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Our driveway is old and in desperate need of replacement. It’s cracked, rutted and basically caving in on itself. This isn’t uncommon in the great state of Maine, land of frost heaves and pot holes that can swallow a car in one easy gulp, but sooner or later everything has to be fixed.

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We’ve been putting off the inevitable because I knew the cost of contracting a new one was going to make me scream. But fate intervened when our neighbor told us they were redoing theirs and the paving company said we could both get a discount if we did them at the same time. Never wanting to miss a sale… we sucked it up and took the plunge.

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Mind you, our driveway isn’t huge. 92 feet long, narrow at the road end and widening by the garage with a parking bump out on the left.

Not knowing a damn thing about the process of ripping up the old and installing new, I naively guessed the cost would be eight to ten thousand dollars.

I was wrong.

By half.

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Hence the title of my blog.

Over $20,000…. and yes, I did scream. For mercy but there’s none coming.

We had a few other estimates that were similar but none of those companies could get to us until late next year, they were booked that far out. The only reason we’ll be redone next week is because our neighbor was already on the list.

Oh, the discount?

$576. A weirdly random number and not nearly enough… but it’s something.

Now if you’ll excuse me I need to go have another scream at the thought of writing an almost $21,000 check for something I’m just going to drive on.

😩

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