Browse Forums Building A New House Re: Anyone heard of PLACES HOMES LAND LIFE builder??? 61May 12, 2010 1:00 pm From my contract experience to date, as you have signed off on the drawings, you have accepted the design in its current state. any changes will be a variation and you will be liable for costs associated. you may be lucky though. good luck with it. cheers Steve Re: Anyone heard of PLACES HOMES LAND LIFE builder??? 65Apr 27, 2011 1:50 am Hi unhappycustomer, Which house are you building and where? I thought if you've purchased a house and land package that site fees were fixed cost. Is this perhaps the extra amount your talking about when you went to sign? Just wondered how you would know what site fees or works are required to build the house correctly? At least you'd be safe in the knowledge that you home has been built solidly from the ground up and won't start moving, causing large cracks and major problems in a few years! Could you please explain what you are referring to as 'requested to build the house as an order job'? I can't believe a builder wouldn't allow you to make changes to the house as this is where they make their money! I don't know of anyone who builds a house but doesn't change anything from standard, whether it be windows, doors, bricks, roof or upgrades internally such as kitchen bench top or cupboards. Seems very odd! I have to ask how the developer informed you that your original plans would be better suited if the builder never submitted them? How did you find out this information from the developer? In my experience, apart from general information on estate requirements, they normally don't liaise with the owner unless you are an owner/builder. I understand you have had some difficulties, but if there's any stretch of the truth going on, I would be careful as defamation laws still apply on here and I would not want to take on PD solicitors. I hope your luck changes soon. Re: Anyone heard of PLACES HOMES LAND LIFE builder??? 66Apr 27, 2011 8:06 am By order job I mean we didn't take one of their so called packages. This meant that we didn't pay a ridiculous amount of money for site costs. The land was flat and solid and they knew that. There should never have been these site costs in the first place. When I had a meeting with the developers, I showed them the plans the builder told us to have then told them what we wanted. The developer agreed with us, not the builder. They were reluctant to allow us to make these changes. Yes, we paid top dollar for the changes such as colourbond roof and windows but the builder does not like to make changes because apparently it makes it too hard for them. Re: Anyone heard of PLACES HOMES LAND LIFE builder??? 67Apr 27, 2011 8:54 am unhappycustomer By order job I mean we didn't take one of their so called packages. This meant that we didn't pay a ridiculous amount of money for site costs. The land was flat and solid and they knew that. There should never have been these site costs in the first place. Our block was supposed to be a fixed h&l package.....but.....it became an order job. The reason was because of the 800mm fall from the land to the road. The builder couldn't fix the site costs because they didn't know how the land was cut and filled. The point of all this is that when our block became an order job our site costs INCREASED! Doubled in fact! I wish it stayed as a house and land package, I would be 7grand richer now! So much trouble you have had...is it too late to cut your losses and run?? Re: Anyone heard of PLACES HOMES LAND LIFE builder??? 68Apr 27, 2011 9:01 am And that is the problem. The builders are happy to do a package if they know they don't have to do any work on the site prior to construction. They charge you site costs when they don't need to and if they can see there will be work needed, they make you do an order job and charge you even more. In ours and probable 30 other blocks in our estate, there was no work to be done on site prior to construction but they tried to charge site costs. Obviously we did not pay them but everyone else paid them when it was unnessassary. It's too late to cut our losses. I was going to cancel the contract early on in the building phase but somehow they convinced me to continue. I wish I had of cancelled the contract when I was going to. We will not accept handover until everything is 100% perfect, regardless how long it takes. They have 1 week until the contract time is up then they have to pay us $250 a week for every week they're late. The stress and anxiety caused by this process is unforgivable though. Re: Anyone heard of PLACES HOMES LAND LIFE builder??? 69Apr 27, 2011 9:11 am Our site costs did include the upgraded slab to p. At least for the money I know I have the top of the range slab! So, what was the package you got? Surely a package means fixed costs? Or am I being naive? Re: Anyone heard of PLACES HOMES LAND LIFE builder??? 70Apr 27, 2011 9:19 am Which house are you building and where?? A friend of a friend and one of our employee's are building with them, so I just find it strange that changes and upgrades were welcomed and expected for them and yet not for you. As far as the block being flat, yes that would mean no cut and fill or retaining walls would be required, but if the land has already been leveled by the developer or has previously been used for farming or large trees once grew there leaving the root system, the earth may be unstable or it may be a rock prone area all of which would mean that your home will require piering to create a stable foundation. Unless the builder has xray vision, there is no way of knowing. Sometimes even when the soil test finds none of the above, when they start to build these things may still occur. I have read many stories on this forum of site fees being as high as $65,000! In fact one of the ladies in the PD displays told us of her own experience of this exact thing happening to her costing her in excess of $80,000. This is meant to be a forum to share your experience, good and bad, but not the place to come to just rant. My opinion and I will leave it at that. Good luck Re: Anyone heard of PLACES HOMES LAND LIFE builder??? 