New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:

The Resale Theater

post #1 of 55
6/8/11 at 10:20pm
Thread Starter 
The Resale Theater

We are having a home built in a north San Antonio subdivision with the understanding that we will be moving in 4-6 years. (USAF) Almost all decisions made on this house from which lot to flooring and finishing are made with one question in mind. will this help with resale? I freely admit that some decisions were made with our preference or convenience as the priority. Exhibit A- the dedicated Theater. This is something we cant wait to have and is probably one of the reasons we chose this floor plan. I realize that not all buyers want this so we are planning to take plenty of before pictures to display for buyers when the day comes that Uncle Sam decides I have to move on to a new location. In my mind I may have to return the room to the original state or be prepared to negotiate the room contents with the sale of the home. That day is years away though so on with the build!

The lot- the back of the lot is on a hill crest so the view will be over roof tops to the hill side beyond. Hopefully that helps with the closed in feel a subdivision can have.




The front elevation- rock and stucco




First floor- covered patio and second sink for Master bath are include in our plan.




Second floor- I love the game room off of the theater. My AV equipment will be housed in the cabinets in the game room. I have had the media room wall moved 2.5 feet to get over 16 ft of length (it was 13'10x 13'8) if I encroached on the game room anymore it would have killed its usable space. Interduct cable run , door swing, projector outlet, cellulose insulation in interior walls, 5/8 inch drywall have all been included in the build to make my life a little easier.








Equipment
AVR-----------------------------Denon 1910
L,C,R front speakers--------- Behring TRUTH 2030P
L, R rear speakers-----------WHARFEDALE WH-2 dipole
Subwoofer ?
Projector- 8350 or HC4000
Cables to go IR repeater
Jamestown 100 or 120 screen

Inputs
Direct tv
HTPC with Blu-ray
WII

Seating-
Open for debate but leaning toward two rows of 4 IOIOOIOI

Color scheme- open for debate but I love this room of similar dimensions http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=897055


Goal - build a theater we can enjoy movies, sports, tv and MOVIES in that will have an instant theater feel when you walk into it for wide spread appeal.
Reply
Reply

AVS Top Picks

post #2 of 55
6/11/11 at 6:45pm
resale is what i have been over and over.. i know one day i will leave so i cant come to a good idea on seating etc. I want a over all accepted dedicated room if that can been achieved.
Reply
Reply
post #3 of 55
6/11/11 at 6:56pm
I honestly hear mixed opinions. It's often hit or miss based on the buyer. As my theater nears completion, I've been told by some local realtors that I may bring in a bit more as the room, though classified as a bedroom, had no closet, a cheesy overhead fan, and was kind of tough to purpose. Now that it has a clean installation and it's been specifically purposed, I can probably get back what I put into it, which even with electronics, isn't much.

That aside, I also rolled the dice when buying my home (I could even have to move after 11 months due to work!) Even then, I don't regret the theater build for one minute. However, I did somehow manage to build it so that the entire screen wall can come down with 4 drywall screws, and the windows can be uncovered. I could literally undo the theater aspect and turn it back into a bedroom in under an hour.

Anyways, good luck with your build!
Reply
Reply
post #4 of 55
6/11/11 at 9:30pm
Thread Starter 
The builder in this subdivision has 4 of 8 plans that all have a dedicated media room so hopefully this is a sign of demand by the public.

Either way its what I want in the house for the next 4-6 years so its going to happen. We have been doing the "propped up projector with a sheet for a screen" for the last 2 weeks and the WAF is high for a theater now. I cant wait for this house to be built!
Reply
Reply
post #5 of 55
6/12/11 at 2:34am
13'x15' master bedroom?, thats real tight, about the size I have with a queen sized sleigh bed there's not much room to open dressers and walk around.
Please dont tell me it's well under 200k to build a new house, I live in the semi overpriced northeast!
Reply
Reply
post #6 of 55
6/12/11 at 8:05am
Quote:
Originally Posted by alittletank View Post

The Resale Theater

We are having a home built in a north San Antonio subdivision with the understanding that we will be moving in 4-6 years. (USAF) Almost all decisions made on this house from which lot to flooring and finishing are made with one question in mind. will this help with resale?

Congrats on your soon-to-be new home! It looks very nice!

