So my wife and I bought a house late last year on the lower north shore, in Sydney.
Problem is, the house itself is an absolute disaster: built in the 1940's, with work last done on the house in the 1940's.
So, before I hit the renovation side of things, an idea of the house.

Typical red brick house:
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Living room (and this is as good as it gets):
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Moving on...to a 1940's kitchen, complete with an "Early Kooka" cooktop:
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But...we're so lucky that we have TWO 1940's kitchens:
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Our grand staircase:
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And our massive outdoor entertaining area:
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Main bathroom:
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And our lovely downstairs shower room...which is just too gross to use:
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Door from a bedroom into the garage...isn't it normal to have it a metre off the ground?
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Our backyard...what we call the jungle (but one of the reasons we bought the house: 1200 sqm of land):
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So, needless to say, we're undertaking a massive renovation. A lot of the internal house will be gutted. Rendering. New roof, etc.

We're doing this in two steps: first is the house and (new) carport, second is the back garden (with entertaining area, pool, retaining walls, etc).
Our budget for the house renovation is 350k.

So we've hired an architect, who has been working on the plans over the past couple of months. We are supposed to get them through this weekend. I'll post them here when they are done, would appreciate others thoughts on them.

Wow. Big slope on that block. So common for that part of sydney. You're up for one massive reno job. Have you thought of doing knock down & rebuild instead? Staircase looks quite narrow.

Did consider before we bought it whether it just needs to be knocked down. But we were assured by the architect and a structural engineer that it actually is a solidly built home, with plenty of potential.

As for the staircase, yes, it is narrow, but it is going. Replaced by a new, modern, open plan one 900mm wide in a totally different area of the house.

Plans are here. The rooms aren't labeled, but it's pretty obvious what they are.

Upper level:
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And lower level:
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The architect has tried to keep the existing internal walls as much as possible (they are brick), so are shown in black. While there are a few minor changes we want, in general are very happy with the design.

Is your main bedroom on the upper level? The bedroom you have there ae you going to use it as a bedroom or an office? IF you use it as an office you might want to reconfigure your ensuite bathroom to have a bigger bathroom for the main and just a toilet with wall hung basin for guests. The extra room in the ensuite makes for a more luxurious look

Ohhh, renovators delight there!!

So much to do, good luck with your reno.

yuk, yuk & yuk - lived in similar circumstances years ago before our reno

but oh what an adventure it was and you will have also!

Make sure you upload lots & lots of piccies, roba. This is going to be one hell of a project and it's going to be an exciting ride - for us H1ers too

Looking forward to your start!

This was something we did consider.

The upstairs bedroom just on the left will be a proper bedroom (though will be a guest room). Initially, it was to be the study, but we moved that downstairs (top right of plan), as that room was too small to be a proper bedroom.
Since we have a proper bedroom upstairs (as well as the main BR), we decided we needed a full bathroom in addition to the ensuite. The architect has drawn a bath in there, but we don't want that: just a shower.
The ensuite bathroom fits into the space that is currently the main bathroom, so it should be big enough (plus making it bigger would require knocking down an existing brick wall).

Rob

Looking at the external walls,it looks as though you are doing with in the existing footprint - is that right?

We are also doing a reno in same area (depending how you define LNS!!) so will watch with interest

Yes, the footprint of the house isn't changing. From an external perspective, we are filling in the existing balcony (it becomes part of the lounge room) and building a new one. There is also a new carport. But that's about it.


Good luck...hope to see it here!

Our Architect Saga

I thought I'd share our little saga finding an architect.

Back in January, after we moved in, we phoned up two architects to see about renovating the place. Both dropped past, but for various reasons, neither was suitable.
We then phoned up two more. The first came past on the Wednesday, and was fantastic: spent about 90 minutes here, discussing options, then sketched the place. Said he'd come back to us with some ideas in about a week.
The last architect dropped past on the Saturday, and we were similarly happy: he took some photos and a copy of the floor plan, and said he'd be in contact. Just before he left, we asked if he'd send through his proposal, which he assured us he would.

At this stage, we would have been happy with either the third or fourth architect, however we were leaning towards #3.

The following Tuesday, architect #4 called. Told me he had entered all the dimensions into his computer and come up with a design, and wanted to send it through. At this stage I was a bit concerned: it seemed like he was doing too much when we hadn't given him the go ahead. So I called him back, and shared my concerns with him.
He became a bit aggressive: told me he thought we had given him the go ahead on the weekend and had done $1000 worth of work on our house already. If we didn't want to go ahead with him, then we could pay him and go our separate ways.
I was caught off-guard: this wasn't what I was expecting!

