Browse Forums Building A New House Re: Boutique Homes 1381Jul 29, 2015 9:27 am I got ours the day before, because I chased them up for it. We were supposed to have received it about a week before, but it had slipped their mind (and mine too to be honest). Re: Boutique Homes 1382Jul 29, 2015 2:33 pm Email just in from Boutique: Quote: This week we have the tiler for main floor booked. To follow next week we have the jet master install scheduled. The sad thing is, all of the above was completed on Monday, two days ago... I can't be too surprised - these out-of-date communications are the norm. Re: Boutique Homes 1383Jul 29, 2015 3:49 pm [thefarmers] I'm finding communication is not a strong point either. Then again during a previous build I got a load of updates for various stages from Simonds including framing etc several months after we'd had handover so not the only builder to show scant regard in this area. Still no less frustrating. And that's before we sign!! Location - Geelong Land Purchased - Yep Builder - PD Model - Plaza Options - PWC signed - Colour App- Electrical- Build start date - Progress... Re: Boutique Homes 1384Jul 30, 2015 1:59 pm Well, in more positive news, we have a final inspection date - 3 1/2 weeks from now. While there are definite signs of having done a good job - there's still a few things that aren't right, and I'm skeptical they'll be finished by then. I met with the SS this morning, and he genuinly seems committed to doing things the right way, I get the feeling he's hamstrung by Boutique. I've got my independent inspector lined up as well - those guys are the best. If you haven't thought about it - you really should, for every stage. Re: Boutique Homes 1385Jul 31, 2015 3:01 pm Hi Guys After a bit of advice. A our original electrical appointment we where quoted on FTTH which we had been told was an estate requirement. I discovered at a later date this wasnt the case and asked what we would need for net in our home. They have given us the following options but I am not sure which one to choose seeing as I know nothing about NBN and what we will need to have internet when we eventually move in. hey have advised me that the estate will have NBN. They aren’t able to advise if it will be NBN ready when you move in or if it should just be prepped for NBN for the future roll out. With the information I have just received I would perhaps pick one of the below options (if any suit you?). You can : a)– You can get an NBN preparation pack which will run all your conduit and drawstring from the street to a connection to the home :$ 509.79 (you would still need to add at least a copper ph and or data point to the home for current use until NBN is in use ) (NBN will then need to come out and install a cabinet in the garage and do all internal phone and internet connections for you - they will most likely charge as well) b) – You can get the full NBN pack which would include a cabinet in the garage and all undergrounds plus x3 internal ph/ data points :$ 1735.74 (NBN will still need to come out and make a final connection for you, they will most likely charge as well) c) – You can place in copper phone and/or data points to the home for now and get NBN to do all undergrounds and connections to the home once they advise NBN will be coming to your street down the track. Any advice on which option to go with? Re: Boutique Homes 1386Aug 01, 2015 9:43 am baneshouse Hi Guys After a bit of advice. A our original electrical appointment we where quoted on FTTH which we had been told was an estate requirement. I discovered at a later date this wasnt the case and asked what we would need for net in our home. They have given us the following options but I am not sure which one to choose seeing as I know nothing about NBN and what we will need to have internet when we eventually move in. hey have advised me that the estate will have NBN. They aren’t able to advise if it will be NBN ready when you move in or if it should just be prepped for NBN for the future roll out. With the information I have just received I would perhaps pick one of the below options (if any suit you?). You can : a)– You can get an NBN preparation pack which will run all your conduit and drawstring from the street to a connection to the home :$ 509.79 (you would still need to add at least a copper ph and or data point to the home for current use until NBN is in use ) (NBN will then need to come out and install a cabinet in the garage and do all internal phone and internet connections for you - they will most likely charge as well) b) – You can get the full NBN pack which would include a cabinet in the garage and all undergrounds plus x3 internal ph/ data points :$ 1735.74 (NBN will still