Getting Organized

Building a house involves a lot of steps. There is financing a construction loan, getting the design we want, and finding the various contractors we need to build the thing. If we are going to be our own General Contractor then we need to get organized and stay organized.

Since we both work in technology it makes sense that we use software to manage this project. We have been talking about what to use for about a week when it dawned on us that we should use Jira. Kate uses Jira on a daily basis at her work and, while I don’t currently use it at mine, it is used and I should learn it.

The cool thing is that Jira has a free version which allows for up to 10 users. Considering none of the contractors we are considering even have a website we are pretty sure Kate and I will be the only users. So last night we started up personal accounts and got to work.

I should say that Kate got to work as she actually knows how to use Jira. If you are not familiar with Jira it is project management software used by a lot of software developers. While we aren’t developing software, and won’t be using the Agile features, we will have a number of tasks that we need to keep track of. Jira is probably overkill for what we need but its free and as I mentioned we both already have various levels of exposure to it at each of our work places.

Currently the Design project is the main focus but as we progress we are going to have a builder handling the foundation, walls, and roof. There is going to be an excavator handling the basement dig and the trenching for the Primary and Secondary electrical wiring. There will be a plumber, electrician, insulation, roofer, dry wall, painter, finishing, and landscaping to name a few. Each of those are going to have their own bids, schedules, materials, change orders, etc.

During the entire project we are going to be in contact with the bank issuing funds for each stage. We will need to keep track of expenses and make sure everything matches up. Basically we are going to be running a small business for 6 to 8 months, on top of our regular jobs. The good news is that we work from home and will be living on the job site. Its going to be work and staying organized with Jira is going to help a lot.

Workout Detail

We went for a nice ride this morning before it got hot. We did a nice easy 23 mile loop to town and around on some dirt farm roads. We stopped at our local coffee shop just over halfway for some iced coffee and peach tarts. It was a lovely day and we talked about the house project almost non stop.