Browse Forums General Discussion 1 Oct 08, 2011 8:03 pm Hey Guys, Im New to this Forum and just chasing some info from ppl who have built in the Eucalypt estate. We have just bought in stage 22 which hopefully will title early (ish) next year, just at the point with the builder where we are talking about Site Costs. What has been Everyones experience with this so far in this estate, we have been quoted around 28k Fixed Site for a 32sq house, on a 590 block, seems a bit excessive but i know there is a fair amount of rock around. Is this realistic or just out of control? Kind of torn between subjecting it to a soil test or just fixing costs and not worrying about it again. What preparation are the developers doing to these blocks before title are they clearing any rock and engineering the land or are they just doing the bare minimum? Any Info would be great Cheers Anthony Re: Eucalypt Estate Epping North Site Costs 2Oct 09, 2011 5:29 am It also very heavily depends on slope as well - slope generally means needing to use piers and/or drop-edge beams (if not retaining walls), which is a double whammy, because just on their own they blow out your site costs significantly but if the builder does hit rock while excavating pier holes then there they will need to go through more rock as they have to dig deeper. The problem with soil tests is that they will only do three bore holes, so while they can be indicative of the soil type on your block they may not shed any light on the amount of rock the builder will encounter especially if they have to excavate for pier holes. The other problem is that blocks are hardly ever uniform when it comes to rock - you can have a shedload of rock on your block and your neighbour can have virtually none or vice versa, so it's always a gamble either way (it's still a good idea to get feedback from neighbours if there are any building close by, but if you are in a new release and removed from any current construction then what other people have found on their blocks might not necessarily indicate what you will get on yours). I don't know anything specifically about Eucalypt, but I can assure you that no developer will ever do anything about sub-surface rock - if there are boulders visible on the surface (ie 200-300mm from the required nominal ground level in the plans) then they will remove them but anything below the surface is on the builder (and by extension you) when they need to excavate to lay down the footings of your house. For the record my site costs in a hilly estate for a similar sized house on 800m2 are 21.5k with a 3.5k provision for rock - there were possible floaters at each bore hole as well, so I'm a little nervous at the moment. (it's not the size of the block that matters, it's the soil profile, slope and amount of rock across the building envelope that have the most impact) Some people apparently have nothing better to do than comment on other people's sigs. Re: Eucalypt Estate Epping North Site Costs 3Oct 12, 2011 5:18 pm WOW 28K seems excessive, i'm not at that stage yet of building at Eucalypt, my land should be registered soonish. I'm going to have to look at this, that's a lot for site cost. I know people that's building in the estate next to Eucalypt and they are only paying 5K. Re: Eucalypt Estate Epping North Site Costs 4Oct 15, 2011 9:39 am Do those people have as much fall or rock to contend with as those in Eucalypt? Are they building the same size house? My site costs (different estate) are coming in at about $26k with 2m of fall across the block and a bit over 1m of fall across the building envelope - we also have rock in the area so there is a provision for that too. Oh and is that "$5k" their total site cost, or the extra amount they have to pay on top of the "included" site cost provisions? The number quoted by the O.P. might very well be for the entire site cost amount (ie. he has no included site cost provision), so you need to compare apples to apples. Different builders do their site costs in different ways - with Big M our total site cost was estimated at the start rather than having some pretend provision for site costs included in the base price for the house. Other builders may follow the "included site cost" model factoring it into their base price, meaning the buyer only pays whatever excess amount there may be (they think they have saved money but really a large chunk of their site costs were added to the base price in the first place). Some people apparently have nothing better to do than comment on other people's sigs. Re: Eucalypt Estate Epping North Site Costs 5Oct 18, 2011 10:42 am pinoy WOW 28K seems excessive, i'm not at that stage yet of building at Eucalypt, my land should be registered soonish. I'm going to have to look at this, that's a lot for site cost. I know people that's building in the estate next to Eucalypt and they are only paying 5K. Which estate is that? $5k is stupidly low and I've never seen / heard anyone having costs that low in a new development. Re: Eucalypt Estate Epping North Site Costs 6Nov 27, 2011 9:29 am Hey guys, we just put a deposit on a block in Eucalypt aswell, currently we live in Highlands, but with the lack of a shopping centre, we've decided to move, and seeing we travel to Epping almost on a daily basis for all our needs, we decided with Eucalypt. One question comes to mind, and thats the design guidelines from Stockland. I'm wondering how effective they really are? As I'm planning on being owner builder (again) why couldn't I just submit my plans to council directly? I mean the land is mine? right? Reason I'm getting a bit annoyed with this is because (as you might already know) Stockland were the developers of my area, and we did everything they stated, built within 2 years, etc, etc. To the point we had to rush building because we were running out of time, but more importantly we built a house which IMHO isn't very energy efficient, and this was mainly due to the guidelines. On top of which, I have several neighbours who bought their land same time, and are still yet to finish their houses (some haven't even started!), plus the ones that have finished, didn't even comply to their guidelines, yet their houses still stand, and yes, they still live there. Talking to them, their response was, "My land, my house, stockland can go "F" themselves..I build what I want". My direct next door neighbour doesn't even have a driveway yet (after 4yrs of occupancy), nor is any of his land landscaped in anyway, infact, its quite disgusting. Now, I understand Stocklands motives, its to avoid people like that, people who'll leave their yard to be a mess, and not finish it nicely, I can understand with my neighbour, as they've probably ran out of money, but on the other hand, I went into A LOT of debt just to do what Stockland wanted...so I didn't find it fair. So, now, buying in a Stockland development area again, my initial thoughts on these guidelines that they've handed me upon deposit is, "F" that, I'm building what I want this time, not what you want! What I'm wondering is how effective my claims would be in front of a hearing, if it were to go that far. I'd think it would be thrown out of court, and dismissed. Re: Eucalypt Estate Epping North Site Costs 7Dec 09, 2011 11:13 pm I built in Lyndarum a couple years ago. Im currently building in Mernda. All house contracts come with a slab so you only pay the difference between your basic m class wafflepod and what your engineer says so need. My 400sqm Epping block that was flat was full of rock. 40 tonne ( 4 of the large trucks you see ) $160 a truck = $640 The site cut was done, excess soil filled in where the rocks came out, we had 2 trucks of clean fill delivered $200. Labour and truck was charged at 1600 for the day. = Epping site cut total = $2440 P class wafflepod slab upgrade with no peers was $2400 upgrade. My 570sqm Mernda block had 1.6 m of fall with no rock . we pulled out 170m of soil.. (17 trucks) The local clean fill places charge $70 per truck load.. cost $1190 then $150 and hour for a guy on a 10t excavator and his mate with a 10t truck 2 days, 8 hours a day =16 x 150 =2400 = MY mernda site cut was = $3590 M class raft slab upgrade 750mm peers $4700 upgrade. Now my builder had the site cut done but knew that i understood the costing. I Made it clear i would only pay the site cost once i saw the invoice he was charged.. He was happy to do so and i didnt get ripped off. Builders make so much money from site cuts.. Stand your ground and only pay what its worth. Hope this helps, I am not sure whether Perth has its own way of doing things in regards to this. Most of Perth has class A (sandy soil), except for some areas near rivers or hills. 2 13098 Is anyone building with Mojo and have a recent site cost tender 0 15952 Henley should give you some indication of site costs. Too many variable to give you any reasonable accuracy 1 1882 |