need to come out and make a final connection for you, they will most likely charge as well) c) – You can place in copper phone and/or data points to the home for now and get NBN to do all undergrounds and connections to the home once they advise NBN will be coming to your street down the track. Any advice on which option to go with? If it is a new estate then D is not an option. Any new estate must be cabled with fibre. You should be able to follow the NBN rollout timelines online but it should be available before your build finishes. http://www.mynbn.info/map may have more info. Re: Boutique Homes 1387Aug 01, 2015 9:47 am QuarumNibblet baneshouse Hi Guys After a bit of advice. A our original electrical appointment we where quoted on FTTH which we had been told was an estate requirement. I discovered at a later date this wasnt the case and asked what we would need for net in our home. They have given us the following options but I am not sure which one to choose seeing as I know nothing about NBN and what we will need to have internet when we eventually move in. hey have advised me that the estate will have NBN. They aren’t able to advise if it will be NBN ready when you move in or if it should just be prepped for NBN for the future roll out. With the information I have just received I would perhaps pick one of the below options (if any suit you?). You can : a)– You can get an NBN preparation pack which will run all your conduit and drawstring from the street to a connection to the home :$ 509.79 (you would still need to add at least a copper ph and or data point to the home for current use until NBN is in use ) (NBN will then need to come out and install a cabinet in the garage and do all internal phone and internet connections for you - they will most likely charge as well) b) – You can get the full NBN pack which would include a cabinet in the garage and all undergrounds plus x3 internal ph/ data points :$ 1735.74 (NBN will still need to come out and make a final connection for you, they will most likely charge as well) c) – You can place in copper phone and/or data points to the home for now and get NBN to do all undergrounds and connections to the home once they advise NBN will be coming to your street down the track. Any advice on which option to go with? If it is a new estate then D is not an option. Any new estate must be cabled with fibre. You should be able to follow the NBN rollout timelines online but it should be available before your build finishes. http://www.mynbn.info/map may have more info. Little confused by what you mean as D is not an option? Yes it's a new estate earlier stages the developer provided Fibre to the home with crazy restrictions on points etc. our stage isn't covered under this and we are getting conflicting info from the builder and developer. I don't understand any of it Should we go with option A or B with Boutique? The nbnco website doesn't list our future address yet as our land isn't going to title until next month (fingers crossed) Re: Boutique Homes 1388Aug 01, 2015 7:20 pm I know it costs more, but I'd say get the house wired correctly from the start. I'd go with option "b" as you will most likely be able to group that up in your mortgage. Plus once the house is done, you'll probably be wanting to spend your $$ on blinds, landscaping and lights! One less major cost to worry about! Re: Boutique Homes 1389Aug 02, 2015 10:20 pm I agree with Szep - get it all done from the get go. In saying that I have no idea about NBN. The Farmers - so glad that the end is (hopefully) in sight. I wonder if the fire is treated like appliances - they don't want to put it in until the end so it doesn't get stollen??? Seems funny they don't listen to the jet master people. Our build has officially started - we have had the site cut, a retaining wall, and the plumbing done. Yeah!!! Looking forward to seeing some more action this week. (I hope) Have a good week everyone. Blog: www.dapplegrey.com.au Re: Boutique Homes 1390Aug 03, 2015 12:10 pm baneshouse Little confused by what you mean as D is not an option? Yes it's a new estate earlier stages the developer provided Fibre to the home with crazy restrictions on points etc. our stage isn't covered under this and we are getting conflicting info from the builder and developer. I don't understand any of it Should we go with option A or B with Boutique? The nbnco website doesn't list our future address yet as our land isn't going to title until next month (fingers crossed) Basically, I'm assuming when you talk about "wiring for copper" you are meaning the old copper network that will connect to your house, not your internal wiring (even if you wire internally with cat6 cable everywhere it's still copper, it's just a cable) as pretty much no one wires their house internally for fibre as very little devices actually have fibre connectors. If you are talking about your estate connecting to your house, pretty much the only option here is fibre if it is in a new estate area as that is what is mandated by the government, so - if your developer is doing anything else they are in violation of the telecommunications act. See: https://www.communications.gov.au/polic ... velopments Also section 3.3.3 : https://www.communications.gov.au/docum ... 