Building Our Dream House
Last spring, my family decided to build a house on a beautiful piece of land outside the city. We thought it would be easy. We were very, very wrong.
In March, our manager Karl arrived with his team. Karl was cheap - only 15 euros per hour. Now I understand why. On the first day, they started to dig the in the wrong place! They created a huge hole exactly where we wanted our roofed terrace. "No problem!" said Karl. "We can move everything three meters to the left."
After two weeks, the hole was finally filled with for the cement base. But Karl's team forgot to put wire through the . When we asked about it, Karl said, "Wire? Oh yes... wire is... optional?" It was not optional.
By May, the walls were going up, but nothing was straight. Our three- house looked drunk. The windows on each floor didn't line up. My wife cried when she saw it from the top down view. It looked like a puzzle made by a confused child.
The garage became a carport because Karl "forgot" to order the walls. The around the garden fell down three times because the posts weren't enough. The path to the house was so uneven that my grandmother called it "the mountain trail."
During construction, Karl multiplied all the costs wrong. Our "completely realistic price" became double. Then triple. We stopped counting.
After eighteen months - not the promised nine - our house was finally "complete." The drive the wrong way, so water runs toward the house, not away from it. The studio in the is so small that only a child can stand up straight. And it's a seller's market, so we can't even sell this disaster!
But you know what? We live here now. And every day, we laugh about something new we discover that Karl did wrong. Last week, we found out he the toilet in the attic bathroom .
Welcome to our dream house!
In March, our manager Karl arrived with his team. Karl was cheap - only 15 euros per hour. Now I understand why. On the first day, they started to dig the in the wrong place! They created a huge hole exactly where we wanted our roofed terrace. "No problem!" said Karl. "We can move everything three meters to the left."
After two weeks, the hole was finally filled with for the cement base. But Karl's team forgot to put wire through the . When we asked about it, Karl said, "Wire? Oh yes... wire is... optional?" It was not optional.
By May, the walls were going up, but nothing was straight. Our three- house looked drunk. The windows on each floor didn't line up. My wife cried when she saw it from the top down view. It looked like a puzzle made by a confused child.
The garage became a carport because Karl "forgot" to order the walls. The around the garden fell down three times because the posts weren't enough. The path to the house was so uneven that my grandmother called it "the mountain trail."
During construction, Karl multiplied all the costs wrong. Our "completely realistic price" became double. Then triple. We stopped counting.
After eighteen months - not the promised nine - our house was finally "complete." The drive the wrong way, so water runs toward the house, not away from it. The studio in the is so small that only a child can stand up straight. And it's a seller's market, so we can't even sell this disaster!
But you know what? We live here now. And every day, we laugh about something new we discover that Karl did wrong. Last week, we found out he the toilet in the attic bathroom .
Welcome to our dream house!