New cottage/retirement home near Lake Michigan

ededic · May 3, 2013

Thanks to MotorSeven, Obed, Pete and others putting themselves out there, I am attempting the same, as My wife and I start down the path of building a retirement home.

We are planning on replacing our 24'x32' summer cottage near the lake with a retirement home that we assume to be our last home. We have done the searches on home plan sites, looked closely at other homes, watched threads here and have gone through many sketches of possible plans in the past 2 years. Our current home is 6 bedroom walkout ranch in the country and have spent the past 8 years remodeling much of it. This remodel project has also helped us understand what kind of finishes and plans we like and don't like.

We started with a remodel plan for the existing cottage and that went on for about a year.

Then, based on a plan we found on line a design has stuck.

We now have an architect making my "sketches" into reality.

We are going for a 3 bedroom home that we plan to have many guests over the years, hence the "suites".

I also am replacing a 32x40 workshop...

Planning to go under the garage and screen porch with this space.

Looking forward to where this goes. I will keep you all posted with photos as we make modifications to our plans.

Ed

ededic · May 3, 2013

I was experimenting with that last pic. Can't seem to delete it. That project was a real inspiration for me to document this endeavor, so I guess it is fitting that I can't delete it.

ededic · Apr 13, 2016

Ok guys, I am back an providing an update on this project. Lot of things have changed and am going to provide some updates in order. We are at the foundations and getting ready to pour so will be playing catchup but will keep everything chronological. Looking forward to sharing our project.

Our plans to build the house discussed above are still in play however, we struggled with how to build and live here at the same time. Something I have seen a few others have the same conundrum on this forum.

We landed on the idea of building the wood shop, metal shop and garage with an apartment above on an adjacent property and live there while building. The problem was we did not have an adjacent property. We approached our neighbors to no avail of buying the empty lots that ajoined our lots. So we were thinking about alternatives. One Friday afternoon before Memorial Day 2015 we went for a walk only to find the cottage behind us for sale. Now, I maintain the roads in our association all summer and worked on that road in front of that cottage during the day and there was not for sale sign.

We talked to the relator who lives in our neighborhood at sunset that evening and setup to see it the next day. We put in a purchase agreement and they accepted the next day. Now the proud owner of two old cottages.

... and the project begins.

ededic · Apr 13, 2016

We started with having our architect take our design and update the wood shop, metal shop and garage plans to the new site and contours of the land. We staked out the footprint and marked the trees. Wow some great old growth trees here that will need to come out, tree lovers don't fret, there is a happy outcome...stay tuned. When we had the plan final we hired a company to take down the old cottage. It was unfinished and when we opened it up you could smell it from the road 50 feet away. No way we were going to be able to salvage it. The septic was root bound and the well was below grade in a loose brick pit.

Unfinished Cottage interior

Root bound Septic

Tearing it down

EddieWalker · Apr 14, 2016

Congrats on your progress and new property. Sure sounds like exciting times ahead for you!!!!

joeyd · Apr 14, 2016

Can't wait to follow your journey, good luck with the project.

ededic · Apr 12, 2018

We were able to start clearing trees on the (2) 60x132ft lots after taking down the old cottage.

And then we had inspectors come in, the four legged kind. They wanted to see what we had done with their habitat.

After clearing over 50 trees with the tools we had, we brought in the professionals.

They spent the next three days taking down and trimming up the trees on the lots.

I helped but spent a lot of time on conference calls #daysoffarereallynotdaysoff

EddieWalker · Apr 12, 2018

Wow, it's been two years!!! Did you get busy doing other things or is this how long the red tape is to get permits?

ededic · Apr 12, 2018

By the third day, the tree crew was trimming up the rest of the tress on the lots. We cleared canopy 50-60ft to let the sun in as we are in high humidity and moss grows on your feet if you stand too long.