A friendly word of warning though: with such an emphasis on resale, watch out about letting the tail wag the dog. For starters, your resale will be much more strongly influenced by the local market, and - especially with a new subdivision - the supply/demand of new construction within your subdivision. If they are still building a lot of new houses there when you look to sell, you can expect more new buyers will prefer to buy new and choose their floorplan vs. buying a 4 - 6 year old house. Whether you have a HT or not won't matter nearly as much as you might think.

In any event, if you're not careful you can waste years of use now worrying about what may, or may not, be attractive to some buyer down the road. I'm not saying ignore resale concerns, but after owning several houses over the past few decades, my main regrets inevitably involve things I did NOT do to our houses: why do so many of us wait until we are about to try to sell our houses before we decide we "have to" do certain improvements, like re-painting or redoing the kitchen, etc? All too often we seem to spend the money for other people to enjoy the benefits. Why?

That's one regret I have avoided in our current home, where we decided what it needed when we bought it and made the improvements, including our modest HT in the basement. We use it as a family a lot, so it will have been a great investment even if costs us something in resale - which I don't think it will. It only takes one buyer.

End of Old Fart rant. Thanks for your service to our country, and enjoy your new home: emphasis on your new home!
Reply
Reply
post #7 of 55
6/13/11 at 6:09am
may i suggest an add-on annex for the ht gear..

probably better than modding a room to suit what you want..
Reply
Reply
post #8 of 55
6/13/11 at 7:04pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by mystic_sniper28 View Post

may i suggest an add-on annex for the ht gear..

probably better than modding a room to suit what you want..

I'm not sure what you mean by this. A seperate building for the theater?

By all means you can suggest it... it wont happen with this house though. I'm puzzled why you would suggest it though. This house has a media room as per the plan and I intend to use it as such. The room is smaller than I ideally would want and I really wish basements were possible in San Antonio TX but I dont think that means we cant be happy with it as a theater on the second floor. Perfect? no. Happy? yes.

Then again I am completely new to HT and dont know what I dont know at this point.
Reply
Reply
post #9 of 55
6/13/11 at 10:50pm
i came up with dedicated room for the ht room because it can be a pain in de arse to modify an existing room and turn into something passable as a ht room...

given that you haven't broke ground yet, it might give you an option add on to the existing floor plan not a separate building as such more of a add-on...

hey do what you like, my opinion is this current floor plan doesn't look suitable for any type of ht...
Reply
Reply
post #10 of 55
6/14/11 at 7:23pm
Thread Starter 
This is the room I am working with so I would like to focus on planning for this room at this point.



I am looking at this room and starting to think about speaker placement and acoustical treatments. Because space is at a premium here I was thinking of mounting the center channel above the screen. There will be a 1' tall soffit circling the room 7-8'. The left and right will be in columns in the corners to either side of the screen. Similar to what the ARTHOUSE theater has here- http://i214.photobucket.com/albums/c...DSC01648-1.jpg

rear surrounds will be mounted on the rear walls about 3'
sub in the front left column.


I have absolutely no idea how to treat this room however after doing some reading on the forums I have gathered that I need to do the following.



1) 24" diagonal bass traps for 3 corners of room- Owens Corning Fiberglas 703 3 of the 4 corners will be easy to put bass traps into however the corner door is going to present a challenge.
2) window plugs with Owens Corning Fiberglas 703
3) 1" Insul-Shield- for entire screen wall
4) 1" Insul-Shield 42 inches high on side and rear walls.
5) leave the front of the riser unsheathed for an additional bass trap.
6) cover the side and bottoms of the soffit with AT material and fill them with fiberglass for additional bass traps

Am I on the right track? Any recommendations on speaker placement or how to best treat this room would be awesome.


Thanks
Allen
Reply
Reply
post #11 of 55
6/15/11 at 5:42am
Have you thought about in-wall LCR's and an acoustically transparent screen? The floor plan shows the windows right next to each other but the rendering has a couple of feet of wall between them. Can you fit a center speaker between?
Reply
Reply
post #12 of 55
7/20/11 at 1:00am
Thread Starter 
Petew i worry about cutting into the drywall for sound transfer so I am shying away from inwalls.
Reply
Reply
post #13 of 55
7/20/11 at 1:02am
Thread Starter 
progress! 1st floor framing is underway.