7-May-2015 The first link has a section to the act - it basically says "in existing areas (brownfields) NBN can choose the access technology, but in greenfields (new developments) it is expects that connections will be FTTP unless there is a serious case for it not to be." Interestingly, it now also lists costs to the developer for putting NBN in as $600/single unit (house) and $400 per unit for multi dwelling units. Kinda makes you wonder why builders tend to charge around the $1500 mark, then try to charge an additional $500 for an "NBN pack" Oh wells. It should be kept in mind as well, that cat6 (data cable) can happily be used for telephone cables as well, so there is no point in wiring specifically in your house for a telephone outlet - just make everything data points. You then buy an adaptor that plugs into each end of the cable to adapt to the telephone plug which only uses one of the data cable pairs. (search for RJ11 to RJ45 adaptor) - Get these cabled back to a central location, and then a couple of cables run from the NBN cabinet (usually in the garage) to this location as well (you can probably do with just one but two future proofs) and you should be good to go. Re: Boutique Homes 1391Aug 03, 2015 12:22 pm baneshouse Yes it's a new estate earlier stages the developer provided Fibre to the home with crazy restrictions on points etc. our stage isn't covered under this and we are getting conflicting info from the builder and developer. Oh, and this sounds like the developer changed telecommunications providers half way through, this is not that uncommon. It sounds like the first half of the estate was cabled with someone like Opticomm who do put some crazy restrictions on how things are done in your house, NBN tends to be a lot more laid back (as are Telstra), where they will put the devices up to a certain point on your house then the rest is entirely up to you. Re: Boutique Homes 1392Aug 03, 2015 4:34 pm Hey guys, Building with Boutique in Harpley Estate. Do you guys find fixed costs of $20,000 a bit excessive? I'm building the Oslo 29 and can't wait for it to happen already. So far though, my experience with Boutique has been so-so. New home advisor was OK until she left all of a sudden after getting us signed. Been dealing with pre-sales consultant who is pretty good, but finding all the changes really frustrating. New colour showroom introduced in April not that great either. Had 2 walk throughs already, and came up with more questions after. It is so hard to choose/prepare when 1. file they provided to us was outdated (pamphlets containing wall/render colours, appliances, etc) 2. wall/render colours are different to what boutique and supplier provides 3. process changed from colours, electrical, and HIA to colours, HIA, then electrical. the question i have is how can i sign and agree to a contract price when electrical has not been done yet 4. lucky there's 6 months in between my land being settled and the time signing the HIA. i still have so many questions unanswered. Re: Boutique Homes 1393Aug 03, 2015 7:14 pm [frenchwontons] Depending on the land you're building I wouldn't call $20k excessive, but then I know somebody building a single story on the best soil that paid less than $20k site costs. I agree that the pre build lead up could be improved a lot. The need for customer preparation is something that is not understood and I've brought this up with them. I got nervous about signing the HIA prior to colours and electrical so I asked to sign last and it was no problem, I'm so glad we did due to various unforeseen costs and questions which I feel we'd have had less success dealing with if we had already signed. So I'd definitely recommend signing last off and also checking through all paperwork very carefully. I'm hoping the build stage is more organised. Location - Geelong Land Purchased - Yep Builder - PD Model - Plaza Options - PWC signed - Colour App- Electrical- Build start date - Progress... Re: Boutique Homes 1394Aug 03, 2015 7:49 pm Hello all. Longtime lurker finally coming out of the woodwork. We're currently building in inner west Melbourne. Getting close to lock up stage! (donovansdaily, we