Browse Forums Building A New House Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 241Dec 22, 2010 1:05 pm Just a quick update from us... We received encumbrance approval on friday 17th December and Homestead sent our plans off to council on friday afternoon. We rang the council yesterday (being tuesday) to see that they had received the application and they had, so we have been informed that approval should take about 6 weeks but we will probably lose a week because of christmas. How is everyone else going? Signed with Homestead: 27-07-2010 Land Settled: 10-08-2010 Building Design: Custom design based on Homestead's Sandridge Building Contract Signed: 19-11-2010 Site Scrape: 21-02-2011 Follow our building process at our blog... http://nathandjessbuild.blogspot.com/ Support our business - Indulge Yourself Lingerie http://www.indulgeyourselflingerie.com.au Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 242Jan 24, 2011 7:14 am Just updated our blog, check it out for our latest chunk of information, it has been 2 month since the last update on it so it's fairly big. Hope everyone had a great Christmas and new year. Signed with Homestead: 27-07-2010 Land Settled: 10-08-2010 Building Design: Custom design based on Homestead's Sandridge Building Contract Signed: 19-11-2010 Site Scrape: 21-02-2011 Follow our building process at our blog... http://nathandjessbuild.blogspot.com/ Support our business - Indulge Yourself Lingerie http://www.indulgeyourselflingerie.com.au Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 243Jan 24, 2011 9:18 am Thanks and you too. We finally have action on our block, other than the growing of weeds, so it's suddenly becoming real! Homestead Homes SA: The Lamont Bayswood Estate; Aldinga Beach Preliminary Signing: April 2010 Floorplans: 13 June 2010 Building Contract: 19 June 2010 Selections: 28 Sept 2010 Scraped; Trenching: 21 Jan 2011 Slab Poured: 28 Jan 2011 Framing: 17 Feb 2011 | Completed 24 Feb 2011 Roof & Gutters: 02 Mar 2011 Bricks: 03 Mar 2011 Wire-up: 12 Mar 2011 Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 244Jan 24, 2011 9:58 am That must feel really nice finally getting under way! Weeds... Aren't they great... Ha, the only action that we've had on our block is weed slashing. All in good time though. So your footings should maybe go down next week then? Do you have Rob as you SS? Signed with Homestead: 27-07-2010 Land Settled: 10-08-2010 Building Design: Custom design based on Homestead's Sandridge Building Contract Signed: 19-11-2010 Site Scrape: 21-02-2011 Follow our building process at our blog... http://nathandjessbuild.blogspot.com/ Support our business - Indulge Yourself Lingerie http://www.indulgeyourselflingerie.com.au Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 245Jan 31, 2011 2:46 pm Slab was poured on the 28th, yeah. Way more exciting than weed slashing and getting the neighbour to move his truck off our land! I think we have Rob, yes...but i haven't had a proper chat with him yet, we're about due for our first meeting now! Homestead Homes SA: The Lamont Bayswood Estate; Aldinga Beach Preliminary Signing: April 2010 Floorplans: 13 June 2010 Building Contract: 19 June 2010 Selections: 28 Sept 2010 Scraped; Trenching: 21 Jan 2011 Slab Poured: 28 Jan 2011 Framing: 17 Feb 2011 | Completed 24 Feb 2011 Roof & Gutters: 02 Mar 2011 Bricks: 03 Mar 2011 Wire-up: 12 Mar 2011 Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 246Feb 15, 2011 2:18 pm I have just gotten to the 2nd fix stage of my 270m² single story and it has been a bit of an effort... The sales phase of our process was fantastic, with Andrew Marr giving us excellent customer service both before and after signing... The construction process has been pretty good too, with everything moving along pretty quickly - slab went down in October last year, and we're now only about 4-6 weeks away from handover, which should be about 5 months all up. The area that we really felt let down with was the selections process... once we signed with Homestead, it took them 2 weeks to submit the plans to council. Council approval took 4 weeks - quite reasonable I thought. It then took a further 2 weeks for a selections interview to be scheduled, and this was only done because WE called and asked. Now i'm not sure if everyone is aware of a clause in the contract which basically says that from the date that you sign the contract, there is a 90-day period in which Homestead must have access to the site and be able to start construction. If for any reason 'beyond Homestead's reasonable control' this 90-day period is exceeded, then they can issue with a variation based on the increase in construction costs over those 90 days. Well that 