My wife and I finally decided on a pool builder and we have just signed our contract. Our Pool Builder actually lives in our neighborhood and it was someone my wife new. He told us from the beginning our rough price would be Cost + 15%.
We interviewed probably 6 builders and ultimately we chose the builder that my wife knew as he had the best design and actually listened to us instead of trying to sale certain products (infloor cleaners..ect...)
Pool Specs:
1) Free Form Pool
2) 112’ Pool Perimeter
3) ~24,000 gallons
4) 28’ x 42’
5) 3.5’ to 7’ deep
6) Chlorine pool **I know most recommend SWG but we like standard chlorine pools better**
7) Spa is 10’ and raised 12” with 6 jets
8) Sundeck -- ~16’ long by 8’ wide
Pool equipment
9) Pentair Sand filter
10) Pentair 400,000 BTU heater
11) Blower for hot tub
12) Auto fill feature
13) Overflow
14) 3 skimmers
15) 4 intelliflo variable speed pumps (I wanted to be able to control each waterfeature separate)
a. 1 for pool/spa
b. 1 for deck jets and bubblers
c. 1 for waterfall
d. 1 for slide à with variable speed I can have a “kid setting” and a “adult setting”
16) I will be using a robot for pool cleaning (this is not included in the price)
17) He is plumbing me for a pressure side cleaner and just going to cap this off at the equipment pad site just incase I ever want to be lazy and go that route.
18) 4 pool drains
19) 1 spa drain
20) Intellitouch automation
21) Screenlogic automation
Tile/decking/plaster
22) Coping – we have travertine included in the price. If we chose something of a lesser quality than travertine we will get a credit
23) Waterline Tile – they included a 6” upgraded tile, if we chose a lesser quality tile we will get a credit
24) Plaster – stonescapes mini pebble – we can chose any color grade we want at no additional charge
Decking
25) 1,520 SF of decking
26) Spray deck – we went this route so we could save money as travertine was quit the jump in price and we chose to spend our “money” in other parts of the pool.
27) Expansion joints, 3/8” steel reinforced, and area drains are included
Water Features
28) Gunite waterfall/slide that will be approximately 16 tons when done
a. Waterfall will span 20 feet
b. Max height of waterfall and height of slide is 50”
29) 3 colorvision globrite bubblers in the sun deck
30) 3 deck jets that spray into the sun deck
Lighting
31) 8 total pool lights
a. 1 in the spa
b. 3 in the bubblers (1 per bubbler)
c. 4 in the pool area
Other Features
32) Outdoor fireplace
33) Wall attached to the fireplace that is roughly 4’ tall for some privacy
34) Electrical ran throughout the wall for lights in the wall and electrical outlets
Drainage
35) Decking drains will be included
36) 6 downspouts can be connected to the drainage system – if I want to add more he said that was fine
37) Drainage will be directed in two directions
a. Direction 1 --> towards the backside of my property going to the ditch (~50’ run)
b. Direction 2 --> towards the street (ditch) that is a slight 2’ uphill slope so a sump pump will be added to help the water get uphill (~150’ run)
i. The reason we are going two directions --> The first direction is the easiest and I want this to be my primary “water unloading” point. However we recently had a 500 year type flood and the water rose in the creek, the water got outside the creek and came within 2 feet of my back patio (this is the worst flood this neighborhood has seen). So to prevent the creek filling up into my yard and water coming up the PVC drain pipes and flooding my pool, we set a “Direction 2” route as a backup. This PVC pipped direction will be slightly higher than direction 1, that way the water will always try to go in the route of direction 1, but in the event of a 500 year flood the water will rise and make its way to direction 2, go through the sump pump and be forced uphill to the ditch that did not flood during the 500 year flood that we recently had.
Dirt Work
38) Pool builder was concerned when we had the 500 year flood that the water came within 2’ of my patio. (he lives in my neighborhood). He doesn’t believe we will ever have a flood this bad again but he believes better to be safe than sorry. He sent my site plan off to his engineers and the consensus was since I have a slope in my yard not to have the pool have a “drop off” because in this scenario water could possibly get under the pool and cause issues.
What he is going to do is dig down and remove all the silt from the area, bring in probably 100 loads of hard clay and compact the site approximately level to my existing patio. He will let that sit for 30 days to let it settle and finish compacting before we begin digging for the pool.
He said doing it this way makes the structure much better in the event we have another serious flood.
He will use the silt that he removed, plus some of the clay that he will dig out when he begins digging the pool, to create a slope off the backside of the deck to make sure the water drains properly to the creek.
So basically were my pool and deck is going, he is building that up to the grade of my house with clay, then sloping it towards the creek for drainage.
