a visit

I went to the property today to see it early in the morning. I was off a little bit about where east is exactly, which is good to know. The trees have really filled in with leaves. This is a picture taken from the access road inside the property toward the main road. The sun is shining at the top right - I thought it was more to the right...

At the edge of the pond, there was some flowing water which may just be from the rain. The cattails are taller than me, and full of marsh blackbirds and other birds. It was all very pretty, and compared to our current house, very quiet. No road noise, no airport, no neighbors driving up and down in trucks and motorcycles. Well, no chickens either. Yet.

We passed perk. I saw a hole in the access road, but forgot to check out along the property line where the septic is supposed to go. We also found out our house site is 1 foot into the flood zone, but we don't need to build on that foot. I don't know if we now have to move the whole proposed footprint or not.

We have picked a new house plan. It is a little less oriented to the rear view, and has a roof line that needs some prettyfiying, but it is a very rectangular shape (which is supposed to be economical to build), and has large bedrooms. And a breakfast nook in the back corner. We'll build a screened porch off of the nook... nice! It should get some morning light (now that I know where east is...)

So now we are still putting together the details of the land loan, and should receive the construction loan at the end of June. Hopefully we'll be clearing the land some in July.

What do you call a pond...

with no water? This picture is from the far side of the pond, looking at the back of our property. The dam would be to the left, and that is where the small amount of remaining water is. To the right is all the cattails, and where the house would be.

Latest twist - I went out to look at the lot, and found the dam had been disassembled. The 'pond' is mostly dry now. The guy we are buying from, Admar, says the county came and took it apart because someone had complained. Who complained, and about what, we don't know. Also, we don't know what the regulations are regarding this pond, as far as the county is concerned. My suspicion is that it has to be left undisturbed and unchanged. No daming, no filling in...

Do we want to pay for land that we have no control over? Do we want this lot if the 'pond' is only wet after a hurricane? We had planned on it being there, really had assumed it would be there. The house plan with its rear views is based on a view! Although, even with no water, it does still have the advantage of keeping anyone else from building there, and it just sort of looks like a meadow of cattails.

The plan of action at this point is to find someone who can tell us what the designation of this pond is and who would therefore have authority over it. Then to see what the regulations and guidelines are and if we want to buy into that. I am glad this all happened before we got further invested into it, by paying for more improvements or even the house plans. At this point, we could just buy a different wooded lot from this same guy, which would have the creek in the back. The creek is not overly scenic, and it makes the immediate area a flood zone, but it is wooded land. and less expensive...