Tile Selection

April 30, 2007 - Today we went to the National Tiles Builder Selection Centre in Port Melbourne to select all of the tiles for our new home.

Overall impressions of the selection process were very positive. The consultant was excellent, being patient and knowledgeable. The range of tiles we could choose from was a surprise!

We went in armed with our Laminex samples for each of the wet areas, and our paint colour. The great news is that one whole wall of tiles at the display centre forms the standard range - which means that most people should be able to find something they like without needing to upgrade.

We had about 10 minutes to browse on our own, and we chose a few things we liked. The consultant is happy to provide advice on the colours which look good together, and as you select tiles they are placed on a large bench so you can see them properly - all next to each other.

In the end we selected different floor tiles for the ensuite, bathroom and laundry (mainly because we have different laminates in each of those rooms). After selecting floor tiles, you select wall tiles, grout and edging. It took us about an hour to choose all of these things - then we went and had a coffee while the quote and diagrams are prepapred.

After the selection process we walked out with all the details in our hot little hands, as well as a pack with all of our colour choices! Very impressive! The whole thing was actually very enjoyable.

Did you notice the pebbles on the top of the pack? These actually come as a strip, and we are using them as a vertical feature in the shower. At some point I'll open the pack and take some pictures of the tiles with their matching laminates. I know you don't care - but this isn't about you... is it? :-)

The first two pages of our tiling plan have been included below:

Email Notifications

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Your email address won't be used for spam. Promise!

A big day today!

April 24, 2007 - Well, today was a big day for us. We went to Hopetoun Interiors in Deer Park for our Electrical Consultation, and our Colour Consultation. Arrived at about 9:00am, left at around 2:30pm. A big day!

Well done to our consultants (Adam, Robyn and Shelley). Very professional, patient and knowledgeable. Even though the process was long one, it was actually very enjoyable seeing things come together.


Electricals: We went in pretty well prepared for the electrical appointment. We
had already sat down and worked out where we wanted all of our lights and power points, as well as other small electrical items.

We are pleased we did - it made life much easier for us today!

When we started, we noticed that our house plan was already loaded into the computer, complete with all the alterations we made at the Tender Appointment stage.

The consultant moved through house, room by room, and entered lights, power points, TV points and other items straight onto the plan. As the lights were put in, we were asked to consider whether we needed any two-way switches and so on.

The end result was that we could walk away with an electrical diagram of our house, in colour! We came in just under our electrical allowance of $5000. For once, something was within range of the budget....

Our finished electrical plan can be seen in more detail by clicking on the image above.


Colour Selection: Again, we were reasonably well prepared for colours. What we were not prepared for is that just about anything we like is an upgrade (meaning - it costs more!).

We started with the bricks, mortar, fascias and gutters, downpipes, window frames and so on. When you think about it, there are a lot of different bits to consider.

As you would have seen from a previous post, the colours we chose for the outside were already decided - so we thought. Then came the question: What colour do you want the render to be on the facade? Would you like one colour or two? Lol! So many things to consider.....

After a very lengthy process, we had everything decided (too many things to go into detail here), and feel as though our new home will be very nice indeed!

Costs for individual upgrade items were provided as we went (for example upgraded taps etc). Some costs (such as cream mortar instead of standard Grey colour) will be provided at Contract time, as a calculation needs to be done to work out the exact cost.

The image at left (click on it for a larger view) shows the second page of the colour selection document after we had finished. It gives you an idea of how detailed everything is.

Words of advice for anyone about to head into their own appointments: Plan as much as you can before you walk in. Look at loads of display homes, check out the lighting in the display homes, and work out extacly what you need. Ask lots of questions (including here, if we can help!). Check out the Homeone forum (see the link at the right of this screen) for more information.

Land Update

April 23, 2007 - Those of you who have been following this humble blog for a while would remember that we are waiting on some land to be subdivided.

Ours is Lot 1. Lot 2 is for sale.

The land is at the back of an existing house, and the owners are subdividing.

Subdividing includes puting in a road, power, water, sewer and so on. We have not seen any activity on the land, and would have expected something by now as we signed the contract for the block back in January.

I dropped in on the owners, and the news is good. All permits have been granted. Tenders for the earthworks closed last week, and Powercor is coming in to put in the new power pit in the next week or so. Earthworks are expected to start in a couple of weeks (assuming the sucessful Tenderer can commence) and earthworks and construction should be completed a couple of weeks after that.

All in all, we could have the title released to us in a couple of months. Start date for the house is set for July, so the timing (hopefully) will work it out!

Facade

April 17, 2007 - Haven't posted anything for a few days, so I thought I'd put up a picture of the facade we have chosen for our home. The dictionary definition for "facade" is "the front of a building, esp. an imposing or decorative one.".

Porter Davis offer a number of different facades for their homes, and a few of them are interchangable between home designs. For example, the "Bridgeport 35" shares a number of facades with the "Hamilton 34".

