How often do you visit your site?

nina marie · Nov 03, 2010 2:16 pm

Hi there,

We are getting closer to our housebuild commencing (fingers crossed as always of course) and I wondered what the general consensus is for visiting the site to check on progress etc? How often do you visit your sites? And do you turn up after the builders have clocked off or whilst they are there (do they get annoyed?!)?

Unfortunately we don't live within walking distance of the site, and I am about to have a baby and have no car as hubbie uses it for work - so if I want to visit I will need to get a couple of buses. Hubbie can pop in on the way to or from work, but probably not every day and possibly not always at times the builders are there.

Grateful for your insights!

Many thanks,

Nina

Izzehz · Nov 03, 2010 2:25 pm

We would visit after work, only once saw a tradie on site, and that was on a public holiday (Australia Day!) Sometimes we visited daily, other times it was left often, but at least once a week. I loved seeing the change between each visit - and hated seeing no change if we hadn't visited for a few days!

nina marie · Nov 03, 2010 2:31 pm

Thanks Izzehz! I suspect we will be similar - sometimes often, sometimes sporadic. I wish I could go every day though....

sleven · Nov 03, 2010 3:13 pm

Ummm - daily - sometimes twice daily :oops:

but we do live 48 houses away from our build - so it's part of our route when we walk the dog of an evening

micks_k · Nov 03, 2010 3:46 pm

We used to snoop around the block once or twice a week until we got a letter from the builder stating they had been informed we had been on site without supervision. The letter pointed out the clause in the contract referring to this and mentioned OH&S reasons. Bummer.

Machiars · Nov 03, 2010 3:52 pm

We are/were a minimum of once per week.
But when they were doing bricks etc we were there pretty much every night.
We have only caught tradies there twice after hours. Our plasterers were doing everything in 1 day (nearly) and they had 6 guys working past 6:30pm.
The other time our painter was having a smoke outside when we rocked up.

We've been locked out for a few weeks now, so when we go out, we tend to look at our neighbours place more than ours.
(And complain how much rubbish they're leaving on our site ::angry::

)

Our builder said they didn't mind if we were there, just don't harrass any of the tradies.

Hope your build goes smoothly ::smile::

~Nic~ · Nov 03, 2010 4:18 pm

We got lucky with our builder - they gave us a site key so we could go and look at the house whenever we wanted... they asked us not to go too often during work hours as it may be disruptive to the tradies, but aside from that, we pretty much had access whenever we wanted it. We normally went up late in the afternoon - at least twice through the week (sometimes more, depending on what was going on at the time) and at least once on the weekend. We only lived around 5 minutes away though so it was easy to get here whenever we wanted!

nina marie · Nov 03, 2010 4:25 pm

Thank you all - great to hear that if we don;t make it daily it's not too much of a drama. Phew! (And we'll be careful about annoying the tradies and being on site without supervision!! :wink:

)

andynmel · Nov 03, 2010 9:19 pm

Hey Nina, you can do a search as there is a whole thread on this very topic with quite a few replies.

stamford sw vic · Nov 04, 2010 7:18 am

we go on every night,,but ours needs to be locked up by us as Our possesions are in the shed from before the fire and we alos have a generator worth some money in there so we go in every night to check the gate is locked,,most nights hubby goes in and walks around the site, if we do not have the kids I do to,,, but we are very wary of it as there are rules to say you cannot go in( not truly enforcable if you have good reason to be on site) and it is more about respect and being careful..I would hate to go on site and something happen,,or if someone saw us on site and thought they could go on and then damage was done..so we avoid it where we can but go in as needed!

higherdestiny · Nov 04, 2010 8:48 am

My site hasn't even begun (it's just a blank block of land), but I think I visit it twice a week or more! haha

When construction starts, I think I'll just pitch a tent next door and live there!

buildingwest · Nov 04, 2010 11:17 am

Hi,

On my last build I visited weekly initially (as I lived about 50 minutes away from the build) as things move so quickly in the first few months of the build.

When things slowed down at the fitting stage etc I would visit every 1 - 2 weeks.

With my next build I will be visiting weekly initially and then probably weekly-fortnightly (as once again I am living 50 minutes from the build).

I mainly visit at a weekend when it is easier to get there and there is less likely to be tradies so you can get a good look around.

Michelle

Bagheera · Nov 04, 2010 11:57 am

every day - we moved in a rental just 5 minute walk from the site ::wink::

I might skip a day in the weekend when nothing is happening but still drive buy for a "colourbond moment" :lol:

Echo · Nov 04, 2010 12:56 pm

Walked there every day , and drove past , but was in the same suburb. We split the block in two and now we have moved into the rear we begin the front build next week so will visit every morning as I go out the driveway and/or return from work , or even just collecting the mail. ::lol::

No one has ever said this on this forum , but tradies working on weekends and public holidays will be a PITA as I wont be able to sleep in. ::lol::

btherl · Nov 04, 2010 1:00 pm

We visit twice a week. We live about 7 minutes drive away, but our kids keep us busy. Our site supervisor told us we aren't allowed to go on because of OH&S, but as far as I'm concerned I will stop going on site when he stops making mistakes with our house! I was also able to save them quite a bit of money by pointing out some mistakes before they had even made them, meaning they were able to fix them earlier, so they should be grateful.

Machiars · Nov 04, 2010 1:30 pm

More of a curiousity as our SM doesn't mind us going onsite.
But I have all of the required cards allowing me to work on construction sites due to work and people wanting everything installed at the same time. (I work in the IT Industry)
I wonder if I could have argued the case as I'm covered for OH&S.

bicko123 · Nov 04, 2010 1:37 pm

Machiars

More of a curiousity as our SM doesn't mind us going onsite.
But I have all of the required cards allowing me to work on construction sites due to work and people wanting everything installed at the same time. (I work in the IT Industry)
I wonder if I could have argued the case as I'm covered for OH&S.

The problem is you are not an employee of your building company (any subbie of a builder is technically an employee of the builder regardless is they have their own business). as you are not an employee you are not covered by their insurance if something happens. so saying you have the cards means nothing to them.

jimnsal · Nov 04, 2010 2:52 pm

We visit at least 3 times a week at the earlier stage and nowadays daily.
We even visited every 2nd day when there was nothing but a builder's sign on the vacant land hoping for a miracle :lol:

We got the site key so could walk in freely, however since lockup, we've been able to find an unlocked window or door to sneak into :sh:

We also got a letter from the builder pointing out the clause in the contract about OH&S, but that did not stop us

Pugs · Nov 04, 2010 3:14 pm

bicko123

Machiars

More of a curiousity as our SM doesn't mind us going onsite.
But I have all of the required cards allowing me to work on construction sites due to work and people wanting everything installed at the same time. (I work in the IT Industry)
I wonder if I could have argued the case as I'm covered for OH&S.

The problem is you are not an employee of your building company (any subbie of a builder is technically an employee of the builder regardless is they have their own business). as you are not an employee you are not covered by their insurance if something happens. so saying you have the cards means nothing to them.

only time you would be able to get onto Your Houses Buiulding site without PLI is during arranged Meetings with your Site supervisor.

when i build I plan on doing the more Owner builder route due to knowing more then 80% of the trades as mates so yeah... just need find a brickie, concreter, Chippies. Plumber and a roofer.

Machiars · Nov 04, 2010 6:11 pm

Figured it may have been something like that.
We're very close to getting hand over, so won't be an issue either way.