9/28/2023 0 Comments Mark demeo![]() ![]() Just the other day, I saw three foxes rolling around out there.” A large woodpecker regularly visits and other birds find their meals in the creek on the property. “There are all kinds of animals,” Stacy said. The DeMeos and their two daughters, 7-year-old Victoria and 4-year-old Cristina, are entertained by the wildlife just outside their windows. The property abuts the 220 acres of Pitney’s corn fields. The 3,600- square-foot, brick, two-story house sits at the end of a dead-end street in Saratoga Springs. They moved into their dream house in March 2005. The DeMeos spent much of that construction year searching clearance sales at area home stores in search of molding and columns, comparing prices, shopping around. Needless to say, we didn’t go with them.” ![]() ![]() They said for $35,000 they’d ship the staircase to us but we would need to get someone to install it. “I remember one bid from a company in the Midwest. Re-drawings and reconfigurations ensued before stairway construction could begin.īefore Mark settled on a stair subcontractor, he solicited bids from a few companies. The stair situation was complicated by the fact that from the time the engineer drew the plans to the time the permit was applied for, New York state changed the tread regulations for circular stairs. “It was so refreshing to have a subcontractor stand by his word.” An open circular stairway dominates the foyer and draws the eye toward the second floor landing. “But our stair guy was wonderful,” he said. So we made on-site changes and I ended up personally building the windows in the middle there.” “He just couldn’t draw it the way we wanted it. “He tried three different times,” Mark said. The architect just couldn’t get the wall of windows drawn the way the DeMeos imagined it. Another estimated a time frame in which he could get a particular job done without taking into account the possibility of a rainy day. One guy took his check and never returned, Mark said. “Dealing with subcontractors,” he added, “is an art in itself.” Throughout the yearlong building phase, DeMeo hired a dozen subcontractors “and had three nervous breakdowns!” he said. Mark, a contractor himself, intended to serve as the general contractor on the project. Finally, the legal T’s were crossed, the I’s dotted, the necessary permits were awarded, plans were drawn, fees were paid (all told another $2,000) and now, in 2004, it was time to hire the subcontractors. ![]()
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