THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, May 13, 1995 TAG: 9505110155
SECTION: REAL ESTATE WEEKLY PAGE: 3 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Cover Story
SOURCE: By Chris Kidder
SPECIAL TO REAL ESTATE WEEKLY
LENGTH: Long : 114 lines
Last Tuesday, Lois Shedlock sat on her dune-top deck - the first time she walked to the deck and looked at her new oceanfront vacation cottage. She liked what she saw.
What she saw was the end of two very long months and the beginning of a return on her investment. It's about time.
Shedlock's factory-built house was assembled on her lot on March 10 with a 65-ton crane. It took less than a day to go from foundation to an 80 percent complete, 3,300 square-foot, three-story house.
After a beginning like that, things can only slow down. They did.
Four weeks into the building schedule, Rhodes & Son, General Contractors, the builder, hit a snag getting town approval for the swimming pool. Work stopped while George Wood, an environmental engineer, was brought in to negotiate with the town.
The delay gave Shedlock and her three partners time to think about making changes. That's the good news and the bad news. They decided to add texture to many of the walls and repaint. Light fixtures, carpet, trim details and other work that could have been finished had to wait.
After two weeks of negotiations, the pool was approved. The builder put his crew back on the job, but now the subcontractors were busy with other work.
Rhodes had hoped to have his certificate of occupancy (called a ``CO'') on May 5, but the pool, indirectly, held things up again.
Once the pool was approved, plumbing had to be completed, then concrete decking poured. Building regulations required a four- to six-foot fence around the pool, gates on each outdoor staircase leading to the pool, childproof latches on each gate, and alarms on each door opening onto the pool deck.
The town's building inspector came by late on the 5th to make his final inspection. He told the owners they could move furniture into the house but the CO would have to wait. ``It's not errors keeping us from getting the permit,'' Rhodes said, ``but things that still need to be done.''
``The house should have been finished in four weeks easily,'' Rhodes said. The two-week delay hurt. ``This time of year, you can schedule subs all you want, but if one guy can't make it, that's it.''
The delays have been expensive. The Shedlocks lost more than $2,000 when two off-season weeks of rental had to be canceled. The environmental engineer wasn't in the budget.
The 10-by-22 fiberglass pool will be worth the trouble - and the $15,000 price tag (that includes engineering help). It will increase rent about $500 per week for six months of the year, paying for itself in under 18 months.
The Shedlocks added an inexpensive, but effective, solar water heating system to increase the number of weeks the pool can be used. ``We run black piping underneath the concrete deck,'' explained Linda Rogers of North Shore Pools, Kill Devil Hills.
A six-person hot tub that shares the pool deck will increase off-season rentals by 25 percent, said Sun Realty agent Betsy Taylor. A $4,000 price tag included installation and $150 for an ozone system that helps purify the water between cleanings.
This job is the eighth modular house Joe Rhodes has built. It's the first one he didn't finish on time. ``Sometimes you can be too lucky,'' Rhodes said with a shrug. ``This time, we had problems.''
The big problem was the pool; others have been minor.
There was a small plumbing leak in a second floor bedroom. Rhodes had to cut a hole in the ceiling to find it and then have the leak and ceiling repaired.
``It cost about $200,'' Rhodes said. Because the leak came from factory-installed plumbing, Nationwide Homes pays the bill.
Shedlock wants Tomorrow's World owner Richard Hahn to reduce the noise made by the rooftop wind generator he installed. Located over the master bedroom, the small windmill runs three water heaters in the house. It sounds like a refrigerator motor. Hahn says he'll do whatever it takes to make her happy.
Shedlock, who works as Rhodes' office manager, has gone through the house and found a dozen things that need attention. Some of the phone jacks don't work. A wall switch needs to be rewired to control a ceiling fan. A chip in the breakfast bar needs repair.
She reeled off the list as Rhodes nodded. ``At the office, he's the boss,'' she said. ``Here, I tell him what to do.''
Rhodes is pleased with how the house turned out. There are only two things he'd do differently.
``I wish I'd had George Wood involved with the pool from the beginning,'' he said. And he'd like to do something to dress up the front of the house. ``I think I could improve it.''
Shedlock looked around her new investment. ``I think I'd make a bigger kitchen,'' she said, after squeezing dishes and cookware for 16 people into cabinets better suited for a family of four.
She was tired on this morning, worn out from weeks of ordering, scheduling and dealing with missed deadlines. Before walking onto the deck, she'd stood amid a knee-high pile of boxes in the kitchen floor, dreading the next four days before renters would arrive.
She pondered whether she would take on a project like this again. ``At this point, I'd have to say no,'' she said.
But after being outdoors, Shedlock saw the house in a different light. She stood in her great room. A wide expanse of blue ocean goes wall to wall. ``Just imagine being able to wake up every morning and see this,'' she said.
She knows the ocean will bring people to rent her cottage. It's the reason she and her partners built the house. It's the reason she'd build it again if she had the chance. ILLUSTRATION: [Cover]
[Color Photo]
[Co-Owner Lois Shedlock and builder, Joe Rhodes.]
[Color Photos]
Drew C. Wilson
Lois Shedlock gave as much attention to the furnishings, carpeting
and paint in her cottage as she did the design and manufacture.
Above, the living room.
Workers install the small roof windmill that runs three water
heaters.
by CNB