July 2022 Update and Timeline
First submittal of construction drawings
Over the past year, we have been working diligently on getting approvals required to start the construction of the underground utilities and the homes. Drawings and documents have been submitted for review and approval to the various departments at Madera County, the state water board, PG&E and the California Department of Real Estate. Outreach efforts have also continued and have resulted in a number of reservations for the first and subsequent phases of the project.
The permitting process has turned out to be a much lengthier process than initially anticipated, but great progress has made been made over the past year, including the following:
The Madera County Environmental Health Department approved the onsite wastewater treatment system
The State Water Board and Environmental Health Department approved the design of the water system.
Most recently, the Madera County Fire Department approved the underground water system and locations of the fire hydrants.
In the next few weeks, we will submit the drawings required by the Building Department for the construction of a 40,000 gallon water storage tank that will provide storage for the drinking water and for fire fighting purposes to the fire hydrants.
As of June, PG&E approved the layout of the distribution system and are now on the third review of the electrical design. We’ve been working with a utility consultant to submit the design of the underground electrical distribution system to PG&E.
Construction Drawings for the 3 unit types have been finalized and submitted to the Madera County Building Department
With the approvals of the water system, septic system, and electrical utilities in hand or close to completion, we have now scheduled the infrastructure construction to start at the beginning of September. Discussions are underway to schedule the contractors and to get quotes and delivery schedules from suppliers on the materials. We estimate that the infrastructure work will be completed by the end of the year. Once this is completed, each lot will have hookups for water, wastewater, electrical and optional telephone and internet services and the internal roads will be completed.
Prior to being able to sell lots and units, the project needs to be approved by the California Department of Real Estate (DRE). This approval process required us to hire an attorney to prepare the Bylaws, Articles and Covenants, Conditions and Regulations (CC&Rs) and a consultant to prepare a preliminary budget for the owners’ association. The initial versions of these documents were completed at the beginning of this year and submitted to the DRE along with numerous other documents. This spring, the initial review comments from the DRE were received and the updated documents were resubmitted. In June, additional changes were requested and these changes are being addressed now and the updated documents will be submitted shortly. Hopefully, the third time's a charm and they will be approved.
Over the past year, three master plan home designs have been refined and finalized. These consist of the following units:
1090 square foot, 2 Bedroom/2 Bath
1520 square foot, 3 bedroom/2 Bath
2065 square foot, 3 Bedroom/2 Bath with a Garage
These floor plans can be found under The Homes section of the website.
Model 3.0 Floor Plan - 2 bedroom/2 bath 1090 sq. ft
Once finalized, the plans were furnished to the energy consultants and structural engineers for them to complete their analysis and their portion of the design. After a number of months the drawings and calculations from all these parties were completed and the drawings were submitted to the Madera County building department.
The Madera county building department uses a third party company to do the review. This company is certainly thorough and have requested numerous updates to the drawings for the project. This was completed and submitted for a second review. Once again, changes were required and these are now being worked on by the engineers and building designer. When these are completed, the plans will be submitted for third, and hopefully final review. Once the county approves these master plan designs, it will be very straightforward to acquire the building permits for the units.
After the building plans were finalized, we went through a thorough budgeting process at the end of last year and the beginning of this year. While it was not a complete surprise, the new estimates the construction cost of the infrastructure and the residences was substantially higher than previous ballpark estimates.
Below is a graphical representation of the current timeline that shows completion of the infrastructure work by the end of the year, the start of the construction of the homes in the Spring of 2023 and the completion of the homes in the Spring of 2024.
The housing units will be built in phases, with a goal of building at least 8 units in the first phase. Thus far we have reservations for six of these units with a few more interested parties considering participating in the first phase. We are still looking for more households to meet or exceed the goal of 8 units. If you are interested in being part of the first phase or subsequent phases, please contact us using the link below. And please spread the word to any of your old-student friends that might be interested.