90-day period in our case was exceeded and in my opinion, this was as a result of the continual mistakes that were made by the selections staff member in pricing our selections. We ended up going through 6 or 7 versions of the pricing schedule, as I kept picking up re-occurring mistakes, omissions and inclusions, in fact, we didn't receive our final selections pricing schedule until 91 days after we signed - and we couldn't finalise our finance until we had our selections pricing completed. To be honest, I was unaware of any 90-day clause in the contract (which is my own faulty) and, as you can imagine, was very surprised when Homestead issued us with a variation of over $5,000, which I argued, saying that the 90-day issue was as a result of their errors and was in their "reasonable control", but they said that they felt it was as a result of us asking for 'changes' to the selections schedule. We 'agreed' to a reduction in the variation amount, however I honestly felt that I was being held over a barrel, as if I didn't sign the variation, the contract would be void and we would lose our deposit and have to go through the whole process of finding a new builder etc again. They basically said that arguing "reasonable control" in a court would be a long and costly process... you can make your own assumptions as to what they may or may not have been implying with that statement. The other issue we've encountered of late is that some of the items we specifically asked for at our selections interview (but stupidly didn't record in email) weren't included in the pricing schedule, and as such we either have to pay extra for them now, or not get them. No surprise now, given that we know what the competency level was of our selections rep (who is no longer with the company). I kind of felt like "well we've never done this before and it's a very overwhelming process, so how do you expect us to remember every single little thing we've asked for and ensure they are included in the pricing schedule", but that doesn't seem to matter; it's simply not in the contract, so we don't get it... very disappointing. Other than these selections/administrative issues, I do have to say that we are very happy with the quality of work to date, and look forward to getting the house all finished in the next month or so. Has anyone else been caught out by the '90-day' contract issue? Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 247Feb 15, 2011 2:42 pm That doesn't sound good. Talk about holding you to ransom and as you say you've never done this before so you expect some guidance. It's a difficult situation - we expect to be guided more by the professionals and obviously for whatever reason they don't tell us more than they need to - unless we ask but then you don't always know you need to ask! I was a bit miffed when I asked about upgrading to a stacker door - the variation was $3000+ so we said no it's too much, but then when we went to the windows selection appointment there was a lovely Entertainer door which was at an extra cost of $1200. You would have thought that other options would have been given to us when I first enquired. So there is a fair bit of research and digging around that you have to do yourself. That's why this site is invaluable for us first-timers so thanks for sharing your story. Hope all goes well with the rest of your build. For info on our build: viewtopic.php?f=31&t=43093 Built the McLaren by Dechellis - slab down 22 Feb - handover 30 Aug 2011 - and gardens finished 9 Dec 2012!! Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 248Feb 15, 2011 5:01 pm Hi Shacky, very interesting story - if you do a little search through this thread on 90 days you will see a couple of people have had this issue. I found out about it through this thread before my 90 days were up funny and I couldn't believe it. We were lucky though and weren't charged so I can't complain too much did it did cause me a lot of stress thinking we were going to be, as we went over the 90 days. I think most people building a house would go past 90 days! We have had a similar experience to you - brilliant salesperson who is the reason I would still recommend the company to anyone (different one to yours though), he was excellent from the day we walked in the display home and was the reason we chose to build with Homestead. It is still one of the best customer service experiences I have ever had. The whole selections thing - our person was lovely but it was frustrating asking about prices for things and then getting no response and then getting the list and the changes hadnt been made, we just had to be really careful and everytime i asked for a change I checked that it had been made, 60% of the time it hadn't! So yes - very easy to get caught out and we still have a fair way to go so we might be in the same boat in the next few months. Can you say the initial of your selections person - pm me if you would prefer, it would be interesting to see if it was the same one. I imagine it would be a difficult job as there would be lots of things to remember for lots of different houses but still it was frustrating and at the time tainted the experience of building for me. The actual build part of the house has also been great so far so again I cannot complain, almost every day there has been stuff happening on our block and the tradies have been great and doing a really good job. Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 249Feb 15, 2011 5:58 pm Our original selections salesperson is no longer working at Homestead - she left a few days before our 90-day period was up (I have suspicions that this may be half the reason there were so many mistakes made - she knew she was leaving and just didn't seem to put as much effort into getting things right), and unfortunately for the selections lady who replaced her, dropped her mess in her lap. Our first selections lady's initials was DS. Her replacement, who has been exceptionally thorough and prompt with answering any enquiries is Helen Tuttle. I kind of wish that we had Helen from the outset, as I wouldn't mind betting we wouldn't have had anywhere near as many problems as we did. As I mentioned before, Mrs Shacky and I went to our first selections interview with a very thorough print out of all of our non-standard selections (including stock numbers, descriptions etc - all from Homesteads supplier). Our selections lady went on holidays the week after our selections interview, then was sick for a week, so we didn't get our first pricing schedule back for over 2 weeks. We were quite shocked at the cost of our selections, and as such asked for clarification on a few items as well as noting some errors. A week later we received version 2, asked for some items to be removed (due to cost), noted more errors and asked for clarification again which was not given after our first request. 10 days later we received version 3, and noted more errors - both mistakes from previous versions we asked to be fixed, as well as new ones. 2 days later we received version 4, again finding mistakes, both old and new, we asked for this to be fixed. 6 days later we received version 5, noted still more errors, and this was fixed on the spot (I was at their offices) where I was issued the final version 6 which I signed off on - there were still errors in this version, but they were in my favour, as some things did not have prices next to them, but I was beyond caring at this point and signed off. This was 91 days after the contract was signed. It wasn't until the selections pricing was finalised that I could pass on this info to my bank to begin finalising finance, which took another few weeks. It was at this point that I received the variation notice. I'm trying to forget that part of the process, and focus on the excitement of construction, and the closer handover gets the better I feel about the situation, however I would still like to make others aware of this 'clause' so that they can do their best to ensure they don't get caught. Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 250Feb 15, 2011 6:27 pm one thing I must say is that the whole 90-day issue isn't limited to one particular builder. The 'plain english' contract issued by the HIA is the problem. The clause is vague and leaves too much room for interpretation; what is reasonable control? 'Reasonable' is a very ambiguous term, as it is completely subjective - what I deem reasonable, may not be what you deem as reasonable, or in this case, what a court may deem as reasonable - who is going to risk testing whether your interpretation is the same as a courts? There is no motivation/incentive/penalty for the BUILDER if they don't expidite the process, and do their best to ensure the 90-days isn't exceeded. If they take their time, so-to-speak, they end up being rewarded by being able to charge the customer more . Again, i'm not suggesting they do it intentionally, but they certainly don't do their utmost (in my case) to get everything done within the 90-days. I mean think about it, WHO would actually have the guts (let alone the money) to actually challenge a builder about whether the reasons for exceeding the 90-days were actually within their reasonable control or not? I'd love to, but to be honest, I simply can't afford it. I think the whole industry needs a review in relation to this issue, but who is able to instigate it? <EDIT> The clause doesn't say that work MUST begin within the 90-days, it says that they must be able to commence work, i.e. all approvals/encumberances/selections/finance etc are all complete, and the builder can commence construction if they need to. Quote: 90 DAY CONTRACT PRICE 1. Subject to any variations that apply under the other terms of this contract, the price is fixed for 90 days after we sign this contract. 