Tuesday, January 26, 2016

Dealing with the Building Department, Round 6.5

I actually don't know what round this is. Really, I don't think there are rounds. It's more like a continuous melee.

But whatever.

Yesterday I got a letter from the Building Department telling me my building permit expired. Well, duh. The next step is masonry. I can't exactly do masonry in below freezing weather, now can I? So, why would I renew the permit until I can actually work?

They also said my temporary residence permit expired. What? I was under the impression that it didn't expire.

So I go down there.

Getting the building permit renewed: $125. I knew that. No paper work involved, so there's a bonus.

The residence permit didn't expire. She said my surety bond expired.

Oh, boy.

When we first got started on this project, I read about the surety bonds. These bonds are a guarantee that once building was complete we would remove the temporary residence from the site. Some of the county's sources said we would have to pay a bond for the travel trailer, others said we didn't. So I asked John, the first inspector I worked with. He said we didn't have to pay it. There was no reason to pay it because a travel trailer doesn't have to be removed; we just stop living in it.

But, nooooooooo. Now it's a different story. Now they want a bond. A $5000 bond.

They have to have this bond. How else will can they be sure that after we build our house we won't live in a trailer next to it?

Who does this?

No one. No. One.

No one builds a house so they can live in a trailer in the back yard.

It's already against zoning regulations to do so. We could be fined for doing so. But it is such a threat that they have to have a bond to make sure that they can fine us and get paid.

Really?

Really.

Yeah, really.

So, I'm getting bond quotes now. Later I will eat country ribs and beans. And whiskey.

UPDATE: One of the bond underwriter people persons called us back. He can't give as a quote because he can't write a bond to guarantee something like this. So, there this saying about asses and holes in the ground...

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