Reply
Reply
post #14 of 55
7/21/11 at 11:48pm
Thread Starter 
crap. I should re size that picture, talk about annoying.- done, thats better!
Reply
Reply
post #15 of 55
7/21/11 at 11:52pm
Thread Starter 
I think My wife is on to my evil plan of expanding the HT budget.

She just asked me to make A LIST OF EVERYTHING!




This is probably a good idea because I had been doing the "want that" method. I want that, therefore its in the budget!
Reply
Reply
post #16 of 55
7/22/11 at 10:51am
Looks good. I'm building an addition on my house (all work by myself, though) and the construction pictures are fun to see. I must say though, that is one hell of a slab for a house. Is that normal in Texas?
Reply
Reply
post #17 of 55
7/22/11 at 11:41am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by SilentJ20 View Post

Looks good. I'm building an addition on my house (all work by myself, though) and the construction pictures are fun to see. I must say though, that is one hell of a slab for a house. Is that normal in Texas?

It's normal for the San Antonio area. :-( I grew up in the midwest and would love to have a basement however the limestone in the SA area prohibits it. When I received orders for there I did a search on realtor.com and got zero results for homes with basements.
Reply
Reply
post #18 of 55
9/4/11 at 1:44am
Thread Starter 
Time for an update, I am in Texas now...

This has been a horrible experience. Evidently I had unrealistic expectations. I thought that when you signed paperwork that showed your house would have certain features ... well I thought the house would have those features. Not the case here.

1) second floor vaulted ceilings (dotted lines on the plan)-- NOPE! 8ft flat ceilings
2)prewired for 5.1 in media room at specified locations on the walls-- NOPE all prewired in the ceiling
3) we choose elevation A- NOPE they built B (windows, stone and stucco )
4)one of the two Covered porch supports is hanging off the cement 1.5" .


There are more but you get the idea. I am so mad right now that I don't even want the house even if they did correct all the issues.
what else was just haphazardly done that I cant see?


We are waiting to see if they can fix the ceilings on the second floor now. Once we get that info then we will decide if we are going to demand our earnest money back or continue with the build.
Reply
Reply
post #19 of 55
9/4/11 at 4:57am
You're not the first to do something like that. I did something similar, and I talked to some lawyers and they said there is no 3 day right of recission on new home builds.

But, your situation is slightly different...your price should definitely be different if you were making some of those decisions (vaulted vs. bonus room, etc).
Reply
Reply
post #20 of 55
9/4/11 at 5:16am
DAmn, that sucks.

Sorry to hear of your troubles.

Hopefully, now that you are on the ground, you'll be able to get things resolved and prevent any future issues.
Reply
Reply
post #21 of 55
9/4/11 at 5:42am
Get ready to demand your money back. If the house is framed and rocked, they aren't changing that ceiling.

I suspect they will offer you some discount but it is up to if you think it is enough for shattered dreams.

Didn't this builder offer a pre close-in walk though inspection? Mine did.
Reply
Reply
post #22 of 55
9/4/11 at 5:53am
For a 5 year theater, I wouldn't go full tilt like many of the rooms you see here. Particularly with a home in this price range. You'd be lucky to sell for a few thousand higher than your neighbor. It's what the comps are selling for that sets your price....not your theater.

That being said, I'd skip any sound isolation work. I'd spend only a few hundred on room treatments, and I'd make everything in the room easily reversable. A technique I've seen used often is to do light framework in the room for hanging drapery on the walls. Looks great, easy to pull out.

I also wouldn't put alot into electronics. They will stay with the room if your room is, in fact, a selling point. I had a 2k system for our "5 year house" and it was thoroughly enjoyable.

Another suggestion: I think a dedicated room is only attractive to us "purist". A multi purpose setup would probably raise more eyebrows of potential buyers. You may have an opportunity with the rear wall of the theater to open it up to the gameroom with a halfwall, bar. It could offer a third row for the theater and a good way for folks playing pool to keep an eye on the game.

Best of luck on your build!
Reply
Reply
post #23 of 55
9/4/11 at 6:59am
Bummer that they have not met expectations. How did the document that you're getting a vaulted ceiling? The dotted lines on the floor plan you posted earlier indicate the roof ridge and valley lines. Did you see a model home with vaulted?

