Browse Forums Building A New House Re: anyone built/building with *? 21Apr 12, 2010 12:23 pm jayw, Nice to get a builder's perspective on the contracts, the only problem I see with upgrades is that unless its something you will do yourself after handover there may not be much to be upgraded ie my alfresco is included in build price already. But agree it would be better if you could negotiate between cash and upgrades/services. I know if my builder went over time or had to pay damages for some reason reason (at this point I cant see it happening), the cash received would go to finishing the house ie brick fences, additional pavers etc so I would be happy for the upgrades style offer. Im sure you will get plenty of good practice ideas for your business from these forums. Hopefully your business continues to do well. Regards Bob Building "DOMAYNE" through COMMODORE HOMES in Pearsall WA Slab down 15-01-2010 Handover 16-06-2010 viewtopic.php?f=31&t=29049 Re: anyone built/building with *? 22Apr 15, 2010 4:14 pm We have recently signed up with CL & so far am feeling pretty good about them. I was slightly hesitant at first but things are ok...although we are still in the prelim stage. Building at the new Shorehaven estate at Alkimos. Made a few changes structurally and all in all those costs are very reasonable. Compared to other builders at the lower end I think these guys seem to to the best value for money. I guess it's just waiting to see what happens at building stage! Re: anyone built/building with *? 23Apr 15, 2010 4:45 pm Everyone, read your contract. Penalties rarely go over $20 per working day if builder fails to finish on time , so the 100 clams ( per week ) they take off your final bill while still finishing your house will come in handy for perhaps, one quarter of the rent u r paying while waiting to move in, OR in my case one quarter of the interest Im paying cos I cant sell my house and move in cos its not finished and I need somewhere to keep my Dog, Cat, Wine collection, oh yeah and the Wife. It is also not uncommon for the penalty to be $1 per day. So where is the incentive to hurry up and finish. All of this is on another thread somewhere in here i think. I recently bought some batteries but they come without batteries so I had to buy some more Timeline Aug 08-Land Mar 09-Demo/Titles Sept 10-Handover No1 Sept 11-Handover No2 April 12-Sold No2 Aug 14-Land/Demo Jan 15-Slabs viewtopic.php?f=31&t=25736 Re: anyone built/building with *? 24Apr 15, 2010 11:00 pm Echo I need somewhere to keep my Dog, Cat, Wine collection, oh yeah and the Wife. I recently bought some batteries but they come without batteries so I had to buy some more I see you perused your wine collection this arvo Echo... A friend of mine built with CL about five years ago. Not bad for the money. Good luck with your builds everyone! Summit/New Gen Homes Slab - 9/4/10 PCI - 13/9/10 Handover - 22/9/10 Re: anyone built/building with *? 25Apr 16, 2010 11:12 am phoenixrain Echo I need somewhere to keep my Dog, Cat, Wine collection, oh yeah and the Wife. I recently bought some batteries but they come without batteries so I had to buy some more I see you perused your wine collection this arvo Echo... I see you got a slab phoenixrain . Congrats And i love the the signage stage being in your signature. Now That is Keen . Timeline Aug 08-Land Mar 09-Demo/Titles Sept 10-Handover No1 Sept 11-Handover No2 April 12-Sold No2 Aug 14-Land/Demo Jan 15-Slabs viewtopic.php?f=31&t=25736 Re: anyone built/building with *? 26Apr 16, 2010 5:18 pm Echo I see you got a slab phoenixrain . Congrats And i love the the signage stage being in your signature. Now That is Keen . Thanks Echo! Yes seeing the signage was exciting since it wasn't there on Monday and appeared on Thursday arvo when I went for a looksie. I guess any little movement on the block is enough to ruffle ones feathers. Summit/New Gen Homes Slab - 9/4/10 PCI - 13/9/10 Handover - 22/9/10 Re: anyone built/building with *? 27Mar 30, 2011 8:16 pm Cheetah, I know this thread is a little old but you may or may not have come through the process with CL by now and I hope you had a good experience. We built with CL (Guildford area, WA) and suffered the worst experience of our lives. The problems began before the pre-start when we questioned the assurances the consultant gave us at the very beginning (time to build, demolish old house quickly, no problems with block, etc, etc). After that is was downhill all the way - attitude problems, nil contact for months on end, nil start on site for 12 months, site supervisor who argued against every point we raised about workmanship or problems, cost overruns for unseen issues (total nearly 40k above original costings), time extensions, no-one on site for weeks at a time and the list goes on. The best part of the whole deal was when we got the keys and kicked them off site (even the handover meeting was a farce). On the actual build aspect, the only decent part is the external brickwork - the rest looks like an apprentice's practice area. Since the handover at beginning of 2007, I have basically been fixing up poor quality plastering, colourbond roof, etc in order to get it to a reasonable state. So much for guaranteed workmanship and quality assurance. The latest issue (last 6 months) gives us the sight of the ceiling and cornices tearing themselves apart from the walls with huge cracks and lateral movement of the whole roof structure. A structural engineer's report is in order for this. So to sum it up, after our experience we would not recommend CL. Cheers Darcymac55 Re: anyone built/building with *? 