Building crew prepare block for take off.

JULY, 2012


A few weeks ago we finally had the bank and the builder working in harmony and we were told they would start on site ASAP.  BUT.....the pegs were missing from the block!!  After two weeks with the surveyor (and a massive dip into our savings), we had new pegs....

Boundary pegs

Cost about as much as our car. 

25 JULY 2012

HOUSTON, WE HAVE LIFT OFF!

A year and a day since we found our little patch of dirt, we have progress with our site scrape and cut.  It's about bloody time!

Front of block, Elevation A - they even cut the driveway for us!

Very large pile of dirt at the rear of the property

The competition...not much there of.

When we first found "the world's greatest broker", he had another couple building the same house as ours, just in the next estate over about 1km away.  They went through the same bank, with the same builder, but the difference was they had little modifications to their design (ours is fully customised), and they were lucky (very, very lucky) with the valuer they were assigned.  They began their build process at the same time as us.  So, our house plan went one way and their's another:

David and AM's house, June 2012

"Their" house, June 2012

As you can see folks, our house is still just a little patch of dirt, whilst "their's" is completed, with landscaping (albeit average) complete.  They clearly have this one in the bag.

Final valuation of plans approved!

Green light!  GO GO GO!!! 


After changing the timber doors to aluminium to try and reduce the price to suit the valuation, then deciding that was a poor decision and swapping them back, then removing the render for the same reason, and the spa, then making a deal with the builder so we pay cash for the spa, we have our final approval from the bank!  So whats changed? What took six months of stuffing around and going back and forth?The house won't be rendered until after handover.  And we lost the battle over having the timber window in the dining room a door.  But you can't win them all and a house full of windows and no doors would still be better than a rental with all doors and no windows!

We found our little patch of dirt on 24th July 2011.  11 months in and we are nearly ready to turn some ground.  Bring on round two!

Long time, no blog

Lets start by saying we have had an issue or two.  We had 'the best broker in the world' who couldn't convince the bank to value our house and land (some other stuff happened here also) and so the bank refused to allow construction based on a previous valuation of the property which was very short of where we needed it to be.  Long story short, we have been back and forth with the broker and the bank, and the bank and the broker, until one day I went to the bank myself and suddenly our problem was solved...we have the green light!


So six months later we have a new valuation of our house and our land and we are in the process of ironing out issues with fittings and we will soon start to build....hopefully :/


Stay tuned folks!!!

Stockland APPROVED!

DEVELOPER APPROVAL IS THROUGH!

Monday December 12, 2011

After Stockland came back to us a week ago asking that we move our house back 600mm to accommodate a car length in front of the garage, we were hopeful they may have approval back to us before Christmas, and here it is!

Now for submission to council........

Turn me on!

Friday 10 December 2011

Today we had our electrical appointment with YHC - Your Home Consulting.  We had the choice between driving down to Springwood (again) or going north to Moffat Beach, and while we were thrilled by the thought of getting stuck in traffic around the city on a Friday arvo, we decided to take the scenic route to the coast. 

 We should say that we were emailed our 'home work' a week in advance and in typical AM and Dave style we got to it at 10pm the night before.  Plantation had given us copies of our basic electrical plan which shows all our standard inclusions (SI).  SI includes ONE cheap as chips batten fitting to each room, a power point or two in each room, and one two way switch for the stairs.  They do not include anything practical like outdoor lights, power for our AC unit, co-axial for t.v, phone points, fans etc.  After all it's only Queensland, who needs AC and fans anyway?  We had managed to scribble a few extra lights and fans and switches on the plan which helped, as, in typical Plantation style our 'Consultant' does very little consulting.

For those who haven't built before (clever, clever people!) you have your contract signed and sealed, and then you upgrade your electrics thereby spending more money which you are responsible for, your financier won't pay.  Early in the process we had no idea how much upgrades would cost but figured we wouldn't have the cash to splash and so we included an allowance in our contract (in our case 10K) and the bank would then pay for the entire house and we would only have to pay if we went above our allowance.  

Our contract presenter claimed most people spend about 2K so she was pretty sure we would come in under budget.  DRUM ROLL PLEASE........our electrical upgrades came to $8,968!  

And here is the new plan (blue is what is standard/included in price, red is upgrades.  No downlight is standard though it just replaces a light point)

Contracts and colours!

Tuesday 29 November 2011

The day has finally come!  What an exciting and terrifying experience, spending 8 hours with Plantation, arguing over, locking in colours with the person whom you will blame for the next twenty years if it's all just not perfect your wonderful spouse, and rushing through signing your life away because you have to rush to daycare to pick up a child after careful consideration signing your contract for your new source of aggravation for 12 months new home.

We met with our 'Interior Consultant' at 9am to discuss colours.  Um, er, well, tell her what you have chosen and she scribbles short hand on some plans with minimal discussion.  Deep breaths and fingers crossed it's going to look brilliant, because they won't be offering many suggestions.  Maybe this is because we have such wonderful tastes in colours and we have been able to match three sets of tiles, hardwood flooring, four paint colours, a stone bench top, timber stain, carpet, colourbond, cabinetry, handles, taps, sinks, toilets and accessories perfectly?! Right??

Anyway, by 1030 we're done with Cosham and we get a free lunch voucher.  Your Dad was right, there is never such a thing as a free lunch, we've paid 3k to get to this point and have had a couple of hours of some 'Consultants' time to show for it.  However, it may have been the best 'free' lunch we've ever had.

So other blogs have lots of wonderful photos to show you of their colour selections so you can ohh and ahh over their fantastic taste in hard furnishings.  Sorry folks, I have one for you, our stone bench colour.  BYO Moet.

Avalanche Quartz

Other selections include:

Exterior Paint : Whisper White, Dulux

Roof, gutter, fascia, garage door (slimline), water tank: Surfmist, Colourbond

Front door, other garage door: Limed white (full), Dulux

Timber stacking and sliding doors, timber capping on stair rail: Cedar, Rich chocolate, Stegbar

Interior Paint: Scallywag, Dulux

Skirts, internal doors: Whisper White, Dulux

Floors Main: (Not readable in English, however some kind of distressed oak, light brown) Carpet Court

Floors theatre and study, stairs, upstairs all but wet areas: (Carpet, off white,) Carpet Court

Kitchen benches : Avalanche, stone bench

Kitchen, bathroom, ensuite cabinets: Parchment, silk effects finish high gloss, Laminex Australia

Ensuite

Tiles floor 400x400 Drift Sand, Beaumont

Tiles walls 300x600 Drift Sand, Beaumont

Feature tile strip in shower Toffee blend, mosaics, Beaumont

No glass on shower, 1400x800 walk in

Spa Kado Lure, Reece

All other wet areas: Bathroom, laundry, powder room, toilet

Tiles Mondo Sand, Beaumont.

I must say how sad I was that my timber folding doors had to get the axe, due to them not being protected enough from rain and both Stegbar and Plantation recommending we go back to a timber window in the dining room.  So we made the window bigger and we kept the other two timber doors in the lounge and other end of dining room.  I'm sure the house will look great and it's going to be new and a project that we undertook together.  I'll work on uploading plans of our mini mansion asap.

Next step plans off to developer and council :)  Fingers crossed x