Masterton Homes - The next thread 4.0

Hi Marina
Thanks for the info.

How long ago did you use them. Do this demo guys know M's requirement for site handover. Just wanted to know from you if you used them to demolish for M to build.
I hear people say that if demo is not done properly and site not done properly, M will charge to undertake cleanup work.

I will call Daniel's and have a quote and discussion. Thanks

Hi Biggest me stake
Thanks for the info.

Could you please let me know as what items caused the unexpected increase in cost. The jump from 23 to 28 is more than 25% increase. Definitely a concern. Please let me know
Thanks
Buildinsydney

Hi do some research do a lot of research don’t assume anything it’s tough going

our quote went fro 17k to nearly 30k. Worst week of our lives. Very nasty company. Happy to advise further, but pm me as unwilling to name on here in case of repercussions. Starts with G.

Hi Buildinsydney,
M require the site to be clear of all building materials, vegetation and grass. They want a bare patch of dirt to work on.
Part of the DA for demolition is to have a private certifier check the land after demo.
Ours found small amounts of asbestos on top of the soil (not surprising) and the demo company quickly cleaned that up.

Keep in mind every house built prior to the 90's will have asbestos in it. Costs will go up if more asbestos is discovered during the demolition. It can turn up buried in the dirt or under concrete slabs.
Insist on viewing any additional asbestos before they remove it from the site.

Thanks Gibson
My house is definitely 40 years old and there is asbestos. That's why I am keen to go with a demolisher who is reliable. Most of the builders such as Edenbrae, Clarendon and Masterton recommend site demolition. I will also contact Daniel's demolition and get a quote.

CathyP,

We used a company called SteelChief for our shed (3x3m) with gabled extension. We found them very easy to install and price exceptionally good. This shed was the 4th shed we have built over the years at different places and we have used multiple other companies. Steelchief allowed customisation of where to put doors and type (swing versus sliding), roofing types (skillion, gable etc) and shed size as well as offered a better colour selection than other companies.

I'll see if I can find a picture (we built a 3m tall wall in front of it to screen the shed from the pool) so I will have to look at old photos.

Cheers

Hi MrsRose

Thank you for your reply. Would be good if you find a photo. I will look at their website.

Cathy

Hi all,

I'm building with Masterton in the Sutherland area.

We've just received development consent and have our appointments booked in over the next 4 weeks.

I'd be interested to know for each of your appointments (i.e. kitchen, Don's Tiles, colours and electrical):
1. what you know now that you wish you knew at the time of your appointments;
2. what is your favourite upgrade(s) and how much did the upgrade cost; and
3. which upgrade(s) had a cost that really shocked you.

We definitely want shaker doors (thermolaminated) in the kitchen. Did anyone upgrade to this option and how much did it cost?

We also want to upgrade the stone to Alpine White quantum quartz in the kitchen (40mm) and 3 bathrooms (20mm in each of the powder room, main and ensuite). Did anyone upgrade to this option and how much did it cost?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated (we are feeling a bit out of our depth and nervous about being talked into all sorts of things at the appointments).

Thanks

SK

Good luck SK and your in for a long journey over the next 18 months. We are also building in the shire and should be finished in approx 1 month (we are 4 months over contract now).

Our best upgrade in my opinion are as follows.

1. LED Dow lights throughout, Cost circa $7k
2. Additional height slider doors off back of house as our ceiling is 3m in that area so 2.7m doors look great.
3. Our kitchen bench stone was upgraded to 40mm with waterfall edges and looks great. We upgraded to have splash back in same stone.

Best of luck on your building journey!

We didn't experience them trying to talk us in to anything, so hopefully that won't happen for you either. We built a bit over three years ago so prices will have changed. Plus we have since sold that house, so left all the paperwork with the new owners, so can't refer to it for prices!

Favourite upgrades were.... freestanding bath $900, 2.7m high stacker doors in living room (we had 3m high ceilings) $?, tile drain covers in wet areas (about $40 each), sliding doors on all wardrobes $?, rainwater style shower heads, big trilock front door handle, undermount sink, pull-out bins (about $600, but excellent!), and drawers instead of cupboards in kitchen. Also upgraded our air-con....the one that came with the house would only cool one zone at a time, whereas there are times that we are in the living rooms, but the kids will be in their bedrooms, so really wanted a better air-con to cater for that. Think it cost about $5000 more? But definitely great. Also put in better carpet (about $3500) as the standard carpet wasn't particularly nice underfoot.

If you do any upgrades to your kitchen, express to the consultant that you need an itemised breakdown of the costs. When we received our quote from them, it was just a total cost. Nothing saying how much each item upgrade was costing. It was quite a challenge to get an itemised account. You would think that for them to have come up with a final figure, that they would have to know and have a record of what each upgrade would cost, and they could just send that out? Apparently not. So if you think you may have overspent, and need to cut back a little, without an itemised listing, how do you work out what needs to be removed? A few others on here have commented on this as well..... it may (hopefully) have changed since we did ours, but worth checking.

Good luck and enjoy your appointments! Its great choosing all the goodies that will soon be in your new home!

Masterton Homes pricing has all changed now. It's called an Ultimate Inclusions Package so there are no base prices anymore and the Mansion package is incorporated into the price (along with flooring aircon etc). It's a much better/easier way of doing things for the buyer.