are basically building across the road from you, looking at your blog!) A sort-of-not-that-brief summary... we bought the block back in August 2013. We had a baby arrive in Dec 2013 which slowed us down in terms of getting our act together to pick a design & colours etc. Land titled in June 2014. Signed colours in Aug 2014. Contract in Oct 2014. Then we found out we needed to do a report & consent - that our brand new neighbours, who'd just moved in, could object to us building. Rather unanticipated by, well, anyone - including the developers who pretty much put us in that situation with the way they laid out & staged the development. This set us back many months. We had a really nice prestart consultant during that drawn out limbo time, she was super supportive & really happy for us when we finally got our building permit. After what felt like FOR-EV-AH we went to construction in May. So far our experience has been mostly positive. We really lacked confidence in our sales dude, but our prestart ladies were lovely. Paperwork has had a few errors & had to be checked with a finetooth comb. Luckily my partner is a bit obsessive about details & he picks up on everything! Re: Boutique Homes 1395Aug 03, 2015 7:55 pm frenchwontons Hey guys, Building with Boutique in Harpley Estate. Do you guys find fixed costs of $20,000 a bit excessive? Our site costs was in the region of $30k... so it doesn't sound excessive to me. I guess it depends on what sort of site class your land is. Ours is the crappiest one, obv. Re: Boutique Homes 1396Aug 04, 2015 10:58 am Wow. That's hell of a lot jamtart. I guess lucky to those who have their site costs below 10,000. Apparently land at Harpley is class P (problematic). Re: Boutique Homes 1397Aug 04, 2015 11:48 am frenchwontons Hey guys, Building with Boutique in Harpley Estate. Do you guys find fixed costs of $20,000 a bit excessive? Ours are about $22k, so like the others have said, not too excessive and not really unusual. I have my fingers crossed that we're being handed over to construction tomorrow. Hopefully not long after that we may actually begin to build this thing Re: Boutique Homes 1398Aug 05, 2015 5:38 pm If the prebuild is anything to go by I can see the build being very work intensive for me. I may have to go part time to manage it! Currently the only thing stopping me putting this project on hold and looking into other builder options is my wife's feelings and love for the house we have designed. The thing that's really annoying me is the fact that this is only the beginning and once signed up there may well be no improvement. I'm stretching my own expectation deadlines to the limit at the moment. Apologies for the grumble but this seems to be the best place to vent my frustrations with people in similar positions or who may even give hope or inspiration for the coming months\years??? Location - Geelong Land Purchased - Yep Builder - PD Model - Plaza Options - PWC signed - Colour App- Electrical- Build start date - Progress... Re: Boutique Homes 1399Aug 05, 2015 10:17 pm Hi Nasher, The pre start process was painful at best for us. We almost pulled the pin a few times as we just couldn't believe how bad communication and boutiques pre start consultants understanding was. That said, we persisted and am happy to say, the building process has been easier. That said, it is not without its pains, and you will need to still be on top of it. The best thing you'll find is once the build starts and the frame is up, it feels amazing. On a side note, our stairs were installed at the house this week, however boutique ordered the wrong ones... Our ss is on holidays this week, so he should come back to lots of fun next week. At least the trades can get upstairs whilst they sort the incorrect order out. Re: Boutique Homes 1400Aug 06, 2015 8:05 am Thanks for those words of support Szep. It's good to know it's not just our high expectations of good customer support but that the pain is and has been felt by others. Pulling the pin has been discussed here a few times and some browsing was indeed done last night. Up to now this has been the best house design for us and due to time invested this is why we are still hanging in. I really am hoping that the build is smoother but at least the house is being built within a few Km of our house and on my way home from work so a frequent visitor I'll be. Thanks again Location - Geelong Land Purchased - Yep Builder - PD Model - Plaza Options - PWC signed - Colour App- Electrical- Build start date - Progress... 10 16271 I would never build with Fowler homes. I built with them in 2021 and till date maintenance issues are pending. All their existing trades and businesses don't work with… 14 109429 |