Shower Sadness

There has been some confusion and concern over the shower in the master bedroom for the past few weeks.

Namely, it's tiny.

When we were choosing a floorplan, we walked through every model home that Estridge has in the area, including some that weren't actually models, but someone's home. There were parts of many of them that we loved, but none of them were exactly what we wanted. We met with Mr. Estridge himself one afternoon and discussed what we had in mind. A few days later, his architects had completely redesigned the plan, especially on the second floor. This included a complete overhaul of the master bathroom to include the extended tub that we wanted, an enlarged closet, and less unfinished storage space. We loved it. It was exactly what we'd been picturing, and included a window seat and multiple showerheads. I was sold.

What we failed to notice, however, was that the bathroom resdesign meant a much smaller shower stall. It makes sense. We probably lost 18 inches by upgrading the tub, and those inches have to come from somewhere (the tub was on the opposite wall, under the window, in the original design). To compound our ignorance, our purchase agreement that lists all of our finishes - everything from carpet selections to what faucets we chose - lists a shower base measuring 34" by 48". Plenty big, and similar to what is in Don's house now.

As we watched the framing happen, we did question whether or not that area was big enough for that size pan. We were gently reminded that "everything looks smaller during the framing process." We accepted that and let it go. After all, our purchase agreement clearly showed the dimensions.

Fast forward to a few days ago. Through a series of emails, it was determined that our signed purchase agreement was wrong. That shower base would not possibly fit in the space. We considered not using a fiberglass base at all, and tiling the entire thing so we could extend it out further into the room. We learned that would add more than $3300 to the cost of the home. We passed (though we may do that on our own sometime later).

We're disappointed that our upgraded master bath won't be what we'd envisioned. We're disappointed that we didn't realize earlier that our signed purchase agreement was incorrect. And we're disappointed that no one at Estridge noticed the error sooner, or alerted us to it once they discovered it. It took us digging and pushing the issue, only to learn that we really had no reasonable options at this point.

So, this will be our shower.

It's itty-bitty, but at least we'll have a bench!