Hurry up and wait! (Katy, TX)

[renesme]

Other things. I just saw this thread for the first time, so I'll skip my opinion of "sun shelf", since it's a done deal.

Yeah, I know these are polarizing - taking up space in an otherwise small pool - but in our case we have family that doesn't like swimming and instead would rather sit in a chair with their feet in the water reading a book. So it'll be used, just not as the label would imply.

You were absolutely right to get the integrated spa. We use ours 12 months. In December, I can set the valves to just circulate to and from the spa and can get it up to 100 degrees in 30 minutes. Our kids are grown and gone, so it is mostly us, except when the granddaughters come over. A major difference in integrated spa vs the functionally better standalone, is when you sell you house. Just ask a real estate agent. And besides that, a standalone "hot tub" just screams 1970!

Basically came with the same thought process! I am looking forward to using it year round.

Soft water. If like ours, it is tied into the water after the irrigation system but before everything else. In our case, the autofill is tapped off one of the hose bibs, so it uses soft water (in our case it's potassium not sodium salt.) So you pay to take the calcium out of the water, then you pay again when you buy calcium to add to the pool water. Seems wrong, doesn't it? The water softener ended up costing us during pool construction, as at the dig, the irrigation system was whacked, so from then until the pool was done and we had Big Mike (I highly recommend him for sprinkler system work) reconnect and redesign the irrigation. So for three months we used potassium-softened water on our yard. A 40 lb bag every week to ten days, as it was a dry summer and we had a lot of new ornamental trees ( 20 of them on a corner lot) to keep alive. HEB sells potassium water softener pellets for $24--better than adding sodium to the water, though.

We are weirdos with no irrigation (yet) so no concerns with underground plumbing at the moment. We use sodium salt in our softener and thus will be cheap enough to add salt after the fill is complete. We have a hard water tap on our system so will fill the pool with hard water.

Landscaping. Our landscape architect specifically laid out our backyard for a future pool. Included in his landscaping were five Wax Myrtle trees, "because they're evergreen." CAUTION: Wax Myrtles are popular in this area, but they are a nightmare near a pool, as in their case "evergreen" means "forever dropping skinny leaves into your pool." Just say no to wax myrtles. If you already have them, get rid of them or be prepared to wish you had. We're stuck now, as ours are 15-18 feet tall and about that wide. Great for privacy, not so great for a clean pool.

haha! No wax myrtles here!

Sun. We have a west facing back yard, too. Unless your porch extension goes all the way to your back fence, it's not going to be enough! Our best friend is the house (the house...not the people who live there) behind ours, as it provides some shade later in the afternoon. I wish we had put umbrella holders in the back wall of the pool, or extended the decking around the west side of the pool for umbrella holders. At least our spa is on the west side, so it gets shaded late in the afternoon. We finally put a 10' cantilevered umbrella off the west side the the spa. It shades the spa from noon until the trees and our back neighbor's house take over shade duties around 5pm or so. Better than nothing, though.

Ours is actually north-facing so the porch stays nice and shady during the hottest part of the day. Is does get toasty as the evening sun drops and the porch shade is in the neighbor's yard, but we intend to add one of those roll screens to the side of the porch after it is complete to resolve that.

 

[renesme]

My electrician came back with his quote which was the same as the PB's guy. SO...The trench will be dug on Sunday, the reroute will be next week sometime....day TBD.
Now please, everyone do the ANTI-rain dance so this can actually happen! PLEASE!

 

[colinn]

My electrician came back with his quote which was the same as the PB's guy. SO...The trench will be dug on Sunday, the reroute will be next week sometime....day TBD.
Now please, everyone do the ANTI-rain dance so this can actually happen! PLEASE!

I’m also in Katy. Next week is forecast to be dry and very hot. This has been a rainy summer in this neck of the woods so getting a full week of sun is something good for a pool build.

 

[renesme]

I’m also in Katy. Next week is forecast to be dry and very hot. This has been a rainy summer in this neck of the woods so getting a full week of sun is something good for a pool build.