2. If for reasons beyond our reasonable control, we cannot commence work on site within that 90 day period then: 2.1. We may review the price and increase it by any amout we dicide is appropriate, we must give you a written variation to change the price 2.2. You may accept the variation by signing it. If you do not accept the variation within 7 days, then this contract is at an end. 2.3. In that case, you have no claim on us, and we have no claim on you. Except you must pay us our cost for works authorised that have been done. Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 251Feb 15, 2011 7:27 pm One thing I have to say about our construction process is how professional and accommodating my SS has been (Tony). He's dealt with all sorts of stupid questions from us, as well as being very flexible with me organising for a bit of external work to happen during construction (data cabling, home theatre wiring, flatscreen mounting noggins etc). I found that the gyprockers had been lazy and not replaced one section of insulation that they removed from the external wall between the kitchen and garage, before putting the gyprock up. I called Tony and the next day the Gyprockers had removed the offending gyprock, replaced the insulation and re-fixed new gyprock. He certainly gets things done... Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 252Feb 15, 2011 8:36 pm I appreciate you sharing your story Shacky. That’s awful about the 90 day clause. I think most builds would go over 90 days before getting to construction. With the 5 month construction time you’ve had, you would’ve had a mighty quick 8 month build if you’d met their 90 day clause. I’ve never heard of a build that quick!! I too didn’t know about the clause you’re talking about so it’s great that you’re making everyone aware of it because I’m sure heaps of people wouldn’t know. I got to the final interview and that’s when I was made aware of it. I’ve since checked our contract and it is there on the first page, although I think I’d need a solicitor to explain it to me for it to make any sense! I’m glad that the rest of your build has been going very well Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 253Feb 15, 2011 9:23 pm Theresa With the 5 month construction time you’ve had, you would’ve had a mighty quick 8 month build if you’d met their 90 day clause. I’ve never heard of a build that quick!! Yeah, and that includes a 3 week shutdown over Christmas. My guess is they want to get it done before the end of March as it is a general rule in the construction industry that most suppliers/wholesalers/tradesmen put their prices up April 1st. Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 254Feb 20, 2011 10:47 am Some good discussion on here now, and i don't have alot to add because our experience has been somewhat similar to everyone elses. Our sales person was AMAZING. We even got a Christmas card from him, some 4 or 5 months after we'd last even spoke to him! He answered so many of our questions, most of which were out of his job spec, but he hunted down the answers anyway. He even came in on weekends to meet us as we had to travel from Whyalla during that contract phase. Selections was alright, though not great. Our Selections person was also quite hard to pin down, and seemed to take an unreasonable amount of time with small issues. I imagine all selections personnel probably have ALOT of builds on their desk at a time though. Plans went through council...with Onkaparinga you can watch the process through the council via a web portal...after a couple of months we noticed it had stalled on a certain point, but no one had rung us. The Website said the council was awaiting documentation from the builder. So we rang the builder. After alot of fluffing around we eventually got onto the bloke in charge of this step...and the drama begins! The Homestead representative said he couldn't find a fill certificate for our block, and essentially threw it back to us after 2 months saying "I can't find it, if you can't find it either your footings will double to around $17,000. He said he'd exhausted all the usual options with no result and he was very sorry. Three phonecalls later by myself, my partner and my father had produced the fill certificate from three parties (The