New Austin, TX Owner Build

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uc
uc
Hey people,

Havent posted in a while because there actually hasn't been much going on. Mostly because I haven't been pushing very hard. Finally, there was some activity today.

First things first, though to answer the questions about the aerial view. We have a porch on the second floor. Here are some pics for perspective.

Today we had the electrician out. He bonded the pool, did some digging, and put the pipe in. We have about a 140 foot run of wires from the electrical box to the equipment. I had my neighbor dig the trench for the last week (he needed the money).

This was an incredibly messy job because of how much water drains through my yard. It rained last Friday, but the trenches kept filling up. I had to rent a sump pump from Home Depot last night to empty out the pool because it had like 3 feet of water in it. I used the sump pump on the trenches. My entire house has mud tracked in. My clothes, my yard, it's crazy. I really hope that 18" trench passes inspection because I really don't want to mess with it again.

Electrical inspection tomorrow. Gunite either Saturday or Monday. I bought an automatic timer to spray the gunite since we'll be out of town next week for Christmas. Also, my gunite guy said that I basically need to keep it wet until it's plastered. Geez. I have to do coping, tile, patio before then and it's Christmas week next week, so that might be going for a while. I think that $30 investment will pay off.

Andy
 
Forgot to mention that coping is a bit up in the air again. A few of our contractors suggested that even a 12" length coping with as many curves as we have will look choppy (ie. A bunch of straight lines).

Were thinking about tan lueders now for the coping instead (sealed with 40sk). I'm honestly so torn and confused right now. I know that the Lueders will look very clean cut and smooth on the curves. They just seem so boring to me.
 
You have a beautiful house! And that wall of rock beside the pool on the right in the last pic, I envision wild flowers just being so happy, happy, happy there. I can't wait to see how this pool progresses.
 
Helen203 said:
The amount of mud is definitely the worst part of a pool build!!! Do you have a plan to divert runoff away from your pool when its constructed?
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Two things:
1) we're going to put a drain into this 18" ditch that we dug for the electrical.
2) going to install a channel drain on the left side of the pool.

- - - Updated - - -

Update: they did the gunite yesterday. Looks pretty cool as it really feels like a pool now.

We had my office holiday party Friday night, and I was a tad hungover as the gunite guys showed up at 7:20 AM. Let's just say it was a long day.

Anyway, here are all the pics and videos. I would do the image in line instead of a link, but there are a lot of them. Gunite

Now I'm under the gun to get the coping ordered asap. Mainly because I have to water this gunite twice a day until the plaster is done.
 
Just got my estimate for my patio. Oh my gosh! Way more than I thought it would be. We increased the area a bit but holy cow. $7000 for 763 sq ft of patio (kool cote is another $2/sq ft for $8500). I have one of the guys who did the Gunite coming to do an estimate tomorrow (He only speaks Spanish but seem to do good work and will probably come in cheaper).

The cost break down is something like $6/sq ft base price, $700 for 2 loads of base material, $500 for turndown (slope away from pool), $200 for pvc install, $300 for deck-o-drain.

On every other aspect of the project, I've been at or under budget. Nowhere in my wildest dreams did I expect the patio to be the most expensive line item (I esp. Didn't expect the gunite to be thousands less expensive than the patio). If I drop down to 400 sq ft, I could be within budget, but I don't think I want to do that based on everything that I've read.
 

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Sorry to hear that...That would be shocking. I think $6/sq ft is way too much for concrete. I've been quoted $5 and even then, a recent owner builder near me said I should try to aim to get $4.50 or even $4. $6 is the price that the PBs were quoting me for extra sq ft of concrete, and you know they are making a profit after the subs they hire. I don't know why they would charge you extra for the slope away from the pool. I've never heard of an extra charge for that.

I'm not sure about the PVC... The guy who quoted me $5 for the concrete charges $6/linear foot for drainage pipe, and $20/inlet drain, so that would definitely add up and might be comparable to what you're getting.

Bottom line, you're right to get another estimate. Don't despair yet... There are most likely better prices out there.
 
The turndown beam is something that our PB did on ours. It's not the slope away from the pool. The turndown beam is about 8-12" deep trench at the far side of the slab, filled with rebar and concrete. Without that beam, the slab lays on top of the ground and water can get underneath it, which makes it easier for the slab to heave later.
 
marcgr said:
The turndown beam is something that our PB did on ours. It's not the slope away from the pool. The turndown beam is about 8-12" deep trench at the far side of the slab, filled with rebar and concrete. Without that beam, the slab lays on top of the ground and water can get underneath it, which makes it easier for the slab to heave later.
Click to expand...

Thanks for explaining that. It's new to me and may be good to know when we need to pour our deck.

Was that a fair price that was quoted above?
 
Thanks for the advice. I had expected around $5 per sq ft, so my total budget was $5000 with koolcote ($2/sq ft). I don't know if Austin prices are just crazy or what.

Thanks for the clarification on the turndown. I didn't know what that was and he didn't speak great English. Did a quick google search but apparently didn't understand correctly. I wonder if I really need the turndown or not.
 
That's cheaper than we are paying. Our decking is costing 7.50/sq ft for salted concrete deck. We added extra as well, probably going to be in the neighborhood of 1000-1100 sq ft in all. Would have loved to get $5- I could have gotten it colored and stamped!!
 
Nursenini said:
That's cheaper than we are paying. Our decking is costing 7.50/sq ft for salted concrete deck. We added extra as well, probably going to be in the neighborhood of 1000-1100 sq ft in all. Would have loved to get $5- I could have gotten it colored and stamped!!
Click to expand...

That's probably comparable to what the guy who quoted me charges. The $5 was just for the brushed concrete, but any color or texture was extra.
 
I got a quote from one of the workers that did my gunite to do the patio, and he said he'd do the concrete for $5000, which comes out to about $6.50, closer to what I had expected. I'll still have to add the $2/sq ft for the koolcote (8.50 total), which puts me above my original budget, but by 1500 instead of 3500.

So he's going to come out to do it on Friday. I'm not as confident in his ability since doing patios is more of a side gig to doing the gunite as his day job, but I think we'll be fine. For $2000 less, I'll take it. He actually doesn't speak any English. 2 of my contractors speak only Spanish, so I guess it's good that I speak Spanish.

Tomorrow is tile and coping. I'll post pics.
 

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