SHUSH, you're gonna jinx it!

 

[Dallaspoolneed]

Mine is similar that all my hose bibs connect to the water softener. My unit is outside (not in the garage). The inlet to the water softener has a tap on it which is below the bypass valve on the system. I have simply hooked up a hose to that tap and occasionally add fill water with "hard" water. Maybe next time you have work on your sprinkler system you can add a valve to your inlet to access hard water. Also, I do not have an autofill but I do have a direct feed line from one of the hose bibs. So it is a manual add of water so it is not much of an issue to pull the hose from that hard water tap as needed. With all this rain, CH as well as CYA has been diluted quite a bit that I have had to add.

**HermanTX, I realize I replied to you, but was meaning to just add a new post for renesme **

Just read your entire post, how exciting!! We have a salt water softener, there is a way to turn off/ bypass the water going into the system (which we have done for the past few weeks since the initial fill/ current pool needs). We also had a hose bib installed to the autofill, and we were NOT happy with that, so we had the landscaper connect it to our irrigation system and it has its own zone (still not full set up, which is why our water softener is currently on bypass mode)

I didnt want to waste money year round on salt AND I hear soft water isnt recommended for the plaster. I will say the cost to direct connect it to the irrigation system was 600 or 700 dollars which was WELL worth it to us. I may have missed it, but I think you mentioned not having an irrigation system? If so, then this might not be a good solution for you guys. For reference, our pool started Feb 6 and is almost done, but lots of little issues.

Good Luck, cant wait for the dig.

 

[renesme]

Correct, we don't have sprinklers so unless we pay extra (nope, lol) to run a new waterline from the main to the pool to get hard water, our autofill will be tapped to soft water. It is what it is and I am ok with that.

Good Luck, cant wait for the dig.

lol...you and me both!

 

[Dallaspoolneed]

Correct, we don't have sprinklers so unless we pay extra (nope, lol) to run a new waterline from the main to the pool to get hard water, our autofill will be tapped to soft water. It is what it is and I am ok with that.


lol...you and me both!

Did they give you a price for the run? I agree it may not be worth it. Just wondering.

 

[renesme]

Didn't ask...paying too much as it is. The water main and the area where the equipment will be are on the complete opposite sides of the house so it'd be a major project in and of itself.

 

[renesme]

The trench guys are here! Bright and early at 6:45 AM.

 

[Olddad212]

I still cant wrap my head around the price of the pool. That is so cheap

 

[jjbradley]

Never had a pool before but both my grandparents did growing up and thus began the "I want a pool" life goal. Moved south many years ago and now this year is the year!

I've been snooping on this site for a couple years now and you've convinced me that salt water and a robot are the way to go. Also as part of this project I'm planning on getting the existing back porch extended across the full width of the house. The western sun is brutal during the 8-month summers we have, and that should help increase the utility of the backyard.

I am currently iffy on whether to do a spa. I agree that the standalone kinds are superior in virtually every way, but I admit that I like the idea and aesthetics of the integrated kind. The kids claim they'll use it all the time, but you know how kids' promises go...

So at this point, I've had 2 PB appointments this past week and 2 more scheduled next week. The first design/quote came in from PB #1 and I'd like to get your thoughts. I've already asked for an itemized quote with part numbers, and intend to sub out the chlorinator for a SWG and nix the auto pool cleaner. So I'll post that once I get it.

PB #1: "...The pool is 12x30, has a sun deck, a raised spa, travertine coping and spray deck decking with drains to edge of deck. The pool is equipped with our Total Hayward package including Phone accessible Hayward remote control, Hayward led lighting, Hayward energy efficient variable speed pump, Hayward 525 Sq. Ft cartridge filter, Hayward blower, Hayward chlorinator, Automatic pool cleaner, The Hayward 400000 btu heater and everything you need to care for your pool . Total price for the pool including final clean up and grading is $50500.00.

