Quite a buildup: Davenport couple builds own home

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By Alma Gaul | Friday, April 25, 2008 2:12 PM CDT | () comments

Jeff Cook/QUAD-CITY TIMES The exterior of the home is sided in khaki-colored vinyl, accented with brick and two rooflines over the three-car garage. Buy this Photo

After living for 37 years in the same home with a one-acre lot and a swimming pool, Bob Anderson decided he wanted to downsize his maintenance chores.

He and his wife Bev considered a condominium, but she wanted a neighborhood with people of all ages, so they decided to buy a lot and build their own house. And Bob — always good at reading instruction books — wanted to do as much as he could by himself, with the help of friends, family and some hired contractors.

Bob designed the floor plan, served as the general contractor for jobs that had to be hired and did much of the framing, roofing and siding himself, plus all of the interior flooring that included almost 3,000 square feet of tile.

From the outside, their ranch-style house blends in with others in the Davenport neighborhood; inside, the customization stands out, beginning with its almost-circular floor plan.

There is also an eye-catching kitchen with a trapezoidal window and birch cabinets from Ikea, an international home products retailer known for its sleek designs. The room’s look reminds Bev of the European-style kitchens they saw when they were stationed in Germany with the U.S. Army combat engineers from 1962 to 1966.

Bob, 71, and retired since 2000, also built the house to accommodate people of limited mobility, should that become important to them as they get older. There are no steps between the garage and the house, everything they need is on the main level, the stairs to the lower-level walk-out are wide enough to accommodate a mechanical lift and the door handles are levers, not knobs.

Energy efficiency was a big goal, too. The walls are built with two-by-six-inch lumber, allowing for more insulation, which he had sprayed in. The windows are triple-pane and the foundation is built with two-inch insulated forms with concrete inside, creating a high R-value of 22. Short of installing a geo-thermal heating and cooling system, Anderson bought the highest efficiency water heater, furnace and air-conditioner.

They moved in last year at the beginning of summer and their utility bills averaged $95 per month for all electricity and gas. Their house is about 1,750 square feet on the main floor and another 1,1750 on the lower level.

The process of building

Before getting your heart set on building, you need to find a lot. Many times, the developers of a subdivision use only certain builders, so if you want to be your own general contractor, you need to find an individual lot for sale. The Andersons were pleased to get a spot where they could build a walk-out basement facing south to catch the most light and one that had a small stream and trees toward the rear for a nice view.

After finding a lot, you need to settle on a design. The Andersons attended real estate open houses for a couple of years to pick up ideas. “We drove up and down the streets, looking at colors of siding, styles of doors,” Bob says. They also visited all of the home improvement centers for ideas and comparison costs.

You also need a general contractor’s permit, and you have to be able to deal with all that entails.

Bob has had a mechanical aptitude from the time he was a boy, and although his college degrees are in general science and computer science, he learned to build things — airfields, roads and culverts — during his time in the Army. He also has done extensive work on their previous homes.

“He’s good at reading instruction books and sales material,” Bev says.

Jobs they hired included digging the foundation; installing the plumbing, electrical and heating/air conditioning systems, which require a license; and blowing in the insulation.

Anderson figures they put about $250,000 into the house, including the cost of the lot. With the help of friends and family, including Aaron Anderson, Ed Vieth, and Jerry and Jeff Santee, he reduced his expenses, but because he didn’t bid the jobs, he doesn’t know by how much.

A walk-through

The front door opens to a foyer with a kind of “art wall” to the left, with niches for display space. Ahead are the stairs to the basement, which roughly line up with the door to the three-car garage. Bob planned it that way so he could easily carry things downstairs to his workroom from the garage.

Also ahead and to the right is the kitchen and the living area/great room combination. To keep that big space from being immediately visible from the front door, Bob built a wall that extends about three-quarters of the way to the vaulted ceiling next to the stairs.

“It was just too open without something here,” Bev says of the wall. The kitchen side of the wall contains a handy computer and storage center.

The kitchen opens to the family room, and from there you walk through an angled doorway into a sunny dining room with windows on three sides. From there, you enter the master bedroom and, finally, a hall that circles back to the foyer with a bathroom, guest bedroom and laundry closet. Bob even built an ironing board into the wall opposite the laundry.

The lower level contains seven rooms, including two that will be finished as bedrooms, a family area, a tool room, an office, a bath, storage and a utility room.

“Four bedrooms and three baths. Yeah, we downsized didn’t we?” Bob says with a smile.

Alma Gaul can be contacted at (563) 383-2324 or agaul@qctimes.com. Comment on this story at qctimes.com.

ANDERSON BIO

Bob Anderson, 71, retired in 2000 from the company now known as Carleton Life Support Systems in Davenport.

He has a degree in general science from the University of Iowa and a master’s degree in computer science from St. Ambrose University, Davenport.

Bev Anderson retired from the accounting office of a Quad-City security company in 2002, but she continues to do bookkeeping for an insurance company and a church. She also does volunteer work.

They have two children and two grandchildren.

KEY ADVICE

“You have to be able to see down the road 10 steps,” Bob Anderson said of would-be contractors. “The next thing and the next thing.”

Also, order your materials on time, he said.

Narrowing the overwhelming choices

A challenging aspect of any home project is making one’s way through the literally hundreds of choices for everything from hardware to floors.

One’s budget limits the choices somewhat, but many remain.

Here are the factors the Andersons considered in selecting cabinets, flooring and windows.

Cabinets

The Andersons like the streamlined, Danish-modern style of furniture and had purchased several pieces when they were in Europe during the 1960s. The pieces had been in storage most of the couple's married life, but “now old is new again,” Bev says.

The couple heard about Ikea — an international company that sells flat-pack furniture — from a cousin and chose birch cabinets. Assembly was “very, very easy to do,” Bob said. “They are very well-engineered.”

The glass fronts lend an airy feel to the kitchen, but they are not so transparent as to contribute to a messy look.

Flooring

They picked tile for the entire house for its looks and durability. “Carpet starts to look ugly in about a year,” Bob says.

The only drawbacks are that you can see dustballs, and the type of tile they purchased has a dull, or matte, finish. In hindsight, Deb would have preferred shiny tile. Bob added shine with a sealer, but the sealer flaked off when it got wet and had to be removed. (Big job!)

Wood was another option, but it is more expensive than the tile they chose. “Per square foot, this is less than $2,” Bob said of the tile. “Most wood is closer to $5. Laminate is $2 to $5.”

Windows

They selected Pella brand for quality and because — in most areas of the house — the windows have miniblinds inside the glass. That offers privacy and eliminates the need for window treatments. And because the blinds are inside, they don’t need to be cleaned. The triple-paning provides high energy efficiency.