Building with Masterton

We selected this nice beautiful house we fell in love with but after all the colour selections, tiles , stair cases - comes out to have an additional extra of 49k all what you see and from the display are not what you will get. We moved from one builder to the above coz we thought Masterton are throwing in a few extras but after all in end of to more than the original builder that we picked ..- again hopefully the quality of the build will be better with Masterton- building industry are too much rip off — should not be allowed to display a home that is highly upgraded.

I'm surprised the ACCC hasn't gone through them for what they do. In other industries, you need to clearly call out every upgrade, and display the price of the upgraded model. If you ask, they'll tell you the "as built" price, but it should be printed on the brochure they hand out. And upgrades should be labelled as you walk through, or at the very least put in a list that is included in the brochure.

I've seen some that the upgrades cost the same again as the base house.

Very true!!! What you see should be what you get. But unfortunately not with this industry. Obviously if you moved away form what the display is you are not getting the same that you wanted for your house. In a lot of cases you fall in - love because of the look of it. Only to find out the extra groove on the kitchen cupboard are extra the sink are extra, the taps displayed is not what you get. Charging $200 Per tap and we researched this tap in displays buying through “ alibaba” or Allie express only fir $50. They marked it more than double .. obviously the end game is you don’t want to move in your house without the tap or the stairs. No wander people are finding it hard to build a house of their dreams.

Have you reported the details to the ACCC? See https://www.accc.gov.au/publications/ad ... ng-selling (False or misleading claims on page 6). If you have not already done so, I suggest lodging a complaint here: https://www.accc.gov.au/contact-us/cont ... umer-issue The more complaints the ACCC receives about an issue, company or industry the more likely they are to act.

I will wait till my house is in the handover as I don’t any further issue. I just worried if I lodge my complaints now. My house will have problems or issues left and right. The proof is always going be there. I am sure a lot of people who are building a house would ran to the same issues as mine. They can turn around and says “ oh you didn’t need to take all the extras added to that house. Then again why display it !! Display the standard house then have a book of all extras that can be added .. in the end if you strip all those upgrades added to their display - then you will walked to the display, the design is then what you are concentrating with “ not the upgraded tiles, taps, kitchen doors and vanities they added to it.. it will be more realistic .. as at the moment you look at the price value in the book then you walk in to the displays is really 2 different things after all the colour selections, brick selection and don and so forth.
But I will definitely lodge something with proof of everything once these are done !!! I don’t want to delay my house building and ran to a problem at this stage.

I went to home world to see those beautiful display homes and you can ask the builder to provide you a copy of upgrade list for their display home, it has details of all optional upgrade items and price, what I have found out that majority of the display homes are at least $200k above their base price due to heavily addon items. My advice for you build is that you need to read line by line on your building/tender contract to see what you will get.

I think you have misunderstood the point here. I am quite aware of the extras and variation. I think the whole point of the initial conversation was why draws you to the highly upgraded displays. It’s like saying I saw a bar of lollies when I took it to the counter to pay only to be told the packets are extra because of the designs in it .. if you walked in to a displays homes unless you have had previously built a house you have no idea. I would be surprise if everyone could remember to think of asking about the extra grooves in my kitchen cupboard are extra, that the cutlery holders plastic one to stainless steel are additional, that air conditioning vents to a different style vent are extra. How many buyers will be able remember asking these when here you are, you are already drawn to the beauty of the house, that size of the basin and the shapes are extra. Many builders have tricky quotes with exclusions and disclaimers specially designed to trap their customers with extra costs later. I think this is the initial point of this conversation.

Some builders use price as the bait for their false and misleading advertising. It's a dirty little secret - they offer a cheap price on an attractive looking model home, and then, once you've begun to build your new home, they pressure you into buying "add-ons."
Up-charging and charging people more than what is fair means selling you something at an exorbitant price. Unfortunately, unethical new home builders often use this method during your home building process (it's more common than you might think).

Here's how it's done: first, they get you in the door with their unbelievably low prices. Then, when you're already locked into the building process, if they can talk you into any upgraded items, they're going to do it. The reason is simple - they're going to be able to add a huge markup to those items they're adding onto the bill.

Totally get what you are saying and it should be mandatory for them to disclose every upgrade that the display home has and the pricing to do so.
My elderly parents are building a very small project home and we chose a Design and then chose the Façade that we wanted.
The Façade we chose was because of the look and also it met requirements of not having Face brick as per one of the Design requirements of the subdivision. It was explained that the Façade we chose was an extra $15000 on the base price and all the extras that it was going to cost regarding cut and fill, integrated retaining, extra security fencing etc. We Received a proposal Signed a contract.
We found out that to have the Home to look like the Facade we chose it would be $6000 extra to have any of the rendered columns or walls as even though the Facade is rendered that the price did not include render. So the wall will be Blue Board at handover. And the columns will be face brick and any other brick work would be left as face brick, which is mot allowed within the subdivison designs guidelines. The project builders cost to have any render or paining of the brickwork was so overpriced, and the budget was to its limits with all the other extras that were not included. The Facade shows Axon boards installed vertically but To have it as it shows on the Facade it would be extra as the price only included Primeline boards installed horizontally and if you wanted them Axon vertical that would be an huge upgrade. So realistically the image of the Facade is very misleading and it should be classed as false advertising. Very dissappointing and wrong that this is allowed to happen.

I am or we are so disappointed as you are. I understand that they will give you or tell you what are the extras .. but the whole point is the misleading displays where they highly upgraded … very misleading. Just what example is the the wall of the displays have all this nice grooves in it .. who would think is an extra… we were give so many downlight on the package but the amount downlights given is not enough to lit the whole house so we have to ask for bulbs in the others now we were charge extra for that . Would it be realistic to say if you build a house you have to have enough lights to it .. who would think the rails in the stairs are extra .. I am not sure why builders are allowed to operate this way to be honest . If you go to a retail store what you see is what you get unfortunately in this industry are very much rip off ..

Why don’t they put the display home as all standard so that the package what we see is what we get ..then by then the customers can chose who has the better deals. They should display the standard homes including all the standard fittings in that way the customers will be more drawn on the actual characteristics of the designs

I’m not sure where you are located but when we looked at the displays I asked the sales person if any on display we’re close to standard inclusions and was directed to one house to look at as an example - we went to so many but I think it was at Warwick farm.