The price for the Patio extension built as close as possible to match house with you supplying the bricks and 2 ceiling fans is $22000.00,..."

I'll post the other quotes/designs as they come in.

Love to get y'alls thoughts!

That’s a nice quote; my design is very similar to yours and my PB is about 11k more. Make sure they are including lighting, decking, and at least pebble tech.

 

[steelman93]

I would kill for those Houston area pool prices, as would most of the country. I really like the design, it is actually very similar to ours. The only thing I would recommend would be some sort of raised wall or jumping rock to give kids a good spot to jump off of in the deep end.

I will say we are on year 2 and use our spa at least once a week which is a lot more than I thought. We can see the patio TV from the spa, so it is perfect for sporting events, movie nights, etc. I would highly recommend adding a TV to the patio if you were not planning to.

I am only an hour east of Houston and my pool was 20k higher for a similar size!

 

[Bvacchiano]

Howdy from Sugar Land. I would highly recommend the integrated spa. For one you need to exchange that water several times a day down here. That all can done automatically for you every day. I would highly recommend doing this. You don’t want that water sitting too long without being exchanged especially down here!
Also, my water hit 91 deg here. First day I put my Chiller on. Something to consider adding if you haven’t already unless you like swimming in a gigantic bath tub from July/-October…

 

[renesme]

Howdy from Sugar Land. I would highly recommend the integrated spa. For one you need to exchange that water several times a day down here. That all can done automatically for you every day. I would highly recommend doing this. You don’t want that water sitting too long without being exchanged especially down here!
Also, my water hit 91 deg here. First day I put my Chiller on. Something to consider adding if you haven’t already unless you like swimming in a gigantic bath tub from July/-October…

We are doing the integrated spa! We are skipping the chiller for now at least though.

 

[renesme]

ugh...what a couple days.
To make a long story short...well the trench was dug and the internet cable was severed during the process (it wasn't marked from the 811 effort). That was fixed this afternoon. Also, I told the PB first thing this morning that they need to get the gas people out here to mark the gas line since I didn't believe for one bit that it was "cleared" (what they originally told me for the internet lines too). The gas line is now marked and no reroute needed there thankfully. The electric reroute/switchover will be Wednesday.

Funny thing .... the cable/internet tech that came out to repair the line is also in the waiting process for building a pool. We had a nice chat comparing notes and such.

 

[renesme]

I still cant wrap my head around the price of the pool. That is so cheap

I am only an hour east of Houston and my pool was 20k higher for a similar size!

It sounds like I've been spoiled! I'll try not to complain about the price too much...lol

That’s a nice quote; my design is very similar to yours and my PB is about 11k more. Make sure they are including lighting, decking, and at least pebble tech.

Yep, we have all those included!

 

[renesme]

Electrical reroute completed today.
Pool stake out early next week.
Tentative DIG DAY, weather pending, next Thursday, Aug 5!

 

[renesme]

And no dice.
The dig is delayed due to the neighbors changing their minds about agreeing to take down a couple panels of the shared fence so the bobcat could get around our water softener. Will be calling the plumber shortly to temporarily remove it for the dig. New dig date TBD until that happens.

*sigh*

 

[Newdude]

due to the neighbors changing their minds about agreeing to take down a couple panels of the shared fence

I hope you put in a 10k sq ft paver patio and they have to listen to the saw for a month straight. 10 hour days. What is wrong with some people ? They can’t be nice neighbors and help you out, Which you will fix when it’s done ? ing JERKS. Like they never needed a favor from anybody.

 

[Oswald]

I hope you put in a 10k sq ft paver patio and they have to listen to the saw for a month straight. 10 hour days. What is wrong with some people ? They can’t be nice neighbors and help you out, Which you will fix when it’s done ? ing JERKS. Like they never needed a favor from anybody.

Our friends across the street offered to pay multiple neighbors to take their fence down for a few weeks. Nobody would do it.

they were going to rent a crane to lift the equipment in until one finally relented.