2015 | Charleston Homes | New Construction Education

Do New Lending Regulations Impact Omaha?

We’re here with Eric Almquist from First National Bank to discuss the new lending requirements. How have these new guidelines affected loans after October 1st?

The new regulations were supposed to be enacted in August, but got delayed until October. These regulations intend to make it easier to understand and more accurate to the disclosure process for customers. It holds lenders accountable to accurately quote fees and costs. It ultimately helps the consumer.

We’re still in the trial stage. We’re still figuring it out. Six months down the line, you’re going to see lenders have things in order. It will benefit consumers eventually. There are delays and frustrations now because these changes were recent.

Although this hasn’t directly impacted Omaha lenders severely, we now maintain better conversations. We’re building awareness and educating our clients through transactions, such as identifying new paperwork. We have a long time period to adapt with, so it’s a gradual process we can work with.

If you have any questions about the new regulations or more, give us a call or email. Thanks for tuning in.

The Advantage of the Charleston Homes Warranty Program

Today, we’ll go over our warranty program and how it compares to our competitors or other home builders. At Charleston Homes, we schedule a warranty walkthrough at the sixty-day mark and the eleven-month mark. This allows people to live in their homes and try it out. People have the opportunity to feel it out before making an adjustments or repairs as required.

The homeowners go through the building process, close on their home, get their keys, and move in. For some builders, that’s the end of their involvement. That’s not the case for us. We like to wait sixty days to conduct an initial walkthrough. We contact the new homeowners and go over any questions or concerns they may have. Minor adjustments might happen at this time. Typically, homeowners create lists of concerns to go over with us during these meetings.

We like to follow up and make sure everything runs smoothly even eleven months after the purchase! That’s why we do walkthroughs a second time around.

If you have any questions, check out our website. Thank you!

Is Your Sprinkler System Prepared for the Winter?

With fall weather approaching I thought it'd be a good time to talk about draining your sprinkler system. When the weather gets cold, the ground gets even colder, and the water left in your sprinkler system has a chance to freeze, which could ruin your sprinkler system.

Any time that the temperature gets below freezing you're going to need to drain the system until it's been fully winterized. To drain the sprinkler, simply locate the shutoff valve next to your sprinkler meter. On both sides of the meter, there will be shutoff valves that control the water to the home, which you'll need to shut off.

Then you will have to find the sprinkler valve. To shut it off, turn it vertically to prevent all water to the sprinkler system. A very important step in this process is to clear the water from the drain. You can do this by opening the drain valve next to the sprinkler shutoff valve. The drain valve will allow any excess water to escape and drip out. Be sure to place a bucket underneath the valve to capture any excess water.

You're going to have to step outside to drain another valve on the outside. All you have to do is open it up and release any excess water that has formed. Most homes also have ports on the outside drainage valve, and you'll need a flathead screwdriver to rotate the system to 90 degrees. You'll need to do this with every port that you have on your home, and some can have up to four or five.

For a quick recap of this process:

1. Shut off the water to the sprinkler system.

2. Open the drain to release trapped water.

3. Open the drain for the system outside.

4. Adjust the ports of the 'open' position.

5. Have the system professionally winterized by late October / early November.

That's a very abbreviated list above, so be sure to contact me if you have any questions. I can recommend you to someone who can come in and completely winterize your system once it's become too cold to use it anymore.

As always, please don't hesitate to visit our model homes in Gretna and Elkhorn.

Lawn Care Tips for New Construction Owners

Today we're joined by Jordan Kroeger from Logan Valley Sod. This company is responsible for all of the sod for our new construction homes, and we'll discuss how to take care of your brand new lawn.

The first two weeks are the most critical for watering. Be very generous with water in those first couple weeks; water three times a day for twenty minutes in each zone, depending on the weather. That's the key to a lush lawn.

In the summer, you may have to water more due to the hot weather. If the yard shows signs of stress, you need to water it more often.

September is a good time to overseed or repair lawn damage. Jordan also recommends aerating the yard in the fall. If you have bare spots, put down either Bluegrass or Fescue, depending on what your yard is. Fescue has a wider blade, so it's good for overseeding.

