Browse Forums Building A New House 1 Jan 25, 2009 9:49 pm Hi All,
I am planning to build a home and would really appreciate your advice on the below listed queries. I recently started shopping around sydney loooking for a right (i.e. reliable and quality) builder. We are still looking for land and have selected to build our home in either LAKEWOOD or Neilson Reidge. We are planning to build a house on land with an approx size of (12.m/30m or 13m/30m) Could you please advice me on the follwoing Land: 1) Things to watch out for when finalizing on land ? (land we have looked so far are leveled within 1m) Builder: Saw eden brae designs at Kellyville/the ponds/middleton and the design we have liked so far is Cambridge 34 with structural changes. We liked their designs specially entertainer 35/37 but that is coming out to be bit expensive and out of range so had to let go of that. SOIL level!!! actually i am not clear about the soil test and the type i.e. M, P etc, sales agent advice to allocate extra 15K for this purpose coz as per him apparantly the council has some weird reuirement on this. 2) Could anyone please advice how to verify this and what exactly is this SOIL leveling? 3) EB have quoted a price (builder;s package) and a promotion (34K worth of Lifestyle inclusions for $3400). Could anyone please advice what all to be wary of when delaing with builders? 4) What is the reputation of EB? 5) Anyone who has/is building a home in Lakewood/Neilson Reidge? 6) Any other advice? I would really appreciate yourhelp Regards Steven Re: Hello , Need Help and Advice 2Jan 26, 2009 7:42 am Amount of fill in the land is important (less is better). If there is a fair bit of fill, getting a certificate saying it is engineered fill is important. Do a search and you'll find stories from other forumites.
Chris Re: Hello , Need Help and Advice 3Jan 26, 2009 1:27 pm Hi Steven,
We're going to build at the Lakewood (a corner block top from the Sales Office, next to the Eden Brae (ex)display home) -- liked the estate more than the Nelson Ridge, plus could get a corner block of the right size. I believe that land-sizes at NR were less than at Lakewood. The main difference between NR and Lakewood is the special design guidelines and site sepcific DCP's (available on the Holroyd's Council website -- Lakewood is covered in chapters 13.x). I believe that NR are much more strict -- you cannot build a single-storey house (I wouldn't have built a single storey house anyway but people are different), you have to have specific designs and vendors, there are more strict set-back restrictions than with Lakewood. Also, with NR they mandate a 60/40 ratio between first and second floors -- so not every home will be possible to build at NR... Regarding the land -- dunno about NR, at Lakewood the land is class H, means highly reactive clay (shrinks when it dries and crawls when it is wet) and it requires a very good slab -- class H while most vendors offer class M -- so a few thousands on top.. Plus a few more hundreds for longer piers. Plus, the soil is high salinity and requries a few more dollars for protection covers. The total cost of having this salty and reactive clay plus all other additional requirements (both council imposed and due to the land) was 12,950 -- so you agent's advice was pretty correct.. Cannot advise much on EB -- however, they seemed to be very nice while dealing with the sales guys.. Not better - no worse than Clarendon.. I've decided to go with Clarendon and the post-sale experience is not great. The reason we decided to go with Clarendon is that we liked their designs more. One support statement for EB: my block is next to the EB Display Home (an ex display home -- they sold it) and Clarendon found that EB encroached to my block with the party wall. Solving this problem (moving the wall) was a pleasure and Eden Brae were very-very communicative and helpful (while Clarendon NOT at all) -- just an amazing service -- friendly, timely updates and making things happen within commited timeframes.... I was really sorry I did not like their designs as much as Clarendon's -- I would have definitelly switched over to EB had they have comparable designs for similar price. ... built a Promenade with Clarendon. viewtopic.php?f=31&t=25104 20-10-09 - excavation and piering completed ... 12-04-10 - Basins fixed. Connecting to the electrical grid 23-04-10 - PCI 07-05-10 - HANDOVER! Re: Hello , Need Help and Advice 4Jan 26, 2009 2:20 pm perhaps look for a builder like ours, because they offer to build including in their price site costs and doing H class (which we are in Tarneit) and they include termite cover for our area also compulsory (council rules). Our builder included all these costs in their price so it didn't matter how much they added up to, it wasn't our problem! A thankful person is a happy person. [/color]My hobby design blog: http://aviewondesign.blogspot.com/ Thanks Guys 5Jan 26, 2009 5:28 pm Thanks Guys for your advice . i must tell you we had a crazy long day today looking through different designs and meetings with the land authority.
