Launch of Teardown Project
Hinges on Ironing Out Details

Editor's Note: This is the 26th installment of "Teardown Diary," a feature by Wall Street Journal correspondent Nancy Keates. The column details her decision to demolish the Portland, Ore., home where she lives with her family and build anew. In the months ahead, she will chronicle what led to the decision, the financial costs, hiring an architect, knocking down her house, choosing the features of her new home and the final product.

We were supposed to tear down our house and start our new home building project the first week of March. So what happened? A lot of cracks came to light.

It would seem imprudent to begin a project without signing a contract with a bottom line price tag. But apparently a lot of people do just that: They give the contractor the go ahead without having picked out all the components, such as carpeting, a heating system and even a material for the roof. When you leave decisions unmade, that opens up the possibility of change orders -- and every time there's a change to the construction plans, you have to pay the contractor an additional percentage above the cost of the new item. My husband and I can't afford that kind of uncertainty, since this project is taxing us to the limit (and no further, I hope).

We've decided to get every single decision out of the way before starting construction. But despite repeated requests to the architect and the designer to write up a list of everything we need to choose before starting, we kept coming up with items that hadn't been designated. The message we are getting is that you can hire as many people as you want, but in the end you are responsible for figuring out the whole picture yourself and making sure all the pieces fit.

First, there was the issue of plumbing fixtures and hardware: We chose vanities and faucets, but not sink basins and bathtubs. Suddenly we found ourselves scrambling to find affordable but still attractive options. My contractor called to say the plumbing fixtures I chose would cost us $16,000 more than we had budgeted to meet his original cost estimate. He made an appointment to take me to a less expensive store to pick out new ones.

I went to a showroom with our designer to pick everything out. Strolling the aisles, I noticed front door handles and doorbells. Don't we need those? I asked her. Perhaps if I hadn't brought it up we would have come to that eventually -- but it wasn't on the list. A couple days later, I realized we'd missed sink basins for the laundry room and the mudroom and other small things like the kitchen soap dispenser and the toilet in the powder room.  

The same process happened with the lighting. My architect emailed a "lighting schedule" -- a list of every type of fixture and its location. But we already had some lights that we planned to re-use (pendants from the kitchen, an outdoor sconce) and they weren't on the list. The choices we saw at the lighting store were limited. Later, when I went online, I realized there were much more affordable -- and equally attractive options.

We picked most of the hard surface materials, like tiles and wood flooring. But we still had to choose carpeting for the playroom, stairs and the closets. This seemed easy enough. My designer showed me some 100% wool samples for around $75 a square foot and some much more affordable vinyl options. When I asked for less expensive all-wool alternatives, she said she didn't have any. So I chose the expensive wool for the stairs and the closet and went with vinyl for the playroom even though I hated it. A few days later, I decided to go explore on my own at a local carpeting store. Lo and behold, I found 100% wool carpeting that looked lovely for about $45 a square foot.

These were just the little gaps. Much more crucially, we still hadn't finalized our heating and cooling plan (called HVAC in contractor terms). We still had to decide how many zones we wanted -- which would affect where the ducts would go and thus the kind of lighting we could have in the second-floor hallway. Did we want a TraneFresh Effects Energy Recovery Ventilator for an extra $6,000, or would we be content with getting fresh air into the system in a less expensive way? My contractor handed me the brochure explaining the FreshEffects system and said he'd talk to the HVAC guy to get a more thorough explanation of its benefits.

We also needed to decide what kind of fireplaces to get for our new home. I was first told that masonry fireplaces were significantly more expensive than zero-clearance (or factory-built) units, so I opted for one masonry unit and two zero-clearance units. It then turned out the zero-clearance units would require a different chimney chase, adding $15,000 to the job. Would that eliminate the cost differential between the masonry and the zero clearance? My contractor said he'd find out.

Then there is the roof. We don't want asphalt. Real slate is too expensive and too heavy. There is a product called TruSlate, which is lighter and less expensive, but still uses real slate, a seemingly perfect solution. But the contractor has never built a home with that material and is wary of guaranteeing something he doesn't know well. He would feel more comfortable with one of the synthetic slate materials, made from plastic and other ingredients. We don't like that look.

Before we can knock down our house, we need to know the total cost. Before we can know a final price, we need to make all these decisions. Before we can make all these decisions, we need to have pricing information. The contractor is working ruthlessly to help us finish this process. But that is where we are. We are now aiming to start the project on March 31 -- a whole month late.

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-- Nancy Keates is a correspondent for The Wall Street Journal and lives in Portland, Ore.

Email your comments to teardowndiary@dowjones.com.