Jackie, You started in the right place. Ask questions on this board. There are a lot of resources available from the experts and those who have been on both sides of the hammer. We will tell you when it's something to really worry about. Respect is a two way street. Hire the best people that you can find. Let them do their job. Monitor what they do. Question things if you don't understand them. Ask if there is an alternate way of doing things. Be flexible. Trust, but verify. Understand that the really good professionals are always busy, but never too busy to answer a sincere question. If something doesn't seem right, ask about it. Don't be afraid to ask why? Question every one of your decisions by asking if there is a better way to complete something? When you are asked to make a decision, give it quickly and decisively. If you don't know the answer, tell them you don't know or don't understand. If you encounter something that you don't like, and you will, talk about it with the GC. Let your GC handle the subs. It's his job to yell at them, not yours. That's what they get paid to do. The GC gets paid to answer to your satisfaction unlimited questions. Try not to bother the subs too much. Always be friendly. A sense of humor will go a long way to get through this process.

Gardengal is thinking of the ideal situation. If you can afford it, then have the top 6-8 inches hauled away and replaced. Just to scope this, 6 inches equals 18 cubic yards of material per 1,000 square feet. That is about the capacity of one 18-wheeler. How many square feet are we talking with this project? Never EVER rototill in preparation for grass. If you can get a tractor to do it, then it sometimes works. The problem is that tillers grab soft soil and sand and dig way down making a hole filled with fluffy soil. They also hit roots and rocks and buck up out of the ground leaving an underground hill with much less fluffy soil. When you level it all, you end up with different amounts of fluffy soil everywhere. When it all settles in, the holes will be holes and the hills will be hills. You'll have a bumpy surface to mow. Never EVER mix compost into the soil. Compost contains plenty of undecomposed wood. When wood starts to decompose, the fungus that decomposes it will steal nitrogen from any source available. When you fertilize, ALL the nitrogen goes to wood decomposition. You can use compost, just don't bury it under the surface. Getting the grading right is most important. Don't bring in any topsoil or any other soil unless you have low spots to fill. If you bring in enough soil that it sits up higher than the concrete walkways or curbs, then you will have soil washing out onto the concrete for the next 20 years. The soil level must be below the concrete level. The soil should drain out toward the street or drainage ditch and never toward any buildings. Your builder should have done this for you. What if you only have 2 inches of "good soil?" It can be fixed. First of all ensure you have a good microbial variety by applying a scant amount of compost. You already have the variety, but most people want better assurance. Compost has it all. Scant means 1 cubic yard to cover 4,000 square feet. Toss it out willy nilly. That's good enough. Then I would spray the yard with shampoo at a rate of 3 ounces per 1,000 square feet to help water penetrate deeply into your relatively poor soil. Any clear shampoo works. I use generic baby shampoo. Some folks like the apple scented shampoo from the dollar store. Water this in deeply - at least 1/2 inch and preferably 1 inch as measured by tuna or cat food cans placed around the yard. This might take 8 hours depending on your sprinklers. Deep means real deep. Then scatter something like corn meal, alfalfa meal or pellets (rabbit chow), soybean meal, corn gluten meal, cottonseed meal, or whatever you can find at your feed store for under $20 per bag. The application rate is 15 to 20 pounds per 1,000 square feet. This is where the magic happens. This is the feed for those microbes you injected with the compost. These grains can be moistened but do not need to be watered in like a chemical fertilizer. This regimen of compost, shampoo, and organic fertilizer will improve your soil to a very deep level. The next level would be to get a good soil test from Logan Labs and post the results here on this forum for help interpreting it. Logan Labs has the best quality control over the long term, and their most basic ($25) test is all you need. You can get similar tests done from your local university, but to get the same level of detail, the add-in testing will run you upwards of $60 at most and $100 at some. Logan Labs can keep their price low because every test gets all the testing, so they buy chemicals at a much higher volume discount than other labs. The next thing to do is get roots in the ground. If you live in the south and are planning to use a hybrid bermuda, you should wait until June to start. Bermuda really likes HOT soil. Most other grasses can be sodded in the spring with pretty good results. Seeding grasses in the spring anywhere but the Pacific Northwest seems to invite crabgrass to the lawn. Fall is a better time to use seed for grasses like fescue, rye, and Kentucky bluegrass. If that is your situation, you can try a cheap seed this spring and nurture the weeds and sparse grass until then learning how to water, mow, and fertilize for several months. Then nuke it and start over. People do this all the time.

It is very hard to get funding for construction. I am an architect, in a not popular company in Florida. I always wanted something more but it is hard to get up in this domain without experience. I am getting a lot of orders and I need to make the best project to approve my building. I spend nights in a row just to make the layout of the building. I try to make my layout impressive so I always to it very big and tall. Sometimes I can use Mi tower hire just to finish it. The size of the layout can impress the investors and choose your project to become real.

It's done all the time. Just make sure you get the trim details around the windows correct. Make sure you use a wide width on the horizontal siding.