Our first Home :) the Sahara Q1

We brought our land 12 months ago and have hummm and arred about what house to build. We nearly went through the whole process of building with mainvue but pulled out last min. the cost was huge for what we wanted.
But we took some months off and came across a Henley design that we fell in love with and are so happy we looked around more. Everything we want we are getting in the inclusions. And it has worked out a lot cheaper and we will have a bigger house. Just more for me to clean
We are building the Sahara Q1. With the Piermont Façade.
We have our colour selection appointment coming up and our tender signing too.
We went down to cosham last month and loved looking through everything and tryed to make some decisions before our appointment comes along as on the day of our selections its sure to be crazy.
(We are lucky we did a colour appointment with mainvue before we pulled out so we kind of know what we already want)
Not sure of anyone will follow but I will keep updates

Hi welcome to the forum. I hope you have a good experience. Where are you building? I myself am at a similar stage to you. We had our color selection about a month ago. I was surprised with how much selection there actually was. It's hard to imagine it all put together. We had tender two weeks ago and then signed contracts last week. There were a few errors we picked up on at the contract signing but they were very thorough and have noted all the changes to be made. Our land is to be released in about 1 month so we are hoping to start building mid to late August. I am trying to figure out how to upload photos so I can share our experience. We are building the emperor nouveau Q1 and added a rumpus at the back. We also changed the front lounge to another master with ensuite. Look forward to seeing what you pick after your color selection.

do you have plans would love to see them

I have just started a blog.

I will put the plans on the blog tonight.

I cant figure out how to get photos on here
they come up too small

Thanks
I have been floating around the forum for a while and asking questions here and there but now its time to knuckle down and get into it
It was real funny they wanted us to sign our tender and contract in one day but we said no.
Looking forward to getting it all signed though. i just keep having a moment where i come up with more questions for them.
i am the same and cant upload photos but i have started a blog and think i will just add my photos on there.
Looking forward to sharing your build with you. i think we will start building in august/september too.

Hi Rangi83

We are also building the Sahara Q1, we have just finished tender and my wife is still doing minor colour changes!!

We made little changes to the house, ill list them in case there is any you might want to consider.

1. We closed off the study and put a single 820 door.
2. We added a double 920 cavity sliding doors to the theater room.
3. Added a flush sliding door to the entrance of the living and dining
4. Door to ensuite upstairs.
5. We moved the shower taps so that you dont have to get in the shower to turn it on.
6. Shower niches
7. Hideaway bin in kitchen 2x 20 litre.
8. We are adding aircon and I added a concrete slab outside for it to sit on instead of the usual bolt to the wall approach which i hear cane vibrate the wall and make internal noise.
9. I added an extra 2 zones to the heating/aircon so we have a total of 4 zones.

I'm sure there is more but they are the major ones I can think of at this time.

Looking forward to my Argus appointment to sort out lighting we are going with battens and replacing them later with LED, our tender liason said we had to many lights and it might be an issue.

Hi RussnDana,

Thanks for sharing those. I never thought of changing the shower. I will tell my husband about that tonight.
We haven’t added much. I would like to add door to the study too. How much extra was that? And the door for the theatre. (how would this look?)

We have upgraded the heating package to be able to add air con later. (wider vents)
We need to have a meeting with Argus about pre wiring for the theatre. Can wait to see how you go with it.
We ended up just going for the top lighting package. But will look at our tender price and may need to do the same with battens.
Which façade have you gone for? We are going for Piermont façade.
Where are you building?

Here is what we have gone for so far.
1. Spa bath in ensuite
2. Taken out window in study (side wall)
3. Upgrade heating to add aircon later
4. We are doing all our own flooring
5. And I am going to ask if we can do our own painting
6. We are adding a tap behind fridge for ice block maker in fridge.

I can’t wait for the colour selection. Did you pick two different colour doors in the kitchen?

Wow Rangi, like the plan! Welcome to the forum and good luck with everything

Thanks Muzzman

rangi83 we are building in south east Melbourne. We code the same color laminate in the kitchen but went all gloss. Don't have the paperwork but I think it WS. 600-800 for the study. We wanted to be able to close the theater room to avoid noise flow upstairs, insulation to internal walls as well. I also got a tap for the frodge but I asked it to be put in the cupboard above the fridge that we are adding as the depth for the fridge is not huge and I didnt want the tap to decrease the depth even further. We are also doing our own flooring and have asked for skorings to be left off downstairs so we don't need to get quad added to our flooring. Broadway facade.

One big point worth noting is if you are increasing the height of your stacker doors then make sure they raise the windows to match the head height.

Did you upgrade the insulation? I didn’t even know that could be done. Do they have options for doors at the colour appointment for the theatre? Does it cost much.
My husband was going to ask them to leave the skirtings off. I didn’t think they would agree.
So stacker doors…. We got the higher ceiling on the bottom floor so then… of course the doors won’t be standard like the display (damn I didn’t even think of that) and the windows. Makes me wonder would they have told me this at the tender? The doors and windows didn’t even cross my mind
Just more to add to my list. LOL
Can you go through all of this at tender or colour selection or is it best to let them know before??

Sorry for all the question

Questions are no problem happy to help sometimes good to bounce ideas off each other especially since we are building the same home. We don't need to pay for upgraded insulation due to the orientation of the block he had to pay 830 for upgrades to meet a 6 star energy rating. At tender they told us this would be a change to external wall batts now at 2.5 and ceiling and garage batts to 6. In regards to the doors you can chose the style at cosham but depends on the kind you want I.e. cavity or not. Other than that any changes need to happen via your administrstor , hopefully yours will be more cluey than mine!! We did not touch the dowbsrair ceiling height it will be the standard 2590.

Thanks so much RussnDana. Thanks for all the advice I will let you know how colour appointment goes

rangi83 no worries happy to help, just to let you know you can tell them at cosham in their colour appointment that you dont want the skirting and specify the areas you dont want it.

Can I ask if you are going to use an independent inspector? If so can you PM me the details we are on the hunt for one.

Anyone else reading this? If there is?? PM me an inspector if you know a good one please.

Love all the great advices everyones giving, i have my colour appt in two weeks and is stressin out!!!

Hi Suey,

What house are you building?

Rangi, im building the lexington belle q2 in the northern suburbs.

Got assigned an administrator and appointments booked.. Looks like theyre very busy though, as our land is settled and titled and wanted earlier appointments but not available

Ahhh yes just looked at your blog

We are the same with our appointment but it is good in a way gives up more time to look through everything and make sure we have covered everything.

we sign contract in august so hope to start soon after.

Ohh you lucky duck! Think you're a month or so ahead of me so thats great! Can ask you for advice hehe

Wow we have our appointment tomorrow!! I have been scanning magazines all day. I thought I knew the colours I wanted and now I am not so sure ahhhh hopefully it all come together tomorrow hehe