Approval!

When we came back from our trip to New Orleans, we found the city's approval letter in our mailbox! :) :) YAY!!!

It was approved on June 20. It's a conditional approval which means that we have to wait 14 days for any adjacent neighbors to complain or object to our remodel plans. THEN we will finally have the OK from the city planning department.

The next steps are to get building permits after the city reviews the structural plans and to get an approval for a construction loan.

Funny thing about the construction loan is that before the whole mortgage crisis, it was a lot easier to get one because most of the big banks had them. But since a lot of the same big banks lost a load of money in their mortgage departments, they have stopped giving out construction loans. I don't know if it's permanent but hopefully it's just a temporary over-reaction to the housing mess.

Meeting with cabinet rep

In light of the last rejection and the fact that the designer, contractor, and us would like to see this project break ground, our designer resubmitted the plans with the recommended changes.

We met up with a salesperson from the cabinet company that we'll be working with - Precision Cabinets in Brentwood (No, not the city near LA. It's the one near Walnut Creek.) He invited us to come up to the factory to see all our options. He also brought over a sample cabinet door in cherry which will be handy when we select our granite.

Our designer had asked for quotes from different cabinet companies and this was the one with the best pricing with high quality work.