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We have recently purchased a block of land in Darling Downs WA and are in the process of trying to select a builder. We are looking at building a farmhouse/estate type home 5 bed, 2 bath with a 2 bed anciliary accommodation attached. We think we've narrowed the choices down to three builders - Dale Alcock, Vision One, Red Ink.
Really struggling to make a firm decision
This is what we've found so far...
Dale Alcock
1. Great looking houses
2. Initial contact with sales consultant fabulous
3. Struggling to get anything out of them. Return phone calls are scarce, any firm designs are non existant. Basically they want you to sign up before they will commit to doing anything. This makes choosing a builder difficult. How do you know if you'll like the design they do?
Vision Homes
1. Great looking houses
2. Initial Contact with sales consultant fabulous
3. Will work with you to give you a design
4. Will allow you to have some input on site works, and will 'hand hold' as requested ( we are first time builders)
5. Haven't come up with a granny flat situation just yet that we're happy with
Red Ink
1. Homes not that really attractive in the farmhouse type range
2. Willing to work with you to create the look that you want 'custom build'
3. on a square meterage basis is cheaper than Vision one and DAH
4. Will hand hold
5. Loads of great reviews
6. Great deal on aircon, solar hot water, led lighting, essa bench tops for February
When I read the above, it seems pretty obvious who to go with, but I really want to hear your experiences with either of these builders. I'm worried that going a cheaper price (i.e. Red Ink) might give us a ho hum home.
thanks
Built with DAH and would not do so again. You will pay more with them but you won't get a better build.
Remember it's not really about the "building company", it's about the site supervisor and the trades that turn up to actually do the work. DAH will tell you they have their own trades but that's rubbish. The site super will get whoever he can for the cheapest possible price.
It really comes down to what you are going to get for your $. Quality across all builders will be much the same as they draw their workers from the same shallow pool.
It's all about maximising your inclusions and getting the best price possible.
I would take the bits you like from other builders plans and show your redink rep and get them to incorporate the good bits into your plan. Even draw something up yourself and get them to add their design expertise to it.
I've been in my redink house for 1.5 months now and I would recommend them. You will get crap trades but you will get that with any builder. We found with redink that they would fix things you aren't happy with though so it was OK. Only thing is that you need to keep an eye on it to point out what needs more work to be at a better quality.
Go with redink and do what kat said
I have been happy with redink. And they are so flexible. I know what you mean with dales -
It's hard to make a what you feel should be an informed decision without knowing what you get.
I spoke with SS this morning and he said he is much happier working for redink because they are flexible and so committed to giving their customers what they want that it makes his job easy.
I think they do nice houses. Don't know about farmhouse range though. But as kat said - get them to design one incorporating other houses you like.
Redink don't really do project builds like ours either, but they came up with the best plan for our block ( and we met with lots of builders).
We were sold actually when we looked at a newly built home on the market and were convinced it was a more upmarket builder, when we asked it was redink!
Goodluck. It is such a hard choice, esp when you feel you don't know all of the ins and outs of what you get for your money.
I'm a glutton for punishment and am on number 11 build with 101.
I've built with DAH and Redink previously
I would never build with DAH again!
Confidence in your product is admirable if it is a good product ...but if it isn't it just comes across as arrogance.
So, Redink all the way for me. No builder is perfect but it's how they handle problems if or when they occur that counts
Wow!! Hadn't anticipated the redink response. This is definitely where I think we will be heading. Will await the design and see how all the inclusions add up. I agree with all of you regarding the tradespeople being used. So we shall see
Excitement plus...our road now has tarmac on it and they are running power cables. I'm told one more week and then hopefully titles not far away, can't wait to start the process of building
I think you need to prioritise what it is that you want from your build - cost of the build, timely construction, brand security, inclusions etc. We went with Dale Alcock Homes because our priorities were:
1. Design - I am a huge fan of beautiful and functional design. I found both a 3x2 and a 4x2 design that I loved and neither needed much tweaking. Every other builder we looked at needed serious adjustments to floor plans, which is of course doable, but it gave me confidence that the architects at DAH were on the same wavelength as me (if that makes sense). Also, our sales guy was simply outstanding, incredibly helpful and full of good advice. The changes he recommended have been perfect for us. I now walk through our build and every window and door is exactly where it should be, the utilisation of natural light is exactly what I wanted (this was big for me) and the flow through the internal spaces is ideal. We've even had random neighbourhood tradies inspect our build and comment on what a good layout we have.