We never anticipated it to be that taxing. our initial thought was if you like the design and have the land sorted and that's its. ebyelyakov: actually i do remember seeing the block you bought and its well placed lot. Also it looked reasonably leveled to also. So far between NR and Lakewood, we have not been able to find any good deal in LW but NR has few lots avaiable. Size we are after is 12.5/30 I agree the sales staff at EB is professional and so far they have been upfront on extra costs. We saw a sales guy at Fowler homes and as per him the council takes only 6 weeks to approve the plan, which didn't sound right Re: Thanks Guys 6Jan 26, 2009 7:09 pm Steven So far between NR and Lakewood, we have not been able to find any good deal in LW but NR has few lots avaiable. Size we are after is 12.5/30 I agree the sales staff at EB is professional and so far they have been upfront on extra costs. We saw a sales guy at Fowler homes and as per him the council takes only 6 weeks to approve the plan, which didn't sound right I belive that NR had plenty of such blocks you're after... Our requirements were at least 13 metres and NR could not provide any of those... They had a few "executive" blocks that were priced something around $370 -- so out of the budget.... There have been one or few more releases at Lakewood on the other side of the lake, however, I believe that the prices were slightly higher and blocks were smaller... As per my conversations with Stockland, it takes them about 3 weeks for approval (which is a must to have before the council DA).. With the council it can take up to 3 months to review/approve. The EB person I had a small talk mentioned that Holroyd Council (in my very soft translation) was not the easiest and most pleasant body to deal with.. I dunno how things are with NR -- maybe there isn't such a thing as the developer's pre-approval. Also, you may want to check with your builder of choice if they take care about the Developer's approval -- some will do only council's leaving the rest to the client. ... built a Promenade with Clarendon. viewtopic.php?f=31&t=25104 20-10-09 - excavation and piering completed ... 12-04-10 - Basins fixed. Connecting to the electrical grid 23-04-10 - PCI 07-05-10 - HANDOVER! Same view on Council time 7Jan 27, 2009 9:35 am We heard the same story on how pleasent the council can be at times. As per the builders the council can take upto 6 months to approve the plan.
we now have a fair understanding on the builders costs but could you please advice on the extra costs one hsould factor in on avaerage i.e. costs not covered by builders like (site leveling + landscaping + A/C etc) Also, at stockland they have a lot which is till not registered and as per them the work with the DA approval could carry on and this wont have any effect on that process. Re: Hello , Need Help and Advice 8Jan 27, 2009 1:15 pm I believe that site leveling has been a part of site costs -- dunno whether standard (included into the base price) or additional (that sum of 12,950)... All builders have different inclusions, so it is hard to compare. In my experience, a ducted air-con attracted an additional 14K, landscape plan (and for Stockland it MUST be done by a certified landscape architect) costed 1.1K, driveway should cost me several more thousands... What else -- I'd say anything that is not specified as included is excluded... ... built a Promenade with Clarendon. viewtopic.php?f=31&t=25104 20-10-09 - excavation and piering completed ... 12-04-10 - Basins fixed. Connecting to the electrical grid 23-04-10 - PCI 07-05-10 - HANDOVER! A question. Im in Queensland and building a new home. We managed to reach practical completion 6 weeks ago but we haven't heard any date for handover yet. Who should we… 0 5811 Versaloc is a mortarless besser block system that still needs a properly engineered footing. If you just do a 400x200 footing it will fail in time. At 17m long you need it… 1 18086 Levelling compound Ardit is the best but buy a bag of sand and make sand dam to protect your wood floor 2 15257 |