Thanks Sevenths and GillyM.

Sevenths we have also made/will make those same 3 upgrades. Depending on cost I think we will do the downlights/fans/heatlaps etc after handover.

We've got 3.2m ceilings but we were told the highest slider door we could get was 2.4m which we opted for. 2.7m would have been ideal. I'm pretty annoyed to be honest because it's not something we can easily go back and change at this stage.

GillyM, we propose to make thew same changes as you with the exception of the freestanding bath. In relation to the bin, I've been told its approx $600 (which is ridiculous but everyone who has it, loves it). Do you remember how much the pot drawers are per set?

Has anyone increased the height/number of shelves in their walk in pantry? I can see it being costly for something that it probably quite a cheap product.

Because of the 3.2m ceiling we are also looking to have increased height cabinetry in the laundry. Has anyone done this and any idea as to cost?

Thanks

SK

Maybe sliding door heights are different to stacker door height options? Maybe that's why they said they could only do 2.4m?

Each set of pot drawers was $525. We also increased the height of the upper cabinets to 2.4m, and that was $1600. (I looked back through my posts from when we built and found my posts which had pricings in them!). We didn't do thermolaminated, but we upgraded from Createc to Ultraglaze which cost $1239. We didn't add extra shelves in the pantry...... we used the top shelf to stack storage tubs for not-used-too-much stuff.

Not sure if there's any relevance, but here's a couple of pics of our kitchen.

If you are under the "yes" inclusion and mansion package updrades, pot drawers are already included. We extended our pot drawers and added an additional drawer (more like a cutlery size one) above our two pot drawers on either side at no extra cost.

We didnt choose the pull out bin option - you can purchase pull out bins from ikea, bunnings etc- much cheaper in my opinion.

we had the yes/mansion packages, but what's included depends on the design of the kitchen of each individual house. and yes, pull out bins are certainly available from bunnings/ikea/etc. We have had bunning's ones previously, and the Hafele ones that M use are far, far better. Granted, they are still just bins, but bin liners fit better, they have fitted lids which keep odours in, they're just better quality all around. But, they are expensive, and don't fit with everyone's budget, and that certainly comes into it! It's a bit like comparing a base model car with something with all the upgrades..... both still get you from a to b, but one is still nicer to have than the other! When we built, the kitchen was one area we didn't want to compromise too much on.

So exciting. Our land just registered last week. We had our colour selections in October so we are set to lodge to council...yay!

1. I had already asked lots of questions so went in feeling pretty good. I found they didnt try and sell you anything other than the norm so if you are wanting to know what other options there are make sure you ask because I believe there is already an option. If you are in bush fire rating zone be mindful of whether your external door trims are merbau...our door and door trims are two different woods and so if we were to stain them the stain would not match...so we decided to paint it but it was an on the spot decision and I wish I had knew before hand so I was more prepared on what colours I wanted rather than picking it on the spot. Also M dont stain Merbau apparently. There is an option to upgrade to the Merbau door (it is $900) but I wasnt told this at the time and only just found out - thanks for that!

2. We got everything we wanted - my favorite thing by far as the raked ceiling with 2 vulux skylights in our kitchen plus automated blinds (about 10K). We also upgraded our tiles in our bathroom to full height tiling, carpet and underlay ($3,200), square set ceilings with furring channel ($2,076), increased external door heights ($1,000.00), sound proofing for beds 1,2, 3, 4 and media room ($1,252), sliding mirror wardrobe doors on beds 2, 3 and 4 ($1,146) and a wine rack in our kitchen ($1300 ridiculous!!!), waterfall bench tops ($1,578.00)

3. Our wine rack - we wanted a tall cabinet with incorporated wine rack to get around the issue of opening our fridge onto a wall..so we paid the stupid price. Air conditioning. that was $6500 on top of what is already included. They only include the bare minimum and can only run one zone at once and doesn't really suit the size of the house. We added 2 extra zones, increased the size of the unit and added 2 grills in the wall of our kitchen (rather than ceiling because of the raked ceiling). Bricks actually werent as bad as what I thought (we didnt upgrade those) but I thought they would have been a lot more. The light grey ones we were looking at were about $3K extra. Our tiling was surprisingly not as bad as I thought - our total tile upgrades (includes grout, drains, kitchen splash back, full height tiling in main bath, full height tiling in shower of ensuite (with upgrade from the base range) etc). was $6,411.00. Render was ridiculous - 2 pillars were $1,815.00. Oh electrical wasnt as bad as I thought it was going to be. We were going to do after handover but our bill came to $6,233 and that includes extra circuits, heat lamps in bathrooms and down-lights throughout.

Goodluck with it all. I am so glad the colour part is over.

Hmm odd how they advertise pot drawers are included in their upgrade package and depends on the house. I don't understand how they could advertise one thing but you get another...

Things may have changed since we built our house..... back then our house design included two pot drawers, but the kitchen was mostly cupboards. We changed two sets of cupboards into large sets of drawers. We were told the the inclusions depended on the layout of the kitchen/house, but that may all be different now. 😊

We have the inbuilt kitchen bin upgrade and also had a matching createc panel behind range hood added in otherwise you get white MDF. Also had a bench (1.2m with tub) installed by kitchen people, all upgrades were about $3k from memory.