This was expensive, I imagine the dirt work will be $10,000, but I agreed with the builder that it needed to be done to ensure the integrity.
We interviewed probably 6 builders and ultimately we chose the builder that my wife knew as he had the best design and actually listened to us instead of trying to sale certain products (infloor cleaners..ect...)
Pool Specs:
1) Free Form Pool
2) 112’ Pool Perimeter
3) ~24,000 gallons
4) 28’ x 42’
5) 3.5’ to 7’ deep
6) Chlorine pool **I know most recommend SWG but we like standard chlorine pools better**
7) Spa is 10’ and raised 12” with 6 jets
8) Sundeck -- ~16’ long by 8’ wide
Pool equipment
9) Pentair Sand filter
10) Pentair 400,000 BTU heater
11) Blower for hot tub
12) Auto fill feature
13) Overflow
14) 3 skimmers
15) 4 intelliflo variable speed pumps (I wanted to be able to control each waterfeature separate)
a. 1 for pool/spa
b. 1 for deck jets and bubblers
c. 1 for waterfall
d. 1 for slide à with variable speed I can have a “kid setting” and a “adult setting”
16) I will be using a robot for pool cleaning (this is not included in the price)
17) He is plumbing me for a pressure side cleaner and just going to cap this off at the equipment pad site just incase I ever want to be lazy and go that route.
18) 4 pool drains
19) 1 spa drain
20) Intellitouch automation
21) Screenlogic automation
Tile/decking/plaster
22) Coping – we have travertine included in the price. If we chose something of a lesser quality than travertine we will get a credit
23) Waterline Tile – they included a 6” upgraded tile, if we chose a lesser quality tile we will get a credit
24) Plaster – stonescapes mini pebble – we can chose any color grade we want at no additional charge
Decking
25) 1,520 SF of decking
26) Spray deck – we went this route so we could save money as travertine was quit the jump in price and we chose to spend our “money” in other parts of the pool.
27) Expansion joints, 3/8” steel reinforced, and area drains are included
Water Features
28) Gunite waterfall/slide that will be approximately 16 tons when done
a. Waterfall will span 20 feet
b. Max height of waterfall and height of slide is 50”
29) 3 colorvision globrite bubblers in the sun deck
30) 3 deck jets that spray into the sun deck
Lighting
31) 8 total pool lights
a. 1 in the spa
b. 3 in the bubblers (1 per bubbler)
c. 4 in the pool area
Other Features
32) Outdoor fireplace
33) Wall attached to the fireplace that is roughly 4’ tall for some privacy
34) Electrical ran throughout the wall for lights in the wall and electrical outlets
Drainage
35) Decking drains will be included
36) 6 downspouts can be connected to the drainage system – if I want to add more he said that was fine
37) Drainage will be directed in two directions
a. Direction 1 --> towards the backside of my property going to the ditch (~50’ run)
b. Direction 2 --> towards the street (ditch) that is a slight 2’ uphill slope so a sump pump will be added to help the water get uphill (~150’ run)
i. The reason we are going two directions --> The first direction is the easiest and I want this to be my primary “water unloading” point. However we recently had a 500 year type flood and the water rose in the creek, the water got outside the creek and came within 2 feet of my back patio (this is the worst flood this neighborhood has seen). So to prevent the creek filling up into my yard and water coming up the PVC drain pipes and flooding my pool, we set a “Direction 2” route as a backup. This PVC pipped direction will be slightly higher than direction 1, that way the water will always try to go in the route of direction 1, but in the event of a 500 year flood the water will rise and make its way to direction 2, go through the sump pump and be forced uphill to the ditch that did not flood during the 500 year flood that we recently had.
Dirt Work
38) Pool builder was concerned when we had the 500 year flood that the water came within 2’ of my patio. (he lives in my neighborhood). He doesn’t believe we will ever have a flood this bad again but he believes better to be safe than sorry. He sent my site plan off to his engineers and the consensus was since I have a slope in my yard not to have the pool have a “drop off” because in this scenario water could possibly get under the pool and cause issues.
What he is going to do is dig down and remove all the silt from the area, bring in probably 100 loads of hard clay and compact the site approximately level to my existing patio. He will let that sit for 30 days to let it settle and finish compacting before we begin digging for the pool.
He said doing it this way makes the structure much better in the event we have another serious flood.
He will use the silt that he removed, plus some of the clay that he will dig out when he begins digging the pool, to create a slope off the backside of the deck to make sure the water drains properly to the creek.
So basically were my pool and deck is going, he is building that up to the grade of my house with clay, then sloping it towards the creek for drainage.
This was expensive, I imagine the dirt work will be $10,000, but I agreed with the builder that it needed to be done to ensure the integrity.
There are also different brands. 
