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hi neighbours!!! it's been a while since i last visited the forum.. been so sick lately.. (pregnancy sickness that is)
anyway.. i've read the posts and now i'm getting worried about issues with the current residents... lived in 5 different suburbs and never had a neighbour issue, everyone was very nice!!!
well, we had a "warm" welcome with a current resident who saw us visiting our site.. neighbour approached us swearing and cursing, telling us how our builder is hassling them.. i.e. frames delivery too early in the morning.. and questioning why the builder's contact details wasn't posted on the building fence...i wasss too scared so i slowly walked away with my littler daughter as i don't want her to hear the cursing too.. good thing hubby remained calm and was able to tame the angry man...
oh well.. at least i know my to be next door neighbours are extermely nice.. a young couple with 2 gorgeous daughters who look exactly like their mother! hehehe.. sorry craigology
it'll be lovely to meet everyone here in person!!
btw, has anyone thought about fencing yet? i'm trying to organize a quote for landscaping but i think we have to have a fence first before landscaper can do their bit? how does fencing work i.e. arrangement with neighbours beside and at the back of your property?
Hi alanamareeSmum
Congrats on the pregnancy - sorry to hear you're having a rough time with it at the mo'.
We spoke to Jim prior to his leaving and he informed us the protocol is to split the cost of the fence with all adjoining neighbours. In our case we have 5 neighbours so that should be a very intersting meeting when the time comes - hope none of them come cursing and swearing at us!!! I can't begin to imagine what sort of arguments it might raise if there are conflicting ideas on price, quotes, product etc.
Perhaps we could have an adhoc Xmas gathering somewhere on site??? Just a few drinks perhaps. What's the consensus?
Update on the land on Chessington Terrace restricted to single storey house: it is a true story!
I talked to someone from Norwest Land, who explained me the whole thing. It wasn't the council who decided to forbid double storey house. Some residents of the established houses South of Beaumont Rise complained so much about that particular lot on Chessington Terrace that Norwest Land, in fact, decided to buy back the lot and resell it for single level house developers only.
They reassured me that none of the issues with that lot are applicable to mine and that in their opinion our development proposal minimise quite well the impact of a double storey house. They don't see why it wouldn't go through considering that all but one house on The Parkway are double storeys.
Many of the existing neighbours tried to oppose to the development of Beaumont Rise. It used to be a country club and golf course. Now they have lost their nice views. I think that may explain why they may not be very friendly.
alanamareeSmum, the cost sharing for the fence is actually regulated by the "Fencing Act". Basically you must first send a "fencing notice" to your neighbour detailing the fence proposal and associated cost (get some quotes first). The neighbours are required by the Act to share 50% of the cost of a "basic fence". The important thing is to get the agreement signed before you build anything. More info here:
http://www.lpma.nsw.gov.au/crown_lands/dividing_fencesDKP
Hi Aussie_chik,
Thanks for setting up this thread to get all the B-Risers together ... Great to meet all the neighbours-to-be.
Here's a quick post on my build details :
Builder : M3tr!con
Where : Stage 5 Chessington
Building stage : Council approval
Welcome Mars - thanks for joining! Hope you enjoy the thread.
Hello all. I hope everyone is well.
Jim told me about Lot 148 - the very last block on chessington terrace been restricted to Single Storey House ONLY due to existing neighbour objections. They actually object on all 2 storey houses DA behind the existing fence lines - our block being one of them.
OUR CONSTRUCTION UPDATE:
Slab+Frame+Plumbing done. Bricks next?
hey mars....good to see another Chessington Terrace neighbour on board.
Hey Eoh - is there a minimum rear set back for 2 storey homes on those blocks??? 8m or something???
I wish this rain would go away
already had so many setbacks on scheduled days where things were meant to be done. I wonder why when I drive around the estate I see some builders at work and not others. Our frame was meant to go up today. Bring on another drought I say - lol
Anyway for those of you yet to start your builds take heart in the fact they you may be actually avoiding the rain delays we're experiencing at the moment and hopefully after Xmas the weather will improve.
Aussie_Chick
I am not sure what the minimum setback is but our rear set back is at app 5.4m.
Thanks DKP for the info re: fencing!
@ Aussie_chick.. we should be ok with the get together.. just let us know when..
The minimum setback from the rear boundary for the houses along the existing fence line is 8 metres for the second floor (instead of the normal 6 metres setback). This applies to Lot 149, 150, 151, etc along the fence. Lot 148 cannot have double storey but that's because its side boundary on the South faces the rear boundary of two existing house so a double storey on Lot 148 would cause big overshadowing on the rear yard of these two houses.
