Simonds Palisade in Adelaide

Hey guys,

It has been quite a journey, but we are well on our way to building our first and dream home this year, with Simonds.

We initially signed our Sales Advice back on 24/12/2018, and that began the entire process. We have had a lot of set backs including financial situations, as we are getting a grant from Simonds, but the bank didn't consider that as part of our deposit. We also made some changes and they have also set the build back. We have had a mix of high/low feelings, almost pulled out a few times and definitely reconsidered our options. But through persistence we have continued through the journey and are well on our way.

We finally signed the final contract on 30/03/2019, with a few post variation adjustments. Two long months later, with a lot of back and forth with the bank, we finally received unconditional approval on the 04/06/2019. Once this was through, there were yet again some more issues with the bank regarding documentation, after which we reached settlement on the 26/06/2019. We are now about to go to site as I post this.

In regards to the house, we are building Simonds Palisade, on a 420 square meter block!




We have gone with the Simonds Precinct TurnKey package, so we have selected the Oyster colour theme, but with the Mystique exterior brick colour.





We have made some upgrades, such as:

• 3.6m ceilings in the Kitchen/Dining/Living area.
• We have raised the standard ceiling height to 2.7m
• Adding a full reverse cycle system in the entire house
• We are extending the wall in the ensuite next to the toilet and adding a door, so the toilet can be closed off.
• We are adding a cluster of three pendants in the kitchen, and will have a little coffee nook near the hallway entrance.
• Both bathrooms will have niches.
• Adding a cold water tap point near the refrigerator.

We are upgrading our sliding doors/windows in the kitchen/dining/living area to a four panel sliding door, to create a similar effect to the Sierra in Blakes Crossing.





We have put our pendants on lay-by with Beacon Lighting, as they recently had a sale, and then another sale ontop of that sale. So we wanted to secure the prices. Our kitchen pendants are the glass diamonds with black pendant, but we are not having the brass deco ring. We also bought the large black pendant for our entryway as well, as we have a large round black mirror, and want to get a black/timber entryway buffet.




Once we move in, we plan on decking the area to the left side of the house to turn it into an alfresco area. It measures 3.66m from the house to fence, so we would like to deck the area, and have a timber pergola, similar to:





I will keep this updated and if I remember anything that I have forgotten, I will post it!

We're excited to share this journey!


The journey so far:
24/12/2018 - Sales Advice Signed
30/03/2019 - Contract Signing Date
04/06/2019 - Financial Unconditional Approval
26/06/2019 - Settlement Completion Date
18/07/2019 - Slab Poured
31/07/2019 - Frame Completed
07/08/2019 - Roof Tiling Completed
- -/ - - / - - - - Bricks Layed

Well done to you both, some exciting times ahead. I look forward to following your posts.

I love the selections, just perfect

I am guessing you have opted for the low deposit option with Simonds as you mentioned the grant ? May I ask what area you opted to build in?

We are looking at a different builder that offers the same low deposit scheme and are truly petrified about valuation. We are looking at building in Evanston.

Hey MissSoph,

We are building in ________, and we did run into a valuation issue. Our valuation was at a shortfall of $7k, just because of the land size.

Excellent choices with the color selection, plan looks perfect, we are building QLD. I've liked the simonds house plans they are timeless.

Yeah, we actually walked into the Sierra display home in SA, and we absolutely loved the layout and the raised ceilings. The only thing that put my wife off was no WIP. But our Sales Consultant showed us the Palisade, as it is almost identical to the Sierra, but features the pantry!

Yes, that's tricky stuff with a grant, glad you persisted!

Yeah, we are glad we persisted too. However, we've hit another barrier where we were told that the grant would be supplied at settlement, but now our builder is saying it won't be until handover. We have told our builder that the grant being supplied at settlement was the incentive to go with this particular build, so hopefully that gets sorted.

BUT! On more exciting news, we received an email last Thursday stating that the plans are being handed over to the site supervisor, and that site works should start this week, and we have an appointment with our site supervisor on Friday!

We had a sudden urge to check on our site, as we hadn't seen it in a while, and we arrived to this:



We were absolutely over the moon!! It feels officially official now!!

We have an update on the grant! One of the head managers has pushed for our case, and the team at Simonds are allowing the handing over the grant to us now that we are at settlement, as this is what we were told when we signed our Sales Advice!!

How exciting and great colour choices. The pendants are absolutely beautiful. 😍 I look forward to follow your build. We are building the Melrose 239. Very similar layout to the palisade except we have another bedroom / study right before the living area and a kids retreat in front of bedrooms 3&4.

Thanks MzMelrose, I saw your plans in the Simonds Selection book, it looks wonderful! I love the layout of the Palisade!

We went to site on Saturday to check up, and there has been a fair amount of work, definitely ready for the pour!



We also had our Site Start meeting, in which we found out our CRC is leaving and is getting replaced. We met our new one and she is lovely! Our site supervisor seems like a genuine guy, and we're very comfortable with him! He noticed a few issues, in particular, our AC unit is too close to the clothesline, so he is moving the unit!

They also said during the meeting that if the weather permitted, they would pour the slab today, however the rain today would say otherwise. So Thursday onward looks a little clearer, so I guess we're aiming for then.