council, our land agent and a representative of the developer). So I have ABSOLUTELY no doubt that this was a grab-for-cash on behalf of the builder. We'd also rung our neighbour who had just finished his build with another building company and he said he had no fill issues. There were a couple of last minute changes to the drawings because Homestead had overlooked a couple of points...like power to the island unit in the kitchen and stuff. So these had to be drawn-in. We then had to get the Bank to give us some money...our broker did most of the organising and consulting. He found that getting the required documents and stuff from Homestead was like pulling blood from a stone. He'd get bits and pieces but not everything and constantly have to chase. The bank doesn't lend money til they get all the paperwork and can see the build plans, so approval was delayed while we waited for Homestead to pull their finger out. Then we were on the cusp of bank approval and we started getting phonecalls from Homestead saying "if bank approval isn't in by the end of the week then your 90 day clause will be broken and you'll be charged more". We had 4 or 5 of those calls in a week. In the end we were about a week later than that, but they didn't charge us. They grumbled and made it sound like they did us the biggest favour in the world and broke all their fundamental rules, but someone would have copped it if they hadn't, and they probably saw that from my phone manner! Now the build is on the go. I'm still not happy. Our SS is a communication black-hole. We only found out our slab was down because we drove out there for a look. We only realised our frame was going up because we drove out there. The only time he's called us is because we had to remove the excess soil, and even then he called us at the last minute and we had to scramble. The letter from homestead in the first instance said we'd have a meeting on-site with our SS when the slab was down...nothing yet. I'll be ringing him tomorrow to ask! Pretty much every time we ring him we get his message bank, and sometimes we have to leave a few messages to before we get a return call. I had heard good things about this SS, so i'm not sure what the dealio is. Anyway, that ended up longer than i was first expecting, sorry for the essay! Homestead Homes SA: The Lamont Bayswood Estate; Aldinga Beach Preliminary Signing: April 2010 Floorplans: 13 June 2010 Building Contract: 19 June 2010 Selections: 28 Sept 2010 Scraped; Trenching: 21 Jan 2011 Slab Poured: 28 Jan 2011 Framing: 17 Feb 2011 | Completed 24 Feb 2011 Roof & Gutters: 02 Mar 2011 Bricks: 03 Mar 2011 Wire-up: 12 Mar 2011 Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 255Feb 21, 2011 8:58 pm rockabilly_kid Now the build is on the go. I'm still not happy. Our SS is a communication black-hole. We only found out our slab was down because we drove out there for a look. Just to add what I know from this part. Site Supervisors are only your point of contact and in charge of the construction process from when the slab is poured and finished. In terms of communication before this, it is the responsibility of the Project Manager and their team. Not common knowledge, but that's the deal with that part. As for the rest mate, not sure! There is some really good discussion happening on here and its great that we can vent and help others out with all our different experiences! In regards to all the conversation over the 90 day clause, for us, our Sales Consultant pointed it out very clearly and not just once. He went through it at the start and then also at the end. We also learnt from our first build to never sign a building contract on the spot. With that in mind we asked to take the contract home to go over it thoroughly for a couple of days. Something to keep in mind. But don't worry I can understand everybody's frustration with it! It is something that is still looming over our heads and especially with us doing external site works, all we can hope is that everything goes to plan. With the banks, for some reason our bank agreed to finance before we have even done selections, but we are putting extra in on top of the loan, so that may be why that worked out differently. I guess it is really just luck of the draw. The last thing, not to be the police at all, but just be really careful guys regarding the use of names. Make sure you don't leave yourselves open to defamation laws. Only use first names if any at all, its the last thing any of us need and it does happen. Our blog has just been updated with pictures as well, follow the link below. Our site scrape started today, so we finally have action! Signed with Homestead: 27-07-2010 Land Settled: 10-08-2010 Building