We own our land and are doing a custom build. We go by every day but also ran that by our GC as a courtesy. He laughed and said "It's your house, of course". A lot of times I go by after everyone has left so I can walk through it myself and see what has been done or catch any issues. I definitely find this easier to do when no one is there. We also set up a once a week meeting where we know everyone necessary will be there with my husband and me. During that time we can discuss more of the down the line stuff, i.e., they can give us a heads up on what we need to pick out, etc. or tell us about any snafus. I will note that I probably talk to my GC on the phone every other day as well. I *do not* bring my kids when people are working and while they love seeing things in progress, I either have them wait in the car or bring someone with me as a second set of eyes. Lastly, I usually bring a box of Dunkin Donuts coffee when I go in the morning; sometimes muffins too. And I always make sure there is water on site. We have a greenhouse on our property so I leave them there and let our GC tell the other guys so I don't interrupt their work. Good Luck and Have Fun!

Thank you, everyone, for your comments! I'm going to try and keep this short as I'm beat...we've been to our homesite (125 miles away from our current home) on Friday, Monday and Tuesday...and yet, I seem to have the energy to sort through my staggering amount of photos and post on my blog because I want to keep it updated - I just added new photos taken today of the foundation layout! Ah, well, the truth is...I'm so excited that our project is finally in motion that I like to keep looking at the darn photos once I'm at home...kinda to remind me that it's real and I'm not having some great dream that we broke ground or something! ;) Tomorrow I'm going to try and add some helpful tips on my blog about streamlining the bidding process. Layout was done today, piers will be drilled tomorrow and DH is making the trip there without me (and I'm hoping that he takes many, many good photos!) Here is a link that might be useful: Villa della Vigna (The Vineyard Villa Blog)

Does seem strange to me that you're the only lot with issues in a subdivision...especially based on the size of subdivision lots I'm used to (usually 1 - 3 acres). I know I had a similar issue when it was time to build. Our initial excavation showed 100% silt, which you can't build on. They wanted piles (similar to piers) drilled, but the large stones in the area drove the cost up hugely because we couldn't use a standard piling company (that works in clay soils around here). Our engineer offered us a number of options: He said we could do piles, OR we could do a slab-on-grade (no basement), or even to over-excavate the land down to a more suitable soil type and then backfill with granular material. For us, the backfilling would have been the best option since there's a lot of gravel pits in the area and we could hopefully pay someone to crush the boulders we pulled out during the excavation. Keep in mind, we took the soil sample in OURSELVES to get tested by the lab, not trusting what contractors and people who can reap the financial benefits might say. That said, our Building Inspector argued PROFUSELY that there was no silt in our area. Not a lick of silt he assured us, not on our neighbours' place 100' away, not up the hill, nowhere in the municipality. :P In the end, the soil test came back 30% silt at the house-site, and 100% silt in our back field. PHEW. We also discovered that we hit bedrock at 6' of excavation depth. Meaning we built directly on bedrock, silt be damned. (and I can assure you the neighbours have silt too...one has a slab-on-grade, the other is down-hill from us with a walk-out basement sitting on bedrock. The thing was, our building inspector was new, the old logs were crappy and it's not that common of a soil around here). So in part, we really lucked out, but there were a number of options we could have taken to alleviate the problem. I would consider a proper soil sample, and taking it to the lab yourself. The cost is cheap and worth it. Ask your engineer for ideas on what can be done, even things like wider footings. As for financing, I can understand money being tight. I went over budget, and no, didn't have this huge 20% contingency either. Some of these folks would say I shouldn't have built, but I couldn't afford to buy a home, I couldn't keep living where I was, and I built the least home I could, managing the finances carefully and cutting things out where I needed to, for later. In the end, I have a beautiful home that I can afford, for FAR less than I could have bought a much older home for. Consider doing more of the the labor yourself to save money; I ended up digging my own foundation, shoveled all the pea gravel for the basement floor, did the basement floor myself, ICFs myself, installed all the carpet, tile, hardwood, painted, plumbed, HVAC, landscaped, pulled my own electrical permit and completed it, shingled, hung doors, hung baseboards (well, still doing those a year later lol), insulated, vapor barriered, put in all the small windows, hung all the cabinetry, designed my own kitchen so I could pay less for cabinets... What I'm saying, is if you don't want to scale back on the size of the house or the finishings anymore, but need the $25k to cover the piers, maybe you guys can do a bit more work to cover the costs?? Some of that stuff isn't so hard and costs a FORTUNE! Or downgrade stuff that's easy to replace later on, like lighting or countertops :) Heck, I'm not even 30 and between me and my 60 year old parents and the odd begged help from some friends, built a 1400 sq. ft. house in 8 months, for 50% of the cost had I GC'd it. You can do this. If you want it, you'll make it work.

Thank you all very much. I'm really enjoying it. Still trying to figure out all of the automation options, but really like having the wireless remote for the EasyTouch! I'll try to post some more pictures as soon as they have finished up the fireplace (had to order more stone) and the final dirt work/clean-up, but it will probably be next Spring now before I take on the rest of the landscaping and put out my new patio furniture. :( It's already getting too cold to really enjoy swimming and the leaves are starting to fall as well so I'm going to have to get it covered soon. (Pool cover is ordered, but not installed yet.) While I've been pretty pleased with the quality of the work of my builder, his project and time management skills have been absolutely horrendous!