I agree with Tony. Keep it simple and inexpensive.

Sorry to here of your troubles. Building a home can be a PITA.
Reply
Reply
post #24 of 55
9/9/11 at 9:22pm
Thread Starter 
Thanks everyone for the support. There are worse things than living in two hotel rooms but it sure does get expensive fast and eating out is getting old.


Home update- the builder has agreed to rip out the ceilings and an engineer has been called in to redesign the trusses. We will have the vaulted ceilings as per the original plan. This actually saved the deal on this house because we had written up an offer on a different house and were waiting to submit it. From this point forward if at any time the builder balks at giving us the house we have signed for I will kill the deal and submit our offer on the other house though.

They expect us to close the second week of October because of all the work to be done now. hotel till then

Just to keep this post legal and HT focused... Projectors I am considering for my room with a 110" jamestown screen and a 14-15 feet throw.
Mits HC 4000
Optoma hd33
Any thoughts? I have plenty of time to decide! :lol:
Reply
Reply
post #25 of 55
9/9/11 at 9:46pm
Glad the builder is motivated. During the boom you would have been given a take it or leave it response. I'm sure you already know this but don't close until the work is done, done. Not nearly done, Not "just need to finish a few things after you get in" done.
Reply
Reply
post #26 of 55
10/19/11 at 5:33am
Thread Starter 
Update to the update ... The ceiling remained at 8 ft and were walking away from the deal when the division president of Meritage Homes to got involved and we delt with him directly. Compensations were made in a few different forms.... He made us an offer we couldn't (or would have been stupid) to refuse.

We have been in the house and out of the hotel for about two weeks now

I have wrapped up the first wave of the honey-do list and finally moved on to the theater project.


In addition to the first post equipment list I have ordered the following
Mitsubishi hc4000. http://74.52.31.162/~theproje/index....hk=1&Itemid=93
Jamestown 110" white screen 16:9 http://www.jamestownhometheaterscree...nDiagonal.html
Low profile projector mount 2.5" http://www.mountdirect.com/ProductDe...roductCode=LFM
4 of Romans new line of theater seats IOIOOIOI http://www.rtheaters.com/FusionColle...goon-1011.html


One challenge is that the screen height is going to be lower than I had originally wanted. If I find that I can't live with it then I will exchange the projector for the Epson.


So now I paint and build the soffit while waiting for everything to arrive.
Reply
Reply
post #27 of 55
10/19/11 at 5:43am
Thread Starter 
Oh yeah and I built my sub ...


The F-20 designed by Lilmike. It's probably too much for the room and it has changed the layout due to its size ... But it is so worth it haha. This thing rocks!
Reply
Reply
post #28 of 55
10/28/11 at 4:15pm
Thread Starter 
Today was an eye opener regarding soundproofing the theater. I hooked up a cheap stereo to test out the 5.1 prewire done by the builder. Good news - the wiring is all good. Bad news- the sound transmits out of that empty room clear as a bell to the rest of the house.

My wife is on board to fix this problem so now I will just need to wait until Ted gets to work on Monday to develop a soundproofing plan. I imagine the following will be needed:

1). Blow in insulation into the floor joists and ceiling joists
2) rubber mat to decouple the floor
3). Layer of OSB over the rubber mat

4) green glue & drywall walls & ceiling

5 ) replace door with solid core door

6) dead vents for in and return


I'll wait to see what Ted thinks ...
Reply
Reply
post #29 of 55
10/28/11 at 4:48pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by alittletank View Post

Oh yeah and I built my sub ...

I almost didn't notice there was a sub in that photo.
Reply
Reply
post #30 of 55
10/30/11 at 12:43am
Thread Starter 
We watched a movie tonight to test out the Mits HC4000 and to play with the F-20 in its new habitat.... I really like this sub!

I have zero confidence that any sound proofing measures on our second floor theater will contain this beast 100%. hopefully we can bring it down to respectable levels though.


We sat in beach chairs with speakers on the floor and the projector sitting on a board shooting onto a beige wall. We still had a great time watching X Men First Class!

Tomorrow I hope to hang a solid core door, clear the room and remove the carpet.
Reply
Reply
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:
  Return Home

AVS Top Picks