My first home - Santorini 26 by M3tr!con

Its looking great JBJ!

Hubby is sooo jelous of your garage extension! Its something he really wanted but wasn't in our budget.

We have chosen the same bath tub and its gonna look great once your tiles are in!

I just love, love, love that bathtub! It looks absolutely devine! Great choice shelz!!

I'm not too sure what I will use the garage extension for just yet, as I don't have any tools or 'boy toys' to fill the garage up with, but it seemed like a good idea and something that may come in handy one day!

jackbellyjean - Exciting stuff! I must remember to ask about that niche!

Again, thanks all the for advise. What would we do without this site! Go crazy, I tell ya! I might need to start my own thread shortly though - I'm starting to feel that I'm hijacking other people's Santorani threads!

Very interesting... thanks for this info. I drove around Shepp today looking at the bricks on new houses... fun... The only Cat 1 brick that I like is Austral Tan, maybe Mushroom. The only Boral brick from Cat 1 that I could find was Rouge, but I'm not a big fan of red bricks. The only other brick that I don't mind that isn't going to stretch the budget too much is La Trobe. Probably another $600-900?

evolvedmonkey - what brick do you have? I can't seem to find any reference to it either in your thread or blog? (I could just be blind ).

Also went to BM Tiles to look at the M standard range - not overly impressed. Floor tiles - one white glossy, then in matte three variations of beige, a light brown and a light grey. All very plain, but not sure if I want to spend an extra grand or two for something with a bit of texture and colour variation. Bathroom - white or beige tiles and about eight different coloured feature tiles (allowance of 28 feature tiles?). Certainly not a big range. I think I will be spending a couple of hundred to do some upgrading here... Does this range sound familiar to others experience?

Does anyone know if austral hawthorn has changed categories? Used to be cat4 to the 76mm and 50mm was a higher category?

The list I got from M last week says Hawthorn is still Cat 4.

ah, OK - thanks heaps for that. We had our colour appointment nearly 3 weeks ago and still haven't received our amended colour schedule, and I was thinking if hawthorn had dropped a few categories we could get some money back - we did 76mm to the house and 50mm to the facade - I'm still shivering at the cost of that!

Tim

I think I was lucky enough to get in when they still had their full range, as I've since heard through here that they have downsized their tile range dramatically. During the M colour consultation, I was told that I had to pay $500 to have a Beaumont Tile appointment and that the cost just covered the appointment only. I said there is no way I am paying $500 just to speak to somebody, when I can walk around their showroom myself and pick out which tiles I like and don't like. The Colour Consultant's manager then clarified that paying the $500 would entitle to me to select any tiles from their standard range (with a grey sticker I think), instead of the few boards of tiles M had on display.

Inspection with SS was done yesterday. Front door is now on, garage entry door and a few internal sliding doors. Insulation has been put in and wiring for downlights both internal and external is now in place. When SS was pushed for a completion date, he said I might be in by Christmas, but that is if there are absolutely no delays. He said they will be working right up until Christmas week and then usually have 4 weeks off over the holiday period, so even still it's not that far off Plastering is due to commence mid October.

Front of the house with the infills complete on the portco --


Master with WIR and ensuite sliding doors --


Kitchen/Lounge --


Bathroom/toilet/laundry --


Another view of the front --

Wondering how much you garage extentension cost????...Hubby is talking about one too....

I think it was approx. $3k from memory; they've included it in the base price for my final contract so I don't have the break-up of the actual cost, unfortunately.

Oh JBJ I am kicking myself that I didn't question it further when they told me at Studio M that it would cost us $500 just for the appointment at Beaumont!
Because they told us this we just accepted it and chose one of those boring tile selections they had available!
I would have been happy to pay that for an option of feature tiles & different colours!

Good on you for picking this up

I just wish they would've disclosed things accuratley at the start!!!!!

Anyway, Congrats on your progress! Im loving the sliding doors!

keep them pictures coming

Jeffsy - I'll be putting more photos on the blog tomorrow and later this week as they are going to done this week, hopefully!

We chose from the base selection, I believe they are called:
Austral Homestead Tan

I really like the dark chocolate with bluey black flecks

Thanks mate. I will probably also be going with Homestead Tan. I might consider the La Trobe (Cat 2) depending on how much extra they cost. I have a mate using using Tan (I originally thought he was using Hawthorn) but it doesn't seem to be commonly used in my area, as I have only seen one other house use it. I don't know why they call it Tan - as you say it is more dark Chocolate.

I am going with a Colorbond roof (free upgrade promotion but sarking still extra) and I am thinking a very light colour for some contrast with the dark brick - maybe Surfmist? The only problem I have is the front cladding and what colour to make this... I was originally thinking a white / beige colour but this would work against the contrast I was looking for with the light coloured roof - the front facade and roof would all be a light colour! Maybe the roof should be a little darker like a Evening Haze, Shale Grey or Dune - might work better with white / beige cladding. The other option is having the cladding a coffee / light brown colour... I might go an have a play with Envisage now...

I am also thinking a light coloured roof for energy efficiency. Am I the only one giving this any consideration - I notice everyone here is using dark tiles...

geez your bricks have come up nice jelly

I can honestly say I didn't even consider having a light coloured roof as I had no idea about it having any effect on energy efficiency at the time I went with a dark coloured roof purely for aesthetic reasons...

And emilygirl, I think the garage extension might have actually been around $1,800. I got both the master and garage extension so I can't quite recall which was which...

UPDATE - 'Lock Up' was officially reached today!!!!!!!

Congratulations!!!!

I was chatting to my local Austral country reseller today. He quoted the Homestead Range (Cat 1) at $700 per 1000 bricks and the Melbourne Range (Cat 4) at $760. So from these figures he believed the real cost to upgrade from Cat 1 to Cat 4 would be only around $600! How can M justify $3K????? That's over a 200% mark up / profit for M! I like the off-white mortor but again the reseller thought $1K was more than a bit rich...

I am going to raise the brick costing with M at my selections appt, but I don't like my chances of them caring...

Any more pictures jackbellyjean???

congratulations and commiserations on your lock up stage, means you can't go check it out by yourself? or are you able to get 'access'?

we dont have many around us so we dont have as much fencing as it appears you do, I know I've mentioned it before, but dang I love your bricks.

have you been given any times or dates of when things are happening or walkthrough dates?

Thanks Charlie & EM

I've still been able to get access via some unlocked doors, so I guess 'lock-up' is only lock-up on paper

Plastering will start tomorrow My SS has been waiting a week for this particular plastering mob to finish another job so that they can start mine, so I haven't really been taking any pics the last week or so as most of the progress lately hasn't been as obvious i.e. cabling, ducted heating installation, insulation, wiring etc. Once the plaster is in, it'll start feeling like a house inside so I'll start up with the excessive picture taking again

Plastering is scheduled to take a week and I think after that it's kitchen time

Hello

I really like the floorplan of the Santorini as i've noticed that Metricon homes like to incorporate as many living rooms as possible. They also have the most beautiful display homes i've seen recently. My favourite facade for the Santorini is the Kingston; but they all look fantastic nevertheless.

Great choice

Is the kingston new? I can't remember seeing that when we were planning? But I agree it is the best looking from my style point of view.

Looking forward to seeing your plaster work photo's, supposably our plasterers are going in thursday (..which I've worked out to mean tuesday so that I dont get too excited).

We dont have our insulation up like you yet though. When did they put that up for you?

What type of mortar did you go for? raked, rolled?