Hey everyone!

Been a bit of a full on few weeks. My wife had surgery last week on Tuesday to have her gallbladder removed! She's recovering well and is back at work.

We also met up with our site supervisor the previous week, he is a very nice guy. We're super confident in him, as he skimmed over our plans and saw that our AC unit was too close to the clothesline, so he has moved the unit!

On the weekend we swung by our block and were surprised by this amazing gem:



They have poured the slab and have begun work on our frame! The glorious football posts show our 3.6m tall ceilings!

Hey everyone,

Another update on the house! Our tradies worked hard on Saturday to pump out this much of our frame:




We are over the moon!

The builder did mention they are expecting the frame to be finished by Friday, so I'm not sure if they meant frame stage (so roof tiles and walls), or if they just meant the frame, but either way, its still super exciting!

Hey everyone,

We've been a bit absent as we've had a pretty full-on month.

My wife had her gallbladder removed, and has been recovering tremendously well from that. Amongst work being busy and trying to fit in a social life, we've been popping down to the site every now and then!

So now, not only is the frame done, we have a fully tiled roof! The windows are all fitted and they've begun the brick work! It was awesome to see our tall ceilings and the large door/window!

The mystique brick is a little different to what we remember seeing in the Gallery, but it's starting to grow on us. We thought we were getting a darker black brick, but the Mystique seems to have hues of brown and red.

Nonetheless, here is some of the progress:













We're very happy with the progress so far!

Hey everyone,

We have more updates! The house has been fully insulated, and they have actually started our plasterboard! The brick layer was sick last Wednesday, but he returned Monday! We're expected to hit lockup on the 23rd of August, if all goes well!

Here are some more photos:

Hey everyone,

Even more progress over the weekend! We managed to get inside and take a couple of pics! Our plasterboard appears to be fully done, and we've been informed that our Brick Layer should be finished by Friday!


Our brick layer is doing an incredible job! Our mystique bricks are starting to settle and the mortar drying is definitely helping the look of the house! One of our front pillars is fully bricked too, and he has used some of the overly red bricks in the pillar, so they don't stand out on the external walls, as the pillars will eventually be rendered!

Hey everyone,

It's been a while since we've done the update, but a lot has been happening! Our builders are absolutely smashing through the house and we're still dead-on track!

So since the last progress, the carpenters have swept through and installed everything, including kitchen cabinets, bathroom/laundry cabinets, cornices, skirtings and architraves! The tiler has been delayed, so he should start sometime this week!

Our walls are all covered with a first coat of paint! And they've begun sealing the wet areas ready for tiles! We were informed that this week should see the completion of tiling, and eave carpentry!

Here are the photos so far:

We have also encountered a couple of issues, that will hopefully get resolved this week.

We noticed there was no capped water point in the refridgerator space, which our site supervisor said would get fixed last week, but we're still waiting to hear back about that.

Secondly, the power outlet in our little coffee nook area was placed just above the skirting boards, but we requested it to be raised to 800FFL.

The last thing we noticed was the air-conditioner cords for the external unit have been installed in the original location, which our site supervisor said he wanted to move.

So we'll hopefully hear back from our site supervisor soon about them, but he's confident that these should be small, quick-fix jobs!

Your house entry from the outside and high stud height in the kitchen looks great. In regards to the capped water point missing in the refrigerator space, is it missing plumbing there altogether? If so, I do wonder how they will cleanly install a plumbing point behind the fridge without running either the plumbing pipe outside the GIB or ripping off the GIB behind it and then run the pipes through the frame and re gibbing it. Power outlet height will be simple enough to resolve. The air conditioner cords, is that the piping? If so then without breaking through the cladding or running the pipes outside via conduit, will not be an easy fix either?

Thanks, we love the overall height in this build! Thats the thing we fell in love with!

There is no internal piping through the fridge wall. Our site supervisor did say that that entire wall is 90% empty space, so it'll be easy to run the pipes through, which means they will be ripping off the GIB.

He also said that the airconditioner unit will be re-routed through the internals, so my guess is they will be ripping through the walls again, and split off the electrical line to the new location.


My wife actually called the supervisor today and said that there are some major changes going on in head office (Which there have been, as our CRC has resigned, and there have been a few issues regarding that), so because of these changes, his requests to get the contractors back on site have been pushed back.

So some updates!

We had a walkthrough with our site supervisor last week to see some of the progress. Our tiles are done, outside carpentry is completed, they've begun painting the outside cladding and rendering, and will proceed to flooring soon after. Flooring was supposed to finish this week but has been delayed due to "sickness" according to our supervisor.

In our meeting last week, we were estimated that we could have our PCI by the 28th Oct, and potentially sign-off the following Monday. We informed our current rental landlord of this, as we have to give them 4 weeks notice. However, this flooring delay has put us out, and we are waiting to hear back from our supervisor for clarity on dates.

Having said that, our powerpoint in the coffee nook has been moved up to the correct position (even though the electrician moved the wrong one first). The cold-water point has been added, it is hidden nicely behind the overhead cupboards (hence why we couldn't find it). The AC unit is still in the same place, but that is still on the list to move.

Here are the progress pictures so far:












We're getting really close now! Exciting and scary!