28Apr 03, 2011 6:42 pm darcymac55 Cheetah, I know this thread is a little old but you may or may not have come through the process with CL by now and I hope you had a good experience. We built with CL (Guildford area, WA) and suffered the worst experience of our lives. The problems began before the pre-start when we questioned the assurances the consultant gave us at the very beginning (time to build, demolish old house quickly, no problems with block, etc, etc). After that is was downhill all the way - attitude problems, nil contact for months on end, nil start on site for 12 months, site supervisor who argued against every point we raised about workmanship or problems, cost overruns for unseen issues (total nearly 40k above original costings), time extensions, no-one on site for weeks at a time and the list goes on. The best part of the whole deal was when we got the keys and kicked them off site (even the handover meeting was a farce). On the actual build aspect, the only decent part is the external brickwork - the rest looks like an apprentice's practice area. Since the handover at beginning of 2007, I have basically been fixing up poor quality plastering, colourbond roof, etc in order to get it to a reasonable state. So much for guaranteed workmanship and quality assurance. The latest issue (last 6 months) gives us the sight of the ceiling and cornices tearing themselves apart from the walls with huge cracks and lateral movement of the whole roof structure. A structural engineer's report is in order for this. So to sum it up, after our experience we would not recommend CL. Cheers Darcymac55 Hi Darcymac55, I came across you post after searching for any info about CL. We have not done our pre-start yet but we have given $2k deposit to CL. I am really not sure whether I should go ahead with them or not? It seems that there a lot of complaints about CL. Re: anyone built/building with *? 29Apr 14, 2011 11:28 am Hi Gundala, My advice is - run a mile! If you cannot get your deposit back, put it down to the cost of business. In the long run you will be better off - the ongoing grief is not worth it. Even with regular independent inspections throughout the build, we have just discovered defects were not fixed and parts of the structure do not comply with Australian Standards! At the moment our house is tearing itself apart due to sagging foundations and poor pad compaction. Remains to be seen how CL deal with this one. Once again - run a mile! Best of luck. Re: anyone built/building with *? 30Apr 16, 2011 10:09 pm Hi darcymac55, Thanks for your advice. I was attracted to CL because of their Grand View design which fits our requirement. We had few problems with the sales reps at the beginning with the cost variations. I suppose I should have done more research before giving them a desposit. I am sorry to hear about your house. Which design did you choose? I just could not believe that this builder would do such a sloppy work. Re: anyone built/building with *? 31Apr 18, 2011 12:03 am I could not really find any threads discussing this builder. Could anybody who's been using * please tell us your experience? Skyblue, Dasha, Falconbrook, kenshifan1, anybody, please tell us more about your experience with this builder. I have been booked for a pre-start in a couple of weeks with CL and I have some doubts. Re: anyone built/building with *? 32May 25, 2011 8:31 pm We really cannot say anything more than we are EXTREMELY dissapointed with nearly ALL dealings we have had with CL - the only exception was when we signed and when we went to prestart. From that, you name, it went wrong, worse yet, no one at CL cared. We signed with CL in July 2010 and had our slab poured in the last week of July 2010. From that moment, the problems started - slab poured 100mm too short, footings not poured for the front pillars, footings not poured for alfresco pillars, footings not poured for the side wall. This however, wasn't all fixed in one go - it was fixed bit by bit over the course of about 6 weeks!! We were astounded that the fix wasnt done in one big hit!! But we have since found out that is the way it works with CL - weeks go by with nothing happening!! From there, things got worse, the repair list got bigger... two exercise book pages worth!! We thought it best to inform CL as the mistakes were occurring, but to date, still not repaired. Even the silliest of mistakes - one brick left out from the garage pier top course... ONE BRICK! Then a picture recess which we wanted lights in the top to shine down (as you see in NUMEROUS display homes) but no, in the electricians infinate wisdom, lets put them in the middle of the picture recess so they shine OUTWARDS, not DOWN!! This, was only the small problems... missing ceilings in the fridge recess, missing ceilings in the linen, the linen door getting kicked in by "someone", ** plastering, painting, half jobs being copleted over the course of weeks (front base coat painted, then took 8 weeks for it to be finished!!)