Rowhouse concrete flatwork and stairs

The concrete crew put in a long day Monday to get the remaining stairs and walks prepped for today's pour.  Access to the front of the townhouses has been awkward so now that we are poured we are in way better shape for deliveries.  The concrete doesn't need a lot of time to set up before it can handle foot traffic but I like to stay off it for 48 hours. The surface scuffs too easily when it is only a day old.  

Dominic is happy to get this pour done so he can get to one of his many other jobs.   

Ready for broom finish and we have permanent sidewalks and can landscape.  

Picking tile for the rowhouse

tile selections are coming together at the rowhouse. It has been a tricky affair as I’m looking to make each unit unique and special and confusing myself with lots of indecisiveness.  Wouldn’t it be so much easier just to do it all the same? 

new arrivals are very tempting 

Lots of small jobs

It is always amazing what it takes to actually finish a house to a full 100% complete.  

Here are a few recent updates

Just need to get these on the walls

Washer and dryer is ready to go  

Ultra premium product on a budget build. How is this possible?

Use of exceptional premium product is a common occurrence on my projects. How can this be possible?  Is it simply a case of reducing margins to offer better quality to the clients?  Or some proprietary builder genius that allows me to trespass in the domain of mansions while retaining affordability?  The answer is none of the above.  In some instances the desire for durability and craftsmanship or quality can overcome budgetary reality.  

Maybe the question buyers should ask is ‘how can I (operating on a tiny budget) offer better or more durable materials on a build to lease rowhouse than may be found on a multi milion dollar estate home? Perhaps these pricey homes are having specification shortcuts that don’t make any sense given the scale of the investment.  

Case study today is the Eavestrough product out of Europe from Lindab.  This exceptional product is now managing roof runoff and will no doubt be functioning flawlessly over the decades to come.  

colour match is exact.  Unfortunately nobody can see this from the street. 

durability starts here 

rigid downpipe.  

Live33st rowhouse update

concrete flatwork preparation is underway now at the rowhouse.  Garages, sidewalks, patio slabs and stairs are planned to be poured soon.  Lots of prep work needs to be done here. The garage is a thicker than normal compartmentalized slab design.  This necessitates cutting a trench around the perimeter for a 16” edge.  The patios get a lot of rebar and the sidewalks bracketed to avoid settlement problems. 

Step 1 is excavating and compacting gravel in the slab edge.  

patio slab prep

pile of brackets ready to go 

Elms are back

the old elm trees that line a few of the Killarney streets are back and looking great after the long winter. The semi detached project is ready for sidewalks and landscaping.

Killarney is looking good. Note the wild mini tree at the front of the lot was cleared of brush and debris. 

Killarney project - carpet

the crew is back to put in the underpad and carpet in the basement of unit 2. Even the pad changes the look of the room tremendously.  Track strips get glued down to avoid puncturing the heat lines in the slab.  Before and after pics to follow. 

pad is down. 

Live33st.com update. The stucco and steel combo is almost done

This post will be a picture only

Drivers on 33 st will have a hard time not seeing the nearly complete rowhouse exterior.  

Live33st.com update rowhouse taping begins

All the drywall is hung and that means it is time to tape. All this will take place over a one week period and ceiling texture work is booked for the next weekend. After that we can prime the walls and start interior work.  

Rowhouse project is looking a lot better cleaned up and ready for taping. 

Killarney project mls link edit sold

The first Killarney semi detached home has hit the mls (c4182007 listing ID). The pictures look great, just exterior work remains.

Project is sold link no longer works  

Listing photos

The semi detached home unit 1 is ready to list and we’ve finished the photos.  The last details seemed to take a week to deal with but we are very close now.   

Finally ready for sale.  

Semi detached preparation for sale

The interior at the semi d project in Killarney is nearly complete.  While a lot of exterior work remains, we had the stagers arrive and set up some furniture.  Looking good so far.  

Rowhouse sound mitigation project continues

We are staying one step ahead of the boarders with the rowhouse sound mitigation project.  Application of a generous squeeze of green glue between the two layers of drywall should contribute to dampening vibration through the wall.  

Jp has applied the compound and is now hanging the next layer  

The lower sheet is ready to go.  

Rowhouse metal cladding

exterior work is taking shape now with the cladding crew on site to start installing trims and the corrugated metal cladding.  With the warm dry conditions a good portion of the site is now dried up mud and the remainder melting snow and greasy mud.  A vast improvement over our formerly glacial front yard.  

a great start on the wall with all the service penetrations and meter bases.  

10 mm glass

10 mm glass has a heft and substantial feel to it, making for an excellent stair railing insert option.  The Killarney project benefits from a significant amount of glass insert and door glass.  The first home is just about ready to go to market in the last week of April.   

stairs are looking good. 

2 inch pex pipe - is it really necessary?

One of the odd requirements of servicing the new multi family sites is the size of the incoming service.  I have always found it ridiculously overcapacity.  Generally the requirement is a 2 inch water line.  These are so stiff, and awful to deal with where they enter the basement slab.  I have had to assist the plumber fighting these 2 inch pipes many times.  It doesnt help that it is super cold and rigid, in an awkward location and needs 200 ft pounds of torque to thread the brass fittings on so it won't pop off and cause a major inundation.

The massive pex pipe is immediately throttled back to a usable diameter.  Right now this is feeding a single connected hose bib.  

Rowhouse sound mitigation project

The rowhouse sound transmission reduction project is well underway.  It is a multi step affair and incorporates some specialized products.  The first is a roxul stuff cavity, followed by the mass loaded vinyl. These two items muffle and deaden sound as they are dense products. To decouple the vibrations we then use a rubber isolated clip followed by a layer of dense drywall.  This is a costly and labour intensive process to detail but it makes a lot of sense to do so in the multi family projects.  Words cannot describe accurately how hideous it is to install the heavy mass loaded vinyl product.  The 4x25 ft roll weighs 100 pounds, and combines the nastiest elements of hanging drywall on a ceiling with stapling poly vapour barrier.  

step 1 - roxul

step 2  - mass loaded vinyl

step 3 - metal furring strips are clipped into the rubber isolating piece.  

Appliance install

The appliance package was delivered during the recent blizzard, and we've invested some time to start the install.  I am usually interested in doing my own appliance installs, especially once when I had received an installation quote for a package of appliances where the wall oven supposedly needed a $250 bill to put it in the cavity and screw in a couple screws.  Often in construction there is no relationship to the value of the service provided and its price, and that is a clear example of something being utterly not worth it.  Other installs can be considerably trickier, such as range hoods where they are bolted to the wall, often a tiled backsplash, and are cumbersome to hang.

Hood fan body is mounted nicely, now it just needs the HVAC crew to duct it and the electrician to wire it.  Appliance install is a team game and getting it all organized is the key to success.

Rather than dual oven, the kitchen features the full sized oven with the compact oven/microwave combo.  This is a costly but desirable appliance upgrade.

Rowhouse insulation

The rowhouse project got a much needed top to bottom cleanup.  This took an entire day but at least we have an empty and swept out building to smooth the transition to insulation.  With delivery of the material the sound reduction project can start.  We’ve got the best materials on the market and we are going to find out how well it works.  

Lots of thermal and acoustical insulation is on site.   

Garage building

whenever I start a garage I often remark how much easier it is to build than a multi family building.  From my perspective it almost seems to build itself.  All the frustration and complexity that comes with underground sewer and gas installation and structural design work doesn’t really apply to the garage.  If you have the right crew in place the garage can be completely done in a couple weeks.  

shingles up in one day 

wiring done today as well. Framing took 2-3 days but there was a blizzard involved.