After the first two months, put down a starter fertilizer. After that, get your lawn on a regular fertilizer regimen. You can do this yourself, or have a lawn care service take care of fertilizing.

If you have any other questions about your lawn, go to LoganValleySod.net, or call (402) 306-7099. If you have any other real estate questions, give us a call or send us an email. We look forward to hearing from you!

What Are You Responsible for as a Homeowner?

Today, I want to briefly cover the differences between homeowner warranty and homeowner maintenance. From time to time, we get some questionable calls from homeowners, so we thought we would explain this topic in some detail today.

Let's start off in the kitchen. The area where the counter meets the back-splash is a grout caulking. If any of the grout chips out, it is covered under warranty. However, if the grout caulking starts to wear, all you have to do is caulk it using a caulking gun, which is relatively inexpensive and easy to do yourself.

Another maintenance item you should keep an eye on and maintain is where the under mount sink meets with the counter-top. About once a year you'll want to make sure it's neatly caulked. Additionally, transitions from the window frame to the actual window also need to be caulked with acrylic caulking.

Moving to the front entryway of the house, you'll want to check your closure on your storm doors. Periodically you may need to push the adjustment screw in or out to adjust how fast or slow the door closes. The further in the screw is, the slower the door closes, the further out the screw is, the faster the door will move. You also want to check your front door entryway thresholds. Make sure the door isn't rubbing in order to keep from tearing the weather-stripping.

As a homeowner, you are responsible for maintaining your own yard. This includes regular fertilization, watering, and mowing. As long as you don't change or alter anything, warranties cover just about all electrical. As a homeowner, you're responsible for replacing light-bulbs, even if they're very high up.

At the new home orientation, your builder will walk you through the home, room by room, and go over not only the ins and outs of the house, but also all imperfections that might exist. All imperfections will be addressed by your builder before close. After closing, if you happen to scuff up a wall or two while moving in, you can find the flat paint downstairs so that you can touch it up after closing.

In the bathrooms, you want to make sure the inside corners of your tiled shower stay caulked, as well as your tub if it has tiled area around it. Any wet areas should be checked routinely to ensure no separation has occurred.

Next, make sure you change out the 9V battery in your smoke detectors. Although the fire alarms are hardwired together, the battery serves as a backup; if a wire is severed, all fire alarms will still send an audible signal in the event of a fire. Once you've replaced the battery, press and hold the reset button to reset all of smoke detectors. This will let out an audible alarm as a test throughout the house, and should be done once a year.

I haven't covered all the differences between maintenance and warranty items, but this is a very good start. If you have any questions about new home construction, or if you would like our assistance, don't hesitate to call us or visit our models.

How to Maintain Your Tiled Shower

Today we're going to be giving you some tips on how to maintain the tile in your shower. Most of our homes have tiled showers, and after a few years you're going to have to do some maintenance on them.

Tiled showers are caulked with Tec Brand Grout Caulking, and this is used where the floor meets the wall or on any of the corners in the shower. You'll want to ensure that there is no cracking in the grout joints, and if there is, you can simply apply more grout with a grout sponge.

When you repair the grout caulking, make sure you have a matching color. If the original caulking is too cracked, you can scrape it out with a putty knife, or you can simply apply new caulking right on top of the old stuff if it's not too damaged. After applying the new grout caulking, you need to run a grout sponge over it and smooth it out.

We recommend sealing the grout annually because most grout sealers only work for about a year. There are other grouts that last for 4-5 years, but an annual check up is still necessary.

If you see any mold or mildew building up in the corners, applying bleach to a stiff bristled brush should remove the mold. If you have a buildup of mold in the corners of the shower you can apply bleach to a paper towel and squeeze it into the corner. Letting it sit overnight and removing it in the morning usually solves issues with mold building up in the corners of your shower.

Hopefully this has been helpful for you. Check back often for more helpful homeowner tips!

What We Do to Help Prevent Settling

Sinking can happen after fresh sod has been put down. We water soak and compact the soil with a tamper to prevent this, but sometimes the ground will still settle.

Today, we're at one of our beautiful homes that's under construction to talk about how the ground around your foundation could sink or settle.