... I can literally go on!! The most disappointing of it was the lack of customer service. No matter how many times we rang to speak to our Liaison Officer, we got only 2 or 3 calls back from at least over 20 or more phone calls requesting she call us. But, will say in last two or three months, she has been great! To top it all off, we are now on Building Supervisor #5 - everytime the handover happens, a minimum of 2 weeks of nothing happening. We can now tell when we are getting a new supervisor! Really, I think there is a staff retention issue there somewhere!! So, now here we are, approaching nearly 11 months of building - and nothing. Come this Friday, 27 May 2011, it will be 6 WEEKS since our Practical Completion Inspection. The list of repairs are still long and since last week, not one person has turned up to work. I really could go on, but we are so disheartened by our whole experience and what we have been put through. WE WILL NEVER RECOMMEND CL TO ANYONE!! We have even diswaded two couples from building with them. The price, which attracted us, has now been absorbed by rent and stress. Our dream has been our nightmare... hope no one else has to go through, or put up with what we went through... Re: anyone built/building with *? 33May 29, 2011 12:20 am Hi EddieNarelle, I am sorry to hear about your bad experience with CL. This is just another good reason for us not to go ahead building with this builder. We were attracted by their price and the size of the house. Thanks for sharing your unfortunate experience with this builder. I think we know now what we will have to do. Anybody else would like to share their experience building with CL? Re: anyone built/building with *? 35Jun 13, 2011 6:55 pm We recently received the keys to our new home from *. We are so pleased with the finished product and have a great new home for our family. We have heard many horror stories about building a new house, but we didn't experience any. Any problems were worked out quickly by our supervisor and client liaison along the way. The supervisor was always available to meet or speak to us, which was reassuring. We had a couple of hiccups along the way, but we're pleased how * dealt with them. Our stone benchtops look unreal! Re: anyone built/building with *? 36Jun 27, 2011 3:40 pm We are very excited that we chose *, because after shopping around they are the best value for money that can be found. We checked on their quality through family and friends that had previously built with them and overall they had positive feedback, which made us very comfortable with our decision. We have a family with three children and found the size of the bedrooms a clear stand out compared to the rest. The kitchen is awesome. It's going to look great with the stone! Happy to report that we have recently completed our prestart. The staff were very friendly, helpful and supportive, as they could tell we were nervous. We now are in the process of finalising our finance approval so that they can begin the building process. We will keep you informed! Re: anyone built/building with *? 37Jun 27, 2011 3:46 pm ZEDONE AND CHARLESEDWARDES??? First time posters? Are you guys from Content??? :/ Building with Life$tyle Homes in Perth SOR Key Dates on First Page of my Thread viewtopic.php?f=31&t=38761 Re: anyone built/building with *? 38Jun 27, 2011 4:21 pm Sorry to hear about the problems that some are having with this builder, I have a friend who is building with them and are ready for roof coverage but there apparently is a problem with the slab and who knows what is going to happen from here Block 05/10; NEW BUILDER 23/11/10; Work draw 22/12/10; 2 Shire 17/01/11; PreStart 7/2, Council approval 11/2, 3/3 sign again, Slab 29/03, Bricks 29/4; Roof on 16/05. Plasterer 20/06. Lock up 22/06. Re: anyone built/building with *? 39Jun 28, 2011 1:26 pm sheznay ZEDONE AND CHARLESEDWARDES??? First time posters? Are you guys from Content??? :/ Hey Sheznay, No, I'm not from Content, but I don't know about Zedone. I had a look at your house design, I really like the activity room at the rear for the children. I like the paint colour in the bedroom picture, what colour is it? But I don't think that Games Room is big enough to hold all of my Eagles memorabilia We're undecided about solar panels, did your builder offer you these? Re: anyone built/building with *? 40Jul 01, 2011 2:08 pm Davesteph I have a friend who is building with them and are ready for roof coverage but there apparently is a problem with the slab and who knows what is going to happen from here Hi Davesteph, that is terrible. Do you know what the problem was? And most importantly whether it is handled properly by CL? Hi All, we are starting to think of building with Masterpiece Builders in Victoria, has anyone had any feedback or experience with them 0 13603 I haven’t. But have a Lowe Design home. Not only did I find Matt Lowe patronising and a bully, but the home is NOT TO CODE. I have water coming through the bricks… 1 14414 Hi we are looking to talk to people who have built with them recently. We have signed mid range built contract but identified that a lot of things are not included.… 0 745 |