2. Quality Build - DAH has solid brand recognition and a reputation that they work hard to maintain. We wanted to make sure we had a quality and lasting build with excellent workmanship, good resale potential, and as few issues during the build as possible. And we were willing to pay for it.
3. Finishes - This probably links back into number 1 a little bit. We wanted good finishes and several of these were included as standard with DAH (e.g. decorative cornices) and others we could upgrade with relative ease. This wasn't always the case with other builders - e.g. they could offer us Caesarstone, but not with waterfall edges, or only supplied Essastone instead, or we could have different this and that but we'd have to supply it ourselves (and take out insurance etc.) and so on.
We weren't as fussed about timely construction or penny-pinching to last cent, but I can be quite particular about aesthetics so these issues were important for us. We decided right from the beginning our focus would be quality over quantity. If it took 18 months to build, so be it, as long as we got the quality we wanted. While I cannot fault DAH on points 1 and 3, we have had several issues arise which have made me question whether we would have been just as likely to have found 2 elsewhere. I am reserving my final judgement for when our build is completely done. I am also aware that there are several things that happened during our build which are not standard for any build!
So what are your priorities? Which builder can best deliver on those priorities? Is there anything you'd need to sacrifice if you went with one builder instead of another? Are you okay with sacrificing this? (e.g. waterfall edges - hell no!)
Answering these questions will help you decide who can best give you a house you're going to love living in while not sending you to the loony bin in the meantime!
We are in the progress of building with DAH.
They did a custom design for us and we really think it was excellent, they got in everything we wanted and made great use of the space.
They have also been quick to rectify any issues in a professional way. Generally happy so far to this point and we would use them again.
We've gone with Ideal Homes - the consultant is Carlo
This whole process is stressful enough.. We've had excellent service so far!!
Personally visits us when we can't get to his display,
Designed the house perfectly for us,
Always answered the phone!
Sorted out all the admin/finance/paperwork directly with our broker,
My sister is very happy with the 345m2 home they've built in Wellard (biggest one I think).
Chris
If you are looking at Farmhouse style builds - have you looked at
Rural Building Co? Also a friend of mine built with
Ventura Homes down Busselton way and was fairly happy.
Or if that will only confuse you, of the three you've suggested, we're building with 101 Resi which is Scott Park like RedInk and have had a pretty good experience, although also had a good sales rep and really good SS that make the world of difference.
As a first time builder myself, they have been pretty good at answering any questions I have - but you also need to be really proactive at staying on top of things and asking the questions in the first place. The default assumption for any project builder will be if you aren't asking any questions, then you probably don't have any. Plus use this forum - lots of different people here with different approaches towards things, so asking questions, getting feedback and see what is going on helps out
I second checking out ventura!! Their design team know what they are doing but they are a bit pricier from our research.
I cant legally say bad stuff about a company so... heres a neutral analysis of our build with a company affiliated with Red Ink (note:not saying anything about red ink themselves)-
Their display homes were the only ones where nothing was broken, tiles were straight, drawers pulled out properly (yes one builder had display draws that were so crooked the stone bench had torn a hole in it), doors were hung correctly etc, but the actual build was a different story.
