Boat Gone, Car Sold, Loan Update, New Jeep, Concrete, Rebar, and Packing!

Super Air NautiqueJust a couple of days ago the boat left the backyard. It’s now at Nautiques of Orlando. Ask for Jason who is selling it for me if you’re interested.

I sold my Audi A7! (Not officially, but we are supposed to finalize paperwork this week.) $30k to someone I think will love and cherish the car as I did.

The day before the car sold, we bought a Jeep! A 2015 4 Door Sport Wrangler with less than 15,000 miles. It’s white. It will be delivered on a boat to Gallows Bay just a couple days before we arrive, which will be a week from now! Scored this about $7k under book value.

Both Bank of St Croix and Banco Popular are willing to do land loans  Banco Popular’s terms are looking way better though.

I spoke with Timoty Francis of St. Croix who is going to possibly help us with the concrete and rebar work. Speaking with him he quoted in line with what my research was telling me on material costs. Concrete is $160-$170/yard depending upon its strength. (GREAT because another blog I read about a Villa build on St. Thomas said it was upwards of $900/yard when they built 10 years go, which sounds absolutely crazy.) Rebar is best shipped from Puerto Rico and is running somewhere around $675/ton. I can’t wait to tell you how many yards and tons we need… it will be a lot, and the total price for these two materials alone could build a framed house in the states on the mainland.

I sold a bunch of my studio gear to friends I made while I owned Venue 578 before we sold out of it today, as well as a big carved wooden fish I liked to my neighbor. You never know how much stuff of value you have until you start selling it all.

PackingAnd finally we’ve started the dreaded task of packing. So much stuff! Our dog, Tate, made sure he was in the “going” pile. We are in the mindset that if we don’t need it in St. Croix, then we probably don’t need it in our lives at all anymore. The good news about this move is that the furniture is staying with the lake house, since we are going to rent it out fully furnished, so the “things” we’ve collected over the last 10 years is really all we’ve got to deal with. Much of it will be at a HUGE yard and moving sale this coming Friday and the rest is getting packed in boxes and shipped via USPS to come with. We worked on it all day, and although we feel like we accomplished a lot, it doesn’t look like it. There’s much more to do.

First on the packing list, Scuba Gear.

Financing and Design

I made calls for about 2 hours today looking for financing information and only got ahold of one person who has 100% of the information I needed. Banco Popular wins for the day out of lenders. The people at Bank of St. Croix were very nice too, but only had info on Construction Loans. Someone is supposed to call me back about Land Loans. First Bank VI and Scotiabank both have to return my calls still as no one could get me to anyone with any information. Welcome to the Island life! These are the only four banks that offer land and construction loans from what I’ve found down in St. Croix.  Hopefully if I have info from all four, I’ll be able to make the best choice between loan products. I need to get prequalified before we start real conversations with land owners. We have our eye on 8 properties at the moment.

In other news, I spoke with Carlos Reyes, a designer and draftsman who was referred to me on the VImovingcenter.com site.  This is my third call with him, and I really like him. He seems to be very free with information and knows where the good deals are VS the sub contractors who are out to get as much as they can from a “mainlander.” He was helpful in a few budgetary items today as well. He also seems like he’s going to be the best value wise for us to use. We’re planning to meet in person when we go down around the end of our next trip.  I’ve got some hand drawings of features I want in the house going, and a Pinterest Board Shaleece and I have been working on, but we have to wait until we get the lot to start layout out the actual house.  Follow our Caribbean Home Pinterest Board and dream with us!

Update: First Bank VI called back first thing this morning (8/22/17) and they are no longer doing Land and Construction loans.  Just waiting on Scotiabank and Bank of St. Croix to finalize a decision after receiving the rest of their information.