Just an aside here: architects cost well over $20,000 for this project. To suggest that my wife and I would go ahead on the spot for such a large decision without even privately discussing it, and not seeing a proposal with costs was ridiculous. We were adamant that we never gave a definite "Yes" to him.

Architect #4 sent through the plan later that afternoon, with his costs. He specifically stated in the email that he had done $1000 worth of work already.
The plan was terrible. This was in part because he never asked us what we wanted. But he gave us a three bedroom house (we want 4), and a tiny bathroom without any bath (we have young kids). There were other problems, but you get the idea.

Architect #3 dropped past a couple of nights later, with three very rough hand drawn sketches showing totally different layouts. He also had printed out a proposal. He left us with it all, with no expectations.

At this stage our architect choice was obvious: #3. We gave him the go-ahead.

I then emailed architects #1, #2 and #4 thanking them for their time. #1 and #2 replied, wishing us the best (which I thought was pretty nice).

#4 emailed us back about a week later, saying he was disappointed. He also said he had put in $1320 worth of work (what happened to $1000?). Since it was a misunderstanding, he was reducing the bill by 50%. So he issued us a tax invoice for $660.

I was ** off. I called up fair trading, who wouldn't say much until they saw an official complaint, but pretty much gave me the impression he couldn't do that. I also looked up the code of professional conduct for architects in NSW. He had broken the code as well. I talked to them (it's a government body), and they told me I was welcome to put in a complaint against him.

I emailed architect #4 back a few days later, telling him that he had broken the code of conduct, and asked him to reconsider his bill (it was a nice email). He never replied.

So I left it at that. If he had insisted I paid, I would have taken it further. But in the end we just wanted to get on with our renovation.

WOW I can't believe he did that!?!? I totally love the way you went about it all, shows him he can't just do whatever the heck he wants and then charge people whatever he reckons! Goodness me I can't believe someone would do that. (Well I can but you know what I mean).

All the best for your reno and hopefully you never hear from him again and that he dosnt do that to someone else.

wow, looks like a massive renno. Should be fun and hard work.

We're doing a renno on a 1950s house but it seems to be on a smaller scale. Still a huge effort for us as owner builders. And ... so slow. I want to move in now ... but there isn't a roof or windows!

Lovely house; looking forward to seeing progress reports

Your architect #4 sounds very good and professional. Wish he brings a happy journey to your renovation.

The #3 is just too short sighted! He not only lost one job, but many referrals later.

You're so smart to know your rights and get prepared to fight back!

Should have got a draftie instead.

$20,000 for this project....Where did you get that kind of figure from?......those are crazy fees.
Its a simple reno job, Mate, I would have clocked it at about $3000 for a draftie and maybe $7000 to $10000 for an architect..maximum.

Pat.

Thanks for all the comments. We're meeting the architect this weekend to keep the ball rolling, but it's going to be a long process!



lol. Architect fees are normally 10-15% of the building cost (I'm not making this up, for example it's stated here: http://news.domain.com.au/domain/renova ... 19icw.html).

So for our project our budget is $350,000. 10% is $35,000. So $20,000 is grossly underestimating.

I'm factoring in everything: design, drawing it up, DA approval, tendering, monitoring the build, etc.

While some quotes were under $20,000, that was for only partial service. For example, one quote was for $18,000, and that was only to get it to the stage of being approved by council! In the quote, this was for stages 1 to 3. There were still stages 4-6 which the architect said it wasn't possible to estimate at this stage. However I'd suggest this architect would have come in around $40k (and cost was why we didn't go with him).

WOW - this one will be fun to watch. The house is almost stuck in time isn't it? Love the red plastic handles in the kitchen!! Glad you are up to scratch with your rights and not letting anyone take you for a fool - that's a good start. Wish you well on your journey and hope there's not too much stress involved. Keep the pics coming we love em!

So six months has passed...and in that time our design has been finalised, approved, and building work started two weeks ago.

A lot of the demolition has been completed, and some new stud walls have gone in upstairs:

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Old lounge room, becoming the kitchen:

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Downstairs, where the stairs used to be, soon to be a bathroom:

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Where the old door half way up the wall was. Currently goes into the garage. Garage becomes another bedroom, brought down to the same level. On the left, where the wall is knocked out, goes the new staircase with glass balustrade to let light in downstairs.

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Back of house. Still ugly as ever:

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We are happy with the progress. The builders are working 6 day weeks. Due to be completed next April.

Looks great! Always good to start seeing progress after soo much planning.

Wow looks amazing and what changes you've made already ... can't wait to see more!