You might have noticed things on the construction front have come to a bit of a standstill lately. Well they haven’t entirely – we’ve merely switched our focus from the main area of the house to another. More on that in a bit – but first here are a few of the lessons we’ve learned in the last several weeks:

1. Windows are expensive. Ok so that’s not really something new that we learned. But geeeez! They’re made of vinyl & glass people…seriously?!?
2. Don’t “shop” for windows until you’re 100% ready to place an order. Trust me on this one. Crunching the numbers in the winter when business is slow is a COMPLETELY different ball game come spring or summer when it’s prime construction season and manufacturers have gotten a couple of home shows under their belts… However, if you need to get replacement windows in NJ, the waiting game can be exasperating! Luckily, Affordable Home Services is trustworthy all year round and the wait doesn’t have to be done.
3. Manufacturer lead times are important! This ties in to our previous point because lead times will vary depending on how busy suppliers & manufacturers are at any given time. Always be sure to get an understanding of how long you’ll be waiting for an order & factor that in to the quoted price & how their timeline might impact your construction schedule.

Sigh…unfortunately for us, the way the financing & timing of our inspections worked out, we weren’t able to avoid having to place our window orders during the height of the construction season. Nor we’re we able to avoid the premium pricing & heavy lead time that comes along with it. So right now we’re playing the window waiting game – which isn’t the most fun when you consider that not a whole lot can happen inside OR outside the house until the windows go in. You can see why construction companies would use some sort of production tracking to record equipment and materials used each day and help to keep everything running smoothly. This is only a small project but we are finding running it more and more difficult as it progresses.

Not all is lost tho…

We’ve been making pretty good use of our time by switching our focus to the basement. Up to this point, we haven’t talked a whole lot about the basement, but in the next few days we’ll be taking you underground & revealing some of what we’ve been up to & what plans we have in store for the space.

Stay tuned…