But first here's how we start with excavating the basement. The CAT operator, after going through all of his calculations and carefully measuring the lots, will scoop by scoop remove dirt to complete the over-excavated basement. This means your basement will be 2-3 feet shorter than the hole itself; the extra space is used for water proofing and draining in order to prevent too much sinking. Later, that space is filled with loose dirt that is never quite as packed as the original dirt. Because of this, rain and snow melt can cause the sod or dirt above ground to sag or sink.

To prevent these common problems, Charleston Homes does things a bit differently. We water soak the area to compress the ground; we manually probe the ground around the foundation with water to help the dirt settle. Another thing we're doing is back-filling and then packing the dirt down to make the loose dirt more compact.

If you have any questions about settling foundations, or if you need real estate assistance of any kind, give us call or shoot us a quick email. We would love to hear from you!

What Should Be on Your Spring Checklist?

Today we wanted to take a moment to discuss our spring home exterior checklist. People are always excited to do spring cleaning indoors, but often neglect the outside of their home in the process. A lot of damage can happen to your property over the long winter, so let's run through a checklist to make sure your home is prepared for the summer.

Check the caulking and sealing on the cracks in your driveway and see what effects the winter months have had on your concrete.
If you have stone or mortar walls on the outside of your home, check for cracks. Also, check the seals on your windows for any possible leaks.
Double check your downspout extensions. Winter weather and high winds can often cause these to become separated. Reconnect them if you need to.
You definitely want to check the sealing on both your air conditioning and your fresh air exhaust and intake. If they have separated, reseal them with putty.
Sump pipes can be disconnected. If yours came undone during the winter, you want to get that water away from your foundation.
If you have areas of sod that need some sprucing, overseed with a bluegrass/fescue mix and those areas will come back over time.

Over the winter, a lot of things can happen to the outside of your home. Hopefully, this list will help you have less worry when it comes to getting your home ready this spring. If you have any questions, we are just a phone call or email away!

What Are Buyers Asking About?

Today we are happy to be joined by Eric Almquist, of First National Bank. Eric is our primary lender, and he's here today to talk about the market and what he sees going on in the mortgage world.

The most common question Eric is getting right now is about where he sees rates going. As of right now, they are in a really good spot and have come down even more in the last few months. This has buyers wanting to lock in rates now, which is a good idea. Rates have been pretty steady as of late, but there is no promise of that in the future. The Federal Reserve has discussed raising rates for a while now. Although they haven't pulled the trigger yet, it may happen soon.

The benefits of getting a mortgage through First National Bank with Eric are numerous. First off, you get a $1500 credit from us, on top of a $500 credit from Eric himself. This is a free $2,000 towards the purchase of your home. This could cover all your closing costs if you want it to.

It's a great time to buy and, if you have an existing home, it's an even better time to sell. If you have any questions for us, feel free to give us a call or send us an email. Talk to you soon!

How to Treat Your Sod

Welcome back, everyone. Today we are going to talk about how to treat your recently installed sod. If you are living in a new home or a home with new sod, you probably got it put in last fall or winter. With the weather getting better and the ground unfrozen, people are going to start watering their yards.

While the grass has some roots, it probably hasn't fully taken hold yet and the roots aren't fully into the ground. To do this, you'll need to do some watering. But be careful that you don't leave your sprinkler on when the temperature dips below freezing.

One more thing you can do with your new sod is apply a light layer of starter fertilizer to get the grass going.

One thing you definitely don't want to do is put any kind of weed killer on your sod if it's not rooted yet, because that can hamper its growth.

If you have any questions about protecting your sod, or anything else real estate related, give us a call or send us an email. We would be happy to help out.

How You Can Combat Frost Heave with Your Exterior Concrete

Know anyone who's interested in building a home? If you have any friends, family, or co-workers who are looking to own their first or second home - would you forward this message to them? We'll be happy to show them our 6 new construction home plans along with the benefits of owning a Charleston Home so they can make a decision that's right for them.
We've had a pretty cold winter, with a lot of temperature swings and moisture changes. This has caused many of our streets, sidewalks, and driveways to fall victim to what is known as "frost heave." This is when extreme cold temperatures and moisture get into the small cracks in the cement and cause the cement to rise. This happens every year, but this year in particular has caused a lot of extra frost heave.

