Author Archives: ladywholivesdownthelane

Up, as in “above”.

When we first started looking into the different styles of laneway houses, I thought I wanted a pitched roof. The reasoning was that the style would fit in better with the main house, which has a cottage roof.  Plus I thought we would get more storage, as anything under 4 feet in height is not included in the overall square footage.

But then I started looking at what the top floor of a pitched roof laneway house looks like, and it seemed a little … cramped.  Not so bad if all you want upstairs is a bed and bath combo, but we want our kitchen and sitting room up there.  Because we are so strictly limited as to the height of the finished building, the pitch really cuts into the living space. The ceiling seems to press down on the rooms. And we definitely lost wall space for shelves, so the storage problem/solution was all swings-and-roundabouts.

So, a flat roof was looking more suitable.  But not literally looking better.  A flat roof with traditional shingles or tar-and-gravel will look like some kind of elevated asphalt slab when you see it from the deck of the main house.  Great if you’re installing a heli-pad, but we are building in someone’s garden.

The answer, of course, is a living roof.

We discussed it with the builder, and it turns out that they are affiliated with the Live Roof system.  Laurel explained that they use sedum plants, a very hardy succulent. They look great all year round.  A living roof will improve the livability of the home by increasing the insulation of the roof (cooler in summer, warmer in winter) and not absorbing heat all day.  They help mitigate the Urban Heat Island problem so many cities have.  And they can last twice as long as traditional roofs.

And voila!

We are starting from scratch, so any structural changes to support a heavier roof will be accommodated from the beginning.

We are really looking forward to this!

We have chosen our builder/designer.  The company is called Novell.  How did we choose these fine people over all the other fine people?  Luckily Dear Daughter did most of the heavy lifting.

As you know, DD and DSIL want some changes to their basement, like a new bedroom, family room, bath, laundry room, and luxurious though eensy legal suite.  We want a laneway house.  Ergo, which always means I’m going to use logic to explain this, we needed someone who wanted to build a laneway house but also was comfortable making renovations to an existing structure.  Novell fit the bill.

DD interviewed dozens of contractors, some of whom had done both renovations AND lane homes.  And after a lengthy elimination process, chose Novell as their candidate.

I interviewed three laneway builders, and after a short process, chose our (unnamed) candidate.

We all gathered to met both candidates (separate appointments, of course, we are not cool enough to handle both at once). Novell showed up on time, OC (our candidate) was 20 minutes late (bad GPS). Novell has experience primarily in renovations, but was super keen to try their (qualified) hands at building a laneway home.  OC told us straight to our face that, though they had experience doing both, they were “trying to get out of the renovation business” because they didn’t like to do it.  Novell explained that, if any expenses were incurred due to their comparative inexperience, they would absorb them because they think it’s an exciting idea, and would love to have laneway design/build in their (extensive) experience.  OC said that their initial quote had been low.  Why?  They had discovered they were not leaving themselves an adequate profit margin, and had to raise their prices.  (note:  don’t tell us you WERE bad businessmen and now you know better.  LIE TO US so we don’t feel like we missed the last ride on the merry-go=round). Oh, and that adorable laneway house I had seen in our neighbourhood that we thought was, you know, adorable — the one that convinced me that OC would be Our Candidate?  OC don’t like it.  They are embarassed about it.  One must ask, “WTF? Why did you build it? And what will be wrong in the one you build us?”

So we made our decision.  One deciding factor, that is not quantifiable, is that we just liked the people. We felt comfortable talking with them.  We didn’t have any qualms handing over hundreds of thousands of dollars to them.  You know when you meet someone?  And you just know you can work with them?  We felt it.

We’ve met with Novell again to discuss the broad stokes of the project.  Once again totally comfortable with them.  They are raring to go — and so are we.

Things I was supposed to do this week:

1. Meet with banker to discuss loans, etc.
2. Meet with designer and daughter to discuss design
3. Find a notary public to witness our tenants-in-common agreement.