We've chosen the "Urban Metro" facade, with a small change. For some reason the Urban Metro on the Bridgeport has horizontal master bedroom windows (i.e. running left to right), and the Urban Metro on the Hamilton has vertical master bedroom windows. We visited a Bridgeport with the horizontal windows, and have asked for the Urban Metro on our home to have same windows.



The pictures shown here are actually Bridgeport Display home.

House Colours

April 6, 2007 - One of the next items for us to do is to select the colours of our new home. We've been keeping an eye on the houses being built not far from us, and found a combination of colours we like.



We are able to choose from a variety of Austral Bricks, and I could see from the used pallets that this house was built with Austral. An email to their customer service centre with the address resulting in a very fast reply indicating that these are "La Trobe". Combined with the dark roof, and colourbond colours on gutters, we think it will suit our new home.

Hot Water

April 4, 2007 - One of the items we discussed at the Tender Appointment was the option to use a different hot water service.

The standard HWS used by Porter Davis is a 135 litre gas storage tank system. There is an upgrade available to the Rinnai Infinity 26 with two temperature controllers - an extra $1600 (approx).

Rinnai Infinty 26 with two temperature controllers: http://www.rinnai.com.au/hotwater/home/default.asp?whs=home&pg=0

The gas boosted solar system is also available, for the bargain price of approx $4,000. Ouch! One of the other options available is to delete the 2100 litre water tank (which is standard) and used for flushing dunnies, and install the solar gas boosted HWS.

The upgrade price is then about $1600. This is option is available because both the tank and solar HWS satisfy the 5 star energy rating requirements.



Boosted solar system: http://www.rinnai.com.au/solar/typesystems.asp?whs=home&pg=0

We decided that the water tank is a "must have", and could not spring the extra $4k for the solar system, so we ended up going for the Infinity system.

One thing I forgot to ask - there's a pre-heat option which saves load of water! D'oh! Must ask....

Tender appointment

April 4, 2007 - We had our Porter Davis Tender Appointment last Monday, and I've have to say that overall there was good, and there was bad!

The Tender Appointment is where you sit down with a consultant and go through every item, so that you know exactly how much the house will cost you to build. In normal cirumstances, the Tender Appointment occurs after the selection appointments - the selections you make could change the price of the house.

In our case, we happen to be making selection appointments after the Tender Appointment, so an extras will be added in at contract time. The biggest unknown is the site costs - that is, how much it will cost to get the site prepared, and the necessary slab put down. A bit more on our site costs later....

We were at the Porter Davis Office in Keilor Park for about 3 hours. Yep - it takes time to do this properly. I have to say that the process is professional and thorough.

The process starts with us being given a plan of our block of land with our house positioned on it. I could see that there is some cut and fill (I knew that, as there is about 1 metre of fall over the area of the house). The other thing I could see straight away was that there is a looooong retaining wall between the house and the existing garage. If you take a look at some older entries, you will see a picture of our block with the large garage.

I knew this was going to get expensive. We had allowed $15,000 for site costs, however the actuals came in at just over $24,000.

A nasty surprise, but at least we now know how much it it. The consultant was very professional, and explained to us all the work required on the site, and where the money will go. The soil report was explained, as was the basic engineering required for the site. The retaining wall alone (plus drainage, silt pits etc) costs around $8k. Given that the retaining wall is over 20 metres long and 1 metre high, that's around $400 per metre. That's what is costs - and there's no provision to allow you to construct your own retaining wall.

The costs will depend on the soil type, and the fall of the land. The soil type affects the slab which needs to be put down - poor soil could mean a different class (thicker) slab, or even peir, or screw piles.

There's also a plan of the house presented, which has been customised to include all the additional items requested at quote time.

The Tender costs are based on the decisions you make with the Sales Consultant in the display home, at quote time. Since then, we had thought of a few other things we would like changed - no problem! We decided that we would like an extra metre of width inthe garage. Cost: About $2500. Our consultant made the change and produced new documents - including the drawings of the house and site before we left.

The consultant went through every line item of the document, and we changed a few things along the way (as everyone does), and added some other items. Items we added (apart from the garage width) included a tap in the pantry where the fridge will be ($128) and a capped gas point outside the house where the BBQ will be ($60).

One nice thing I appreciated was that the consultant had added a phone cable and conduit (in a trench) up to 20 metres long for connection of the telephone - which saves us having to orgainse it later on.

All in all, the experience was detailed and thorough. Nothing was too much trouble, and almost any change can be accomodated.

One thing to remember - at Tender Appointment time the structure of the hous eis set. Walls, layout, etc. are fixed. No changes afterwards. Internal fittings, colours, tile selections, brick colour, electrical items, etc can still be changed between the tender appointment and final contract signing. In our case, these all have the be decided between now and the contract signing.

Now we face one more problem - it's up to us to remove the trees from the block! Another expense...