We just built a house in WA with ************** (Affiliated with Red Ink but we changed the design so it matched a *** plan more than red ink so they swapped names). We went through tradies like icecream to depressed woman - they were underpaid and useless and they quit or got fired during the build - meaning things were left half done, then completed by others and not matching, not correct etc. Spoke to a friend who built with them in Bullsbrook last year and same deal - She complained and sent letters etc and was ignored.
As for the deals - We got AC which was a good deal (except the tradies almost set fire in the roof when they threw a piece of ceiling with a light globe still in it up onto insulation and smashed it instead of cutting out the light and disconnecting it or...putting the vent a metre to the side of the light, and they left some piping untaped), door upgrades (they stuffed up the sizing, installation, drafting, painting and frame cuts) that ended up ok, and Essastone - ok if you not picking black...Da Da Dum -
The kitchen bench is Essastone (reconstitued quartz I believe) Midnight Rendezvous -BLACK- and Ive had no end of trouble with it. From installation it was already stained with splashes around the whole edge, and a big scratch. A tradie left a piece of paper on it and we assume it got wet because it left a massive rectangle stain. A cup, at any temperature, with any water on it will leave an instant ring that can be removed by 3 weeks of rubbing, and a dry cup left for a few days will leave a ring from humidity that cant be removed. The company who sold it sent someone out and he polished, rubbed, waxed and left it worse than before. He (not as a representative of the company) said other companies had stopped selling it for this reason - the stains show up severely on the gloss black and cant be removed. He says if we want black (and we do because the splashback etc is all to match) we need to go with a high quality granite - not reconstituted and not cheap Asian granite because it will have the same problem. He said not to accept a replacement if they say its a 'batch' problem because it is actually the product. I have everything on boards on rubber feet so Im not worried about damaging granite if I get it, we just couldn't afford it and the builder had an offer for these benches when we signed up. The builder has passed the buck to the stone company, who has offered to replace it with another of the same (but then same problem?) or a different colour (not helpful now we've paid for all the matching decor). I tried going to their website to see what they do for replacement options and prices, as they claim to do granite also- but the website is unprofessional and useless - no pictures showing up, broken links etc.
They hired the lousiest tradies because they were super cheap but they were unreliable and apparently unqualified/unexperienced ie - unable to do the job.
We went through numerous supervisors as one quit and didnt tell us so we were calling and getting no response, and the others were moved to other areas. The one we got settled with was new and inexperienced but tried hard. On the surface they seemed happy to help but they changed things in the contract without raising addendums then refused to change them back, they ran out of at least 4 products and we had to rechoose, they acted insolently and rudely when we pressed a matter, trying to downplay it (close examples not direct quotes:) 'its just a little scratch', 'thats just how some tradies are and thats how you get it', ' its not exactly a big thing'- (two gouges in a bit of cornice) etc and made us stressed and embarrassed to bring up any problems. The office workers mixed up orders, addresses, emails etc and didnt return calls.
Theres much more but I cant say too many details without making it obvious and opening up to litigation (although it's all true and mostly in writing I dont want the hassle) so All in all - a horror build, but Ive heard they all are
BTW has anyone bought a black stone benchtop and found it OK? I will need to replace it and don't know what to use.
I'm at the tail end of a build similar to yours ... building a 4/5 by 2 house in Jarrahdale with an attached one bed "granny" flat for my dad. I chose to build with Redink due to their flexibility, their pricing and inclusions, plus the fact that I really liked some of their plans. I agree with you in regards to their farmhouse designs, but you could always flip one of their other designs around so that the longer side becomes the front and alter the entry ...
I didn't even look at DAH as they were just beyond my price range, especially as my block is sloping and full of rock, so I had to budget a large amount to the site works.
I'm maybe a month away from handover and have been really pleased with the way the build has gone. The customer service at the design stage was excellent, the paperwork stage was slow (although that was partially my fault - I added a few extra things in the weeks after prestart and finance took a while to come through) but relatively pain free, and the build has been pretty smooth too. There have been a couple of small hitches, but I'm really happy with the finish so far and can't wait to move in ...