71Apr 27, 2011 9:25 am We didn't get the package because were originally quoted the cost of the land and the cost of the house. When we went to put the deposit on, they added another $10,000 and told us that was there package price. They advertised that site costs were included but they were only included after they added on the extra costs. We knew that our land didnt require any work and so did the builders. The builders had a copy of the engineering plan and so sis we, so we all knew there was no need for any work on the site prior to construction. We eventually convinced the builder to let us do it as an order job which meant we didn't pay the site costs. I just feel sorry for all the other people in the same estate who paid the money for nothing. Re: Anyone heard of PLACES HOMES LAND LIFE builder??? 72Apr 27, 2011 9:52 am Actually, another thing, looking back over the sh!tlist....a few mistakes were made due to incorrect plans being given to the tradies...so did you submit your altered plans to the builder? What construction plans did you sign off on? Where are you at anyway?. Re: Anyone heard of PLACES HOMES LAND LIFE builder??? 73May 01, 2011 12:25 am We built with them 18 months ago. I got to admit. Ive built houses before kinda knew what to expect. However wasn't prepared for the amount of problems we are encountering. We have numberous walls that where at some spots up to 15 mm out of square. We have had blocked toilets for almost a year took the plumbers 8 visits to work out what was wrong. It also seem now that we have a problem where the house is starting to sink into one corner which we have been trying to get on to them about. This has created about 20 or so cracks in the house happy to attach some photos. Because of the house sinking we now have problems with all our doors and windows opening. Ive spoke to an independant builder who believes they may have to underpin the house. We also had pipes leeking in our wall. ( I thought thats why plumbers pressure tested). Numberous other problems which could go on and on. Places claim the severe it is due to the wether however, spoke to both my neighbours and neither have cracks (built with metricon) and certainly don't have sinking houses. Fairly fed up with them. To be honest. All in all building with places has been a distaster and yes they do fix things eventually but 18 months later I'm still waiting and still finding more major problems with the house. These guys are reasonably new on the scene. There will always be a lag time between when they build and the problems they find. ATM their maitenance guy is flat out and there is no wonder. Id hate to be building with them now as Its only gonna get worse the more houses they have out there. I have actually waited along time hoping the problems would be fixed that I wouldn't have to take this to a public forum like this. From a sales and administration point of view places was excellent. No doubt the best I have dealt when building a house. http://img853.imageshack.us/slideshow/w ... g0247o.jpg here is a link to some of the photos I have uploaded of some of our walls. This where taken today. There are serval more however these ones are the worst of them. Total Breeze Air Conditioning and Electrical - Based in Melbourne http://www.totalbreeze.com.au Re: Anyone heard of PLACES HOMES LAND LIFE builder??? 74May 27, 2011 3:55 pm Places Homes teams up to create dream design portfolio Just wanted to share some Porter Davis news with you, we will be undertaking a brand consolidation of Places Homes. The consolidation means that Places properties will be transferred into Porter Davis Homes group, so we will have even more stunning designs under the PD brand. For those of you who aren’t aware of Places Homes, it was founded in 2008 during which time many first and new home buyers discovered an affordable opportunity to build a brand new home with a stunning range of bespoke Places designs. The consolidation of brands will not affect Places’ existing obligations, as all current customer and supplier contracts will be honoured and construction will continue as planned. Also the entirety of the Places staff will be transitioning into Porter Davis Homes group. The rebranding program is due to commence on 1 June and all current Places and Porter Davis display homes will remain open, with Places Homes being rebranded by 1 July 2011. Current or existing Places Homes clients can call their local Porter Davis Lifestyle office for any further information. East – 9709 1200. North – 8467 1200. West – 9363 9555. Porter Davis Homes Questions? Call 1800PORTER Mon - Fri 9am-8pm Sat - Sun 10am-4pm info@porterdavis.com.au http://blog.porterdavis.com.au/ http://www.porterdavishomes.com.au You should pressure clean your roof first and make sure the paint you buy also is anti mould. 4 18564 Sounds like rubbish to me. Ask for the contamination report which I doubt they have. If it's part of a normal subdivision it would have had a contamination report done… 9 5645 |