House that Dean Built
Icy today. Shitty rain ice. Pretty messy. Here's James - the office is pretty cool - beadboard, red door, red blueprint filing cabinets, nice shelf, etc... He is determined to fit that square peg in that round hole, and in this picture, he almost has it figured out.
And here's the brain center - My desk.
And Mr Deer outside our home, eating some rotten apples from the apple tree before-mentioned.
And my new F-250, with Catskill Farms lettering.
Dean's house sits on 6 pretty fabulous and private acres and he was part of our waiting list last summer. And now, give him 4 weeks and he will be living large in Cottage 13. This pic was taken early in the morning on a day we were expecting some snow.
Here are some shots of the plank walled kitchen we are just about to install.
Here's a picture of Alvin the Tile Man in Dean's large, 2 headed shower arena. If you've seen our tile work, then you know first-hand how talented Alvin is.
He has had every size, type, and quality of tile thrown his way - from Nick's Frank Lloyd Wright's shower, to Gayle's stone, to Gavin's to Davids, ... well, you get the point.
Juan and Joe in the basement making some porch railings.
Upstairs bedroom with 12' ceilings.
We are hoping to close this house in early February and if all goes well, will be our 2nd deal of the new year.
It's a pretty neat house - I loved the exterior shape from the moment I stumbled across it in one of those house plan magazines. I must have looked at 15,000 plans to come up with the 30 houses we thought just might work - if we move this, and tweak this, and raise this, and add a window, and enlarge the bath, and add a door, and move the porch, etc...
Value
Big article in the Times the other day about falling prices of homes in the Catskills - I have only one thing to say about that - 'Duh!.' Or, actually, "Double Duh." Anyone with their nose to the train tracks and understood a little about economic history, and a little bit about regional history, knew when shitty houses on shitty property were selling for $300k that something bad was going to happen. I mean, houses that wouldn't have even been considered by a weekender were selling for $400k, doubling or more their price of just 3 years back. Luckily, we never got greedy, never paid more than $4k an acre for our land, never overpaid our labor and staff and never forgot to make the hard design decisions that kept our houses full of detail at the lowest cost. And, most importantly, kept the prices far below what our customers could build the house independent of our vertically integrated process. I think we may be the only company in the entire country that is selling our houses for equal or more than last year. For instance, we have had 5 of our houses appraised over the past 2 months in this tough climate in order for the buyers to get financing - all appraised by different banks, different appraisers - and all came back with values at or above our selling costs. Since appraisals are the biggest obstacles to getting deals done presently, I am definitely pretty proud our homes are not only retaining their value, but actually increasing in most cases. Real Value is always in demand. So is good taste.
Waiting for Mom
Here are Lucas and Me waiting for Mom to finish 'getting ready' on New Years Eve - Note his cool dude party outfit.
New Years Eve In the Country
Pics are worth 1000 words, so I'll let the pics speak for themselves. Lisa, Lucas and Me hit 2 new years eves' parties and considering we live in the middle of nowhere, it was pretty impressive both parties were only minutes away. Gavin and Emily continued breaking in their house at breakneck pace, first with the inlaws, and then with the New Years Eve party, which included a talent show in the basement movie room with built in disco ball effect. Here's a sampling of some of the raw talent outed last night -
Our hostess, fueling up the baby and herself (this routine was set to the pee wee herman anthem).
And here's the man of the house - Gavin, literally pulling an ace of hearts out of his ass (no pic necessary).
And the crowd - tickets were scarce.
The weird puppet show.
The weirder routine with these 2 people in contamination suits.
A gay dance routine to 'Gloria'.
The guests and the Christmas tree.
Trevor and a dog and a child.
James came on down from Livingston Manor with the wife and two kids. As seen in the photo - I brought my double chin along - no party is complete without that lively participant.
And then Lisa and Lucas and Me cruised over to Schumacher Pond Road where Pablo and Ana were kicking it with 2 good friends. We brought in the new year with them and a few bottles of champagne. Pablo told a great story of how much time him and Ana spent at the paint stores picking paints for the house. Only those readers who have spent every free moment for weeks debating, cataloging and dissecting 18 shades of red can share their pain - good news, though, in the end, since the defining red wainscotting was a perfect pick.
It was a big year - coming on the heels of a few previous big years - and at this point, we seem to be really hitting our stride. Not bad for a Depression.
Our 2008 sales.
Chapin Lot 45 - 6000 sq ft
Cottage 5 - 750 sq ft
Cottage 6 - 1300 sq ft
Farmhouse 9 - 1700 sq ft
Cottage 7 - 1300 sq ft
Cottage 8 - 1300 sq ft
Cottage 9 - 1300 sq ft
Gavin and Emily's House - 2700 sq ft
Cottage 15 - 1100 sq ft
Cottage 3 - 1100 sq ft
Not too bad all. With 3 sales set for the first 3 months of 2009, we are on track for a quick start.
Cheers. www.thecatskillfarms.com
