room since it is an open floorplan and transitions from one material to another would have not looked the best. We also decided to put LVT in the dining room because we were worried about keeping carpet clean in that area. The LVT we chose is below.
Luxury Vinyl Tile - Natural Living Vintage Brown Oak
(Our choice for the downstairs areas)
There are only 5 options in the luxury vinyl tile
Our cabinets, kitchen floor, and kitchen cabinet. The cabinet is Scottsdale Maple Espresso (upgraded cabinets included in cost of Palermo). The countertop is the included laminate countertop in Perlato color.
The foyer LVT beside of the carpet for the stairs and kitchen. These two will meet so we wanted to make sure they looked good beside each other.
Our stairs carpet, foyer floor, and railing stain color together. We chose "ebony" for our stair railing color.
LVT Costs:
Dining Room: $1,495
1st floor bedroom: $1,695
Great Room: $2,795
Foyer: $895
Morning Room: $1,195
Kitchen: $1,895
Powder Room: $175
Office: $1.495
Upgraded cabinets for owner's suite and level one upgraded vinyl in the owner's bathroom (extra $100) The color of the vinyl is Pemberton Polar Bear White.
Extra Pricing Information:
Our flooring options summary:
- Upgraded 8lb carpet pad in great room and office
- Upgraded Level B Carpet throughout (great room, office, stairs, and bedrooms)
- Upgraded Level 2 Cabinets in Kitchen (free discount from Ryan Homes)
- Upgraded Level 2 Cabinets in Owner's Bathroom
- Upgrade carpet to Luxury Vinyl Tile in dining room
- Upgraded Vinyl in Owner's Bathroom
- Upgraded to Luxury Vinyl Tile from standard vinyl in kitchen, foyer, powder room, and mudroom
- Total Cost: $6,405
Thursday, January 28, 2016
Choosing a Floorplan
We looked at several floorplans of homes that Ryan Homes was offering at Timber Ridge and initially priced out a Florence with our sales rep. The Florence is a 3 bedroom 1,952+ square foot home that starts in the low 210's. I found that when pricing this home out everything was basic and it would take a significant amount in upgrades to get the home to be something that I was happy with. The Florence had a separate living room and family room but the living room was not going to be a functional space for us. The Florence also only had three bedrooms but we really wanted four to help with resale value and because we think we would utilize the extra bedroom. After pricing out the Florence and then bringing home the price sheet to play with numbers even after making a ton of upgrades I still wasn't in love with the home. We knew from doing our research that upgrades could be a substantial amount so we had originally went with a home that was on the low end of our price range because we wanted to leave a good amount of our budget for upgrades.
After realizing I wasn't going to be happy with the Florence I took a look at the Palermo which is a four bedroom 2,265+ square foot home. The base price of the Palermo was in the upper 230s but I found that a lot of the upgrades that we would have to pay for in the Florence came standard on the Palermo. The Florence had a loft that could be converted to a fourth bedroom for more money but the Palermo had four bedrooms standard. Also we would have had to pay several thousand for kitchen cabinet upgrades in the Florence but in the Palermo cabinet upgrades didn't cost us any extra. After pricing both options out the Palermo was about the same price to slightly more than the Florence but the Palermo offered a mudroom, dining room, and office that we plan on converting to a play room, and more square footage. The Palermo also is located on an estate lot instead of a single family home lot which offers a much larger lot.
My advice is to price out several floorplans if you aren't set on one particular one. We ended up getting much more house and choosing a home we really love and originally overlooked due to the higher base price. Since upgrades and what is included can vary greatly it isn't always informative to base your decision on just the base price.
After realizing I wasn't going to be happy with the Florence I took a look at the Palermo which is a four bedroom 2,265+ square foot home. The base price of the Palermo was in the upper 230s but I found that a lot of the upgrades that we would have to pay for in the Florence came standard on the Palermo. The Florence had a loft that could be converted to a fourth bedroom for more money but the Palermo had four bedrooms standard. Also we would have had to pay several thousand for kitchen cabinet upgrades in the Florence but in the Palermo cabinet upgrades didn't cost us any extra. After pricing both options out the Palermo was about the same price to slightly more than the Florence but the Palermo offered a mudroom, dining room, and office that we plan on converting to a play room, and more square footage. The Palermo also is located on an estate lot instead of a single family home lot which offers a much larger lot.
My advice is to price out several floorplans if you aren't set on one particular one. We ended up getting much more house and choosing a home we really love and originally overlooked due to the higher base price. Since upgrades and what is included can vary greatly it isn't always informative to base your decision on just the base price.
Monday, January 25, 2016
Signing on the dotted line!
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