I went to the council today to informally review my proposal to address the neighbours objections. It's looking ok with some minor details to be added. My big concern is the delay and contract deadline. Because of the objections my DA need to be assessed by the managers who meets every second weeks. Their last meeting for this year is on the 7th December. If we miss that one we are good for a very big delay.
The residents of the existing houses are watching closely what is happening on our lands. When they saw a big pile of dirt on my land (dumped by my neighbours builder) they immediately reported this to the council, worried that I was starting to build.
DKP
We've been massively impacted by the rain and its sometime strange to see that even on a rare sunny/dry there the place is void of any builders.
We are actually doing our Practical Completion today with a tentative handover next week. Finally!!
Be nice to meet everyone as well.
Best of luck Clow, I hope everything goes according to plan. How long has your build taken to date?
Thank goodness for the sun this week, we now have a bottom storey to our house. The chippies must have some other commitments today as there's no activity even though the sun is shining - oh well can't complain!
I was thinking a Saturday afternoon or Sunday in December -not too close to Xmas might be a good time to have a meet and greet. Perhaps the weekend of the 11th or 12th? We can either meet in Dudley Reserve or perhaps on the estate somewhere. If you have any ideas, comments, feedback please feel free to jump in.
Nope, no practical completion
been pushed back another week due to further delays.
Build has taken 32 weeks so far with its fair share of dramas (not unlike everyone else we have spoken to).
Hi clow,
Sorry to hear about your delay.
Our contract expired yesterday and today we were told we will not get an extension. We will have to fork out another 0.5% of the contract price per month of delay. What a xmas present!
We have to wait till next week to know what will be the council decision on our DA, when it will be assessed at the DAU meeting. The thing that worries us is that, apparently the objecting neighbour can still cause more trouble by forcing our case to be handled at a Council meeting.
We are hoping the best for next week but it is hard to have to wait until then to know our fate.
DKP
I don't understand why the existing homes' owners are causing so much troubles to the new guys.. yeah, it was a county club before but the owners decided to sell and develop it to residential.. We are all building decent homes, we are all decent people wanting to build a new home for our family.. It's not that the countryclub is changed into a fish market or a parking lot for huge utility vehicles.. It's so sad.. Like everyone else, we have the right to build our homes anywhere we like and we all paid for our blocks, it's all done in a legal way so we have the right to build on our blocks! We all paid top $$$ for the blocks and all these issues are so frustrating...
Anyway DKP, what's their issue with your building? What are they complaining about this time?
Hi alanamareeSmum
OMG you appear more frustrated than we are!
They haven't raised any new issues so far. The only thing I know is that someone made complaints about overshadowing and privacy. We have addressed the privacy problem with plants screening along the fence. As for the overshadowing there is nothing we can do about it as we already provide quite a bit of setback from their fence and our house complies well with the council DCP.
The reason we are worried is because the people who complaint have raised their concerns with some councilor, and any decision made at a DAU meeting (next week for us) can be overturned by a councilor, pushing the DA to be reassessed at the Ordinary Council meeting. If they do that to us then we for sure will be very unhappy
So it is wait and see for the time being. More news next week...
DKP
Hi DKP,
hehehe yeah i'm getting frustrated.
.nahh just kidding, I'm actually sad
and worried at the same time.. cause i'm used to having nice people around, our current neighbours included.... i've never encountered anything like that to be honest, lived in 3 different states (7 different suburbs) because of work but i've never encountered anything like that, everyone's just soooo nice and friendly.. and besides building a new house should be fun and exciting!
All the best to you DKP, I hope to see fence on your site soon!!
Nearly there! Last Friday the DAU Meeting agenda was put on the council website. Our DA is recommended to be approved (with conditions) as all issues have been addressed or have no ground.
We are not happy with one of the conditions, which is to add a dropped edge beam on the back of the house and cut out half our backyard to reduce the height of our land (they are really worry about us overlooking). Why could we not simply add a lattice extension over the back and side fence? That's simpler, effective and far cheaper!
We could pull out of tomorrow's DAU to discuss and attempt to change this but that would postpone our DA until February next year. Not an option. So if the DA is approved tomorrow we are going to start building as per the conditions then lodge section 96 to request changing the landscaping. If we succeed we would have build a dropped edge beam we don't really need but that would still be much cheaper than the cost of waiting till February.
What a pain!
DKP
Fingers Crossed for you DKP! Hope you get a workable solution soon.
hi aussie_chik.. i've contracted chicken pox (started on sunday night).. so i might not be able to meet with you's prior to xmas
and as you know i'm pregnant so i'm hoping there'll be no complication for my baby.. and i hope too that alana's vaccination work so she won't get the virus!!