Of course, life got in the way:

1. The banker didn’t know we were supposed to discuss loans.  He thought we were going to discuss investments.  Guess what our only investment is going to be?  The laneway house!  Got to make another appointment to discuss loans.
2. Could not attend the appointment because everyone else in the office was out at meetings, illnesses, or holidays and it LOOKS BAD if someone shows up to the office and all you see are tumbleweeds rolling across the floor.  But then it turned out that the designer and the daughter had to cancel, too, so all is well and we will meet in early September.
3. Printed out large list of local notaries public.  Waited until every one else in the office was out.  Called first notary.  He’ll do it for $50 with $10 for each additional copy.  Sounds good to me!  Will make appointment for us to sign tenants-in-common agreement.

Oh look, a picture of a dear little cottage, just like ours will be one day:

except ours will not look anything like that.

The property has been surveyed.

The designer/builder Laurel will be by to speak to Daughter this week, and to get some papers signed.  The city has to know they are authorized to act on our behalf.

Things are moving ahead at glacial speed, but moving nonetheless.

Next step:  must find Notary Public to witness our signatures on the Tenants In Common agreement.

No.  No we are not.

We have signed the agreement to let our designer/contractor actually get started on designing and, you know, contracting.  But it’s obvious that we are not ready to move into a house that is 500 square feet large.  And when you think that 500 square feet is 46.451522 square metres, it seems even smaller!

Lest you think I am being hysterical…..this weekend is a holiday long weekend (BC Day — go BC!) and so we spent a whole day not going to the Pride Parade but instead cleaning out our storage space in the downstairs parking area.  The before picture:

Pretty horrible, isn’t it?  Like we are two empty shoe boxes away from being a reality show.  But after a day of moving stuff, repacking stuff from flimsy boxes into plastic bins, recycling what we could, giving away what we could, and being subjected to the neighbourly stink-eye for filling our collective garbage bin to the top, we finished.

Looking for the after picture?

Nope.  Not going to show it.  Because it is nearly as horrible as the before picture.  We have too much stuff.  But at least now we know that we will have to find shelf space for a couple hundred LP records as well as everything else.

What’s happening, you ask? The wheels of fate grind slow…..but one of the variables that was hanging has now been settled.  So we can move ahead.

Decisions will be made.  Ducks will be placed in a row. Meetings will be held.  Papers will be signed (and notarized).

Our dreams will all come true.  But in the meantime…….

we have cats to look at.

As in all things residential, there are periods of great trepidation, periods of great imagination, and periods of tedium.

What we are doing right now are:

1. making Pinterest pages of everything we want in our new place (we can use them all! — provided we can make our Lane Way Home much bigger on the inside than it is on the outside — kind of a residential Tardis)
2. Looking over a contract from the builder and signing it
3. Looking over an agreement among the Gang of Four (the principals in the enterprise) setting out the terms of the project and signing it
4. Waiting to hear if one of the Gang of Four gets the promotion s/he has applied for — determining whether there will be money to charge ahead, or whether we’ll be cutting back on the scope of the project for the time being
5. Waiting to talk finances with a couple of people who will tell us how we can get equity from our current home without selling it (which would mean moving at least twice in the next year and a half)

For items 2 and 3, we all need to be together in the same room — something that won’t happen until we are all at a family wedding in the next couple of weeks.

So the project progresses, but softly, softly.

One of the ugly surprises I received when looking into building the laneway house was how much it will cost to get the city services hooked up.  Between surveyors, gas, power, sewer, etc. it could run as high as $20K.

So I am hoping the new regulations the City of Vancouver is implementing will streamline the process — and make it cheaper.  According to two professors at the Sauder School of Business at UBC.

The recommendations that charge the city with finding ways to speed up the development process, reduce fees and red tape, standardize procedures and encourage the market to provide more diverse housing forms are most welcome.

These recommendations all address the greatest barrier to the supply of new and more diverse housing: the city itself.

In this editorial they offer a glimmer of hope that, by the time we plan to build, things will be easier for us and our designer/builder. AffordabilityInitiative_VancouverSun_Somerville&Davidoff_20120628