Who is Building with Porter Davis?

Hi all, supposed to be booked in for an October start date with Porter Davis, everything is signed, all ready from our end but PD aren't giving us any kind of answer as to when they're actually going to start. They keep saying we are on track for our October start but how is that even possible if they're not giving us any info and there's only 11 days of October left. Anyone gone through the same? How much notice did they give you? And what's the official "start"? The girl we are working with, while lovely, doesn't seem to be able to answer questions...

Btw building Dunes 29.

We aren't quite at that stage yet. We have signed all the contracts but need to get developer approval and then council approval before we can start.

Hey DB,

We found ourselves in a very similar situation ( take a look at our blog: https://waldorfgrange.wordpress.com/ ) where by we were locked in for an "august site start" and it got to about this time in august and we still haven't heard anything...

From how it was described to me when I asked you could be in 1 of 2 possible areas:

1- all permits are signed and ready to go and PD are waiting till this Friday to "send you to site" as they only do that on a Friday...

2- they are still waiting on the magical PD machine to churn out some piece of paper or missing information that any normal company could do in a day which takes them about a month...

I highly doubt you will actually have an October "site start" but you may get "sent to site" before the month is out


To answer your question they don't give any notice they just call you and say you have been sent to site then over the 10 days you notice things arriving e.g.:temp fences, asset protection toilet etc. Then one day they drop off some big heavy machinery and it is usually done the day after in my experience

Hi, how's your build going? When did they end up starting? We are booked in for an April start date next year, I'm really hoping there won't be any delays!

Hey, they sent us to site at the end of October. That's a fancy way of saying nothing really happened lol so they met their apparent obligation that we started in October, but it actually started in December for us. They're really screwing us on our loan as we organized a loan that would mean we wouldn't have to rent but could sell and move straight from our current house to our PD house, but the term of the loan is 12 months. They told us an October start and that it would be a 28 week contract. Once we got to contract point they advised actually no it's a 41 week contract and yeah that didn't start until site scrap and that happened start of December. So yeah thanks for that Porter Davis... grrrr. Really hope the quality of our build is worth all the half truths and incompetent building coordinators!! Good luck with your build!

Oh that doesn't fill me with confidence as we were also under the impression that it's 28 weeks from start to finish! Considering that's what they tell you it's fair to say that's what we expect.

How do they justify it being 48 weeks???

I've just had a look at our preliminary soil test results and its says our site is classified as 'P' due to abnormal moisture conditions.

Anyone know what this means (especially in terms of site costs?)

P is quite common however usually porter davis only allow up to "m" class foundations in their inclusions and you pay for anything else...

Site costs are really one of those things that PD charge for and it is different for everybody (this is pretty much where they make their money!!)

It's very hard to determine what they will charge you because it basically comes down to what estimator you get etc.. however for reference We had a h2 (just below P) classification for a double storey and a completely flat block and our site costs came in at roughly $27000

http://www.build.com.au/building-reactive-soil-sites

Thanks, They originally told us to allow for 50k site costs (as a worst case...we are doing a KDR) I would of course like them to be a lot less than this, but we can't afford to go over. The site will be totally cleared and level for them so I really don't know where they are getting the 50k site costs from!! Its a quiet and wide street in a very quiet suburb.

Its frustrating that they can't give you any costs until the tender appointment as this will determine how much we spend at world of style, which is of course before the tender app, either way they will be getting the money from us. I would just rather it was spent on a beautiful kitchen instead of concrete I will never see

In my experience, I have found that if you request something from PD and they don't give it to you go to that persons immediate superior and ask for a reason why you can't get it... I mean $50,000 is a really unreasonable amount for them to expect someone to just "factor in" especially with WoS being so expensive and make this known to them!!

So my advice to you is call you BC then when they say they can't give you exact site costs go to their manager... when they give you the reason of "we just can't" or "this is how we always do it" then ask to speak to their boss and be happy with a close estimate... I found 3 levels is usually sufficient to get the point through that they see you want an answer and get it for you!!

Because really what is going to change between now and tender/contract in relation to your soil classification/foundation requirements (unless you decide at tender to do structural changes.)

That's my thought exactly, nothing is going to change?

I'll push a bit more with the BC and see what she says. It's just a worry as because they have put the 50k in the quote I can't see them giving it back even if they don't need that amount..

At sales we were told $20k for site costs. When we got to tender in November our site costs had more than doubled. They had the soil testing done in May so I was really annoyed that they waited until tender to hit us with over $40k site costs. At this stage we have not signed the tender document.

That's exactly what I'm worried about and there's nothing to say it won't go up again at Contract. For this reason I'm not happy about paying 3% at tender.

Ask for the site costs to be fixed at Tender. I will not be paying anything more until I know site costs will not change.

I haven't heard of them doing that though? What have they told you?

I am sure they will fix them at tender as long as all the soil tests have been completed. Ask your BC.

They have done 1 soil test but they say the costs are subject to a second soil test, which I think is ridiculous as what can have changed in 8-10 weeks??

We are building in a new development so our site can change as they are building roads, removing trees and hopefully compacting and levelling the soil. If there are any works done on your block they need the second soil test. Tell them you will not be signing or paying the deposit until they have performed the second soil test and fixed the site costs.

I'll try but they have already said they won't proceed to contract without the deposit being paid. Ours is an already established area so nothing will be changing as far as the soil is concerned.

Quite a bit can change in that time even if it is 8 to 10 weeks. Reactive soil is usually what they r looking for. If a house has been sitting there for 60 years and its finally seen daylight alot of things can change..

Sounds crazy however i remember an engineer explaining it in detail. And prob just another delay pd have u waiting for in anticipation of costs.