Since temperatures have risen here in the last few weeks, the cement has returned to its original position, but it has left behind some imperfections that you'll need to shore up. After frost heave happens, you tend to see a lot of little hairline cracks that will start to form in the cement - seal those up once temperatures get above 50 degrees.

Your home may have this problem as well. On many driveways, between the driveway and the garage, there is an expansion joint. The joint is meant to be there so the driveway can't be pushed into the house. When frost heave occurs, it will be pushed up. You can't really push it back down, so the best thing to do in this situation is to try to cut off the excess expansion joint safely with a knife. Then, get some polyurethane sealant and apply it to the crack. Doing this sooner than later will help prevent against frost heave next winter.

If you have any questions, you can always give us a call or send us an email. We look forward to hearing from you!

Don't Let Frost Heave Ruin Your Pavement

It's been a cold winter here in Nebraska, and along with the cold and snow come some unique problems for homeowners. One such problem is frost heave, which occurs when moisture collects underneath concrete, freezes and expands. The result is that it lifts the concrete and damages your driveway and garage.

Causes of frost heave:

While frost heave can be very typical with the Nebraska winters, there are a few steps you can take to help prevent it.

Do not wash the garage out in colder months
Make sure downspout extenders are secured properly and diverting water away from concrete
Clear snow right away
Make sure gutters are free of debris and working properly
MOST IMPORTANT- Caulking and sealing of the driveway prior to winter to help prevent water from going into gaps or voids (Typically when we receive calls that a driveway has frost heave, the driveway has not been caulked or sealed)

One way to prevent frost heave in the winter is by caulking your control joints early on in the spring or summer. This will help prevent excess moisture from getting inside the concrete slabs and freezing. Concrete is naturally porous, so it will absorb a certain amount of moisture, but caulking will help prevent quite a bit of movement.

What to expect with frost heave:

Typically when a concrete slab heaves due to frost it is not that anything was done incorrectly but
rather moisture made it's way into the ground causing the ground to freeze. Frost heave is more of a weather-related problem and cannot always be 100% prevented despite any measures taken ahead of time.

Most heaves occur between the garage and the driveway
Homes facing North and East are more susceptible to this due to a lack of sunlight and colder temperatures
Slabs can move anywhere from 1/4" to 4" in rare occasions (typically 1/2" to 1")
When weather warms, frost will come out of the ground and slabs typically return to their original placement
On occasion, slabs can be held up by stone and concrete, not allowing sections of the slab to move, which causes cracks in the concrete panels
Cracks less than 1/4" can be caulked using Vulkem concrete caulk

Be careful to inspect your concrete before and after winter to make sure that you've taken the necessary steps to protect your driveway and other paved areas.

If you have any questions about this or if you would like to contact us in regards to a property in Omaha, please feel free to do so via phone or email. We can always arrange a time to meet with you.

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Our Team

Marc Stodola - President/Owner

Mike Freestone - Vice President/CFO

Justyn Kearney - Director of Operations

Heidi Stodola - Marketing Manager

Dave Freel - Contracts Manager

Dan Kruntorad - Contracts Manager

Jeff Krobot - Production Director

Shaun Sterba - Warranty Manager

Brian Hansen - Assistant Warranty Manager

Todd Hansen - Assistant Warranty Manager

Kurt Hansen - Builder

Lucas Simonsen - Builder

Cody Peterson - Builder

Adam Heuerman - Builder

Courtney Stodola - Assistant Builder

Chad Sandell - Assistant Builder

Luke Ediger - Designated Broker & Director of Sales

Dan Graves - Associate Broker & Sales Associate

Mari Lepert - Sales Associate

Kim Fosdick - Sales Associate

Shanon Bohnenkamp - Sales Associate

Nicole Baumert - Sales Associate

Anna Lemieux - Sales Associate

Ryan Finken - Software Architect

Adam Foral - Land Maintenance Coordinator

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