8/20/2006 Building Updates

Progress continues to happen but not as fast as hoped. The electrician delayed the project for a week by not being able to get in and get the Electric done. We finally have it done and the Inspector just approved it. So tomorrow the rest of the floor will get poured and then the walls will go up.

On another not, the city is completely redoing the road outside out building and tearing up all of the sidewalk right next to all our new windows and walls. It's nerve racking seeing a giant cat 2 feet from the brand new windows. But all is going well so far and this road improvement will really help the area around the building look nice and new.

That's it for now, this is a short post but not much happened this week since the electrician was holding up the project. More to come soon.

8/13/2006 New Windows Installed

Finally, the floor and windows went in last week. Everything went pretty smotth with the remodel. The guys busted out the existing concrete on Monday and poured the floor on tuesday. The new window frams went in on Wednesday and the new windows went in on Thursday and Friday. Now we are making progress. I had the electrician run the wire for the building under the concrete before they poured, this will save time pulling wires later and will allow for him to get the job done quicker.

We are moving forward. This week a seperator door and wall between the body shop tenant and the retail store will go in. We also decided to redo the bathroom, which wasn't originally planned. However, I decided it really needed it and it will be started this week as well. Hopefully, it won't add to much to the budget.

The windows look great and the outside is being redone next week. Now, we still have to sheetrock the inside, buildout the rooms and paint as well as run electrical.

I did find out that the epoxy we were going to use on the concrete floor can't be used until the floor is 30 days old. So that will delay some of this.

Most of my time has been spent keeping contractors going with the project and my time has been pulled away from other Real Estate projects. I haven't heard back from my Duluth agent for weeks. I need to work on contacting them this week to get some of that moving forward.

I have also had my time being tied up working with my right hand man to hire some new help at our design business. We are looking to hire a new designer and a new account executive. We have had a lot of reponse but haven't found waht we are looking for yet. So we are spending this week spending some more time on the lookout for new help. I was amazed about the response we had from posting the job listings on http://www.craigslist.com. We litterally had dozens of applications in overnight after posting to the site.

I'll get some pictures up of the building before and after online soon so you can see the progress.

Have a great week.

8/01/2006 Project Updates and New Biz

Well, the floor guy decided to delay the project a few days. He decided to go to a music festival. What the heck? What happened to businesses telling you a deadline and sticking to it. I would find someone else, but we are so close, I just want to get this wrapped up. He was supposed to show on July 31st to start tearout and pour the new floor. He is not coming until Thursday now. This will delay the windows as well. The windows were supposed to be installed on the 7th and the 8th, but the floor won't be poured until Monday the 7th. This means the windows are going to be delayed a few more days as well.

I met with the electrician today and he is coming in over the weekend to run the new wires. Everything will be on a seperate service, so electric can be billed out to the tenant.

Through all this, we've begun designing remodeling our next storefront, which is located next door to this storefront. That project should begin in September.

We've launched Real Estate Create, the new web design company I mentioned last week. It's been a huge success so far. We are scrambling to find new designers and sales people to continue the rapid growth we are experiencing. I tried posting job requests on craigslist.com and it's worked out pretty good so far. We've had a lot of responses to the job offers. They are also located on voltz.net, which is Real Estate Create's parent company.

There's a ton more going on, but I gotta get working on it, so I'll write more later. Have a great week and email me any thoughts or comments about the blog.