As planned, Dawn and I met with Rusty and the electrician, Rob, at the site this afternoon. Rob had a ton of insight with the lights and placement of some of the outlets. For example, in the kitchen, pushing the recessed lights further away from the wall since some of the light would be "wasted" by hitting the tops of the cabinets.
We made a couple of on-the-fly decisions with things like switched outlets and hanging televisions on the wall in some rooms.
I also started noticing quickly that the plans did not account for enough lights. It became apparent when we started out in the garage. We had chosen two 8-foot fluorescents, but Rob said we needed more since there would not be enough light if the garage door were raised. The number of canned lights quickly rose as we went through the living room, too.
Bottom line--we are likely going over budget on the lighting fixtures now. Or at least we did not account for maybe a dozen or so at the lighting store.
We also sort of talked about the drop ceiling in the basement versus a sheetrocked ceiling. Dawn was not crazy about the cheap-looking tiles, which I can agree with. However, we have a ton more flexibility with the drop ceiling when it comes to wiring and (going back a few days) the HVAC ductwork that will need to go throughout the basement. Apparently there are lots of different tiles to choose from, so we'll ahve to look into that.
When we got home, Dawn and I briefly talked about the HVAC stuff. I think we are leaning toward the two mid-size units on the first floor and the one in the basement. This puts is over the estimate in that area, too. By as much as $9,000.
In an effort to save money, we are pretty much skipping the generator for now. This will save us some money now, including a cement pad since we were, at one time, going with a permanent unit outside. Well, actually it will not be saving us anything per se, since a generator was never part of the estimate. Anyway, we will get the transfer switch installed in the breaker box to accommodate a future portable generator purchase.
