Thanks to all of you who share all of your great ideas - we can do some fun things with this house and save money, too. Kirk in Kallispell, MT

Rick's Forum Posts: 1
Journal Entries: 2
Average Forum Rating: 3.00



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Land... ugh

Posted to Team-Rosa by Rick in Springfield, VA on 3/19/2007

Land: there is only so much of it, and what I looked at on Sunday well, stunk; nothing that fit our needs but I got to practice looking at the topography and drainage issues with pieces and looking at nearby homes to get an idea. So the search goes on.

Plans: we continued looking on-line and clipping stuff we liked today, but still at a bit of a rut with it. We will keep looking and planning

100 hours: looked at some of Mark's video with my wife and read over some material on ICF and SIPs that I had ordered. Read some more books.

Tip:

I wanted to clarify my last post about the Google docs.

1. You need a Gmail email account that you can create just for the project and invite the other subs, or people involved on your o-b project to get an email with Gmail. Then they have several features that are great.

2. Calender is free and you can share all or parts of a schedule with people involved and they can see were you are on the project and what is going to be done on that day. Now they can see all or part. For instance your subs may only see the building schedule but maybe your wife or husband can see your entire schedule for the day this may help you to cover each other with kids, office, doctor appointment in case you forget to tell your spouse. (I always forget ). Now everyone can be on that schedule that you set and access it you can even add details to it.

3. "Documents" is also free and you can make create and store all sorts of stuff. Once again, you invite specific people to see and edit each document or maybe you only want them to see it, like a sub, then only give them that access. I plan on putting the room-by-room info for each sub on there so they can access it if they lose the copy and they can always be pulled up for me on site with my wireless Treo phone or laptop to show them or maybe send an email the night before - you get the idea.

4. Spreadsheet: they also a free spreadsheet program that you can use and again give people varied access.

Don't take this tip and toss it out the door.

I manage many people using this system, and the best part is it's free. I would also get a Gmail account. It is much better, and you can keep email records forever with subs, etc. and organize it nicely.

google.com/accounts

Posted by Cara in Orlando, FL on 3/21/2007 Cara's Forum Posts: 38 Journal Entries: 136 Interview Answers: 59 Average Forum Rating: 4.04 My Construction Website Image from Cara's blog 3/21/2007

I have to second the Google calendar and docs... I use the spreadsheet for my budget primarily because I can access it remotely, as you said. It's a bit clunkier than Excel, but I can deal. And Calendar.... Oh, where do I begin??? Put it this way, if their system ever crashes I am up the creek without a paddle :)

Ready Set Go!!!!!!!!

Posted to Team-Rosa by Rick in Springfield, VA on 3/18/2007

OK, I have just begun the process of learning to be an O-B. For me I have to read as many books as I can........must be from all the years in school. I started with The O-B Book and then bought his package deal with like 13 book plus some DVDs. I am also getting ideas from this site and getting info on ICF, SIPs and anything else I can find.

I am looking for land in Fairfax County, namely Fairfax Station, Clifton area and trying to get info from anyone that may be doing the same thing. I will post any good ideas I get in this Blog.

First bit of Info:

1. Use google's new service to post Excel-like spreadsheets and Word docs on a secure site that you can then access from any computer. In additon, you can invite others to work on the same doc and spreadsheets.

So here we go!