Design: Custom design based on Homestead's Sandridge Building Contract Signed: 19-11-2010 Site Scrape: 21-02-2011 Follow our building process at our blog... http://nathandjessbuild.blogspot.com/ Support our business - Indulge Yourself Lingerie http://www.indulgeyourselflingerie.com.au Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 256Feb 22, 2011 8:23 am nathanandjessica rockabilly_kid Now the build is on the go. I'm still not happy. Our SS is a communication black-hole. We only found out our slab was down because we drove out there for a look. Just to add what I know from this part. Site Supervisors are only your point of contact and in charge of the construction process from when the slab is poured and finished. In terms of communication before this, it is the responsibility of the Project Manager and their team. Not common knowledge, but that's the deal with that part. As for the rest mate, not sure! I was kinda aware of that, but we also got a letter to say our SS would be contacting us for an on-site meeting "as soon as the slab is poured". The frame is half-up now and we've heard nothing. I wouldn't be as annoyed but I've got my own cabler coming in to do stuff, so i really need to discuss it with my SS before the bricks start going down. Also frustrating is just the fact that he rarely answers his phone nor returns voicemail messages for questions. I expect a little more. I'd also like to say that I take the contract very seriously, and was wholely aware of the 90-day clause before-hand. My grievance was that 98% of the delays were caused by the builder, so i think it immensely cheeky for them to then turn it back on us and give us the hurry-up. Homestead Homes SA: The Lamont Bayswood Estate; Aldinga Beach Preliminary Signing: April 2010 Floorplans: 13 June 2010 Building Contract: 19 June 2010 Selections: 28 Sept 2010 Scraped; Trenching: 21 Jan 2011 Slab Poured: 28 Jan 2011 Framing: 17 Feb 2011 | Completed 24 Feb 2011 Roof & Gutters: 02 Mar 2011 Bricks: 03 Mar 2011 Wire-up: 12 Mar 2011 Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 257Feb 22, 2011 8:39 am rockabilly_kid I'd also like to say that I take the contract very seriously, and was wholely aware of the 90-day clause before-hand. My grievance was that 98% of the delays were caused by the builder, so i think it immensely cheeky for them to then turn it back on us and give us the hurry-up. I can understand that, we are getting very nervous about the clause as our 90 days from signing ended last week! However, we were informed by our sales consultant that the Christmas shutdown is not included in the 90 days, so we must have a bit of extra time. Nobody can tell us how much time though. It is especially an issue seeming Homesteads servers were down when we did our selections yesterday, so we are expecting to run into issues and mistakes when we finally get the schedule to look over, but who knows when that is going to be! So we are definitely not safe yet, but if they turn it back on us I'll fight it like all hell. I do agree that it is poor communication, especially seeming your frame is almost done and you haven't met or really even been able to talk to your SS, how frustrating! Hope you manage to get hold of him before you need the work done! Signed with Homestead: 27-07-2010 Land Settled: 10-08-2010 Building Design: Custom design based on Homestead's Sandridge Building Contract Signed: 19-11-2010 Site Scrape: 21-02-2011 Follow our building process at our blog... http://nathandjessbuild.blogspot.com/ Support our business - Indulge Yourself Lingerie http://www.indulgeyourselflingerie.com.au Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 258Feb 22, 2011 9:17 am He just rang me then actually, so I'm a little more calm. He doesn't seem to be in a hurry for a meeting though and said "next time I'm on site i'll give you a call and see if you're available". He did at least answer some questions about my data cabler and such though, so at least i know what has to be done. Homestead Homes SA: The Lamont Bayswood Estate; Aldinga Beach Preliminary Signing: April 2010 Floorplans: 13 June 2010 Building Contract: 19 June 2010 Selections: 28 Sept 2010 Scraped; Trenching: 21 Jan 2011 Slab Poured: 28 Jan 2011 Framing: 17 Feb 2011 | Completed 24 Feb 2011 Roof & Gutters: 02 Mar 2011 Bricks: 03 Mar 2011 Wire-up: 12 Mar 2011 Re: Homestead Homes (SA)? Any opinion? 260Mar 29, 2011 7:55 am Awesome news! I bet you're jumping out of your skin! We've just been gyprocked, and sealed. Now waiting on sanding and cornices. Homestead Homes SA: The Lamont Bayswood Estate; Aldinga Beach Preliminary Signing: April 2010 Floorplans: 13 June 2010 Building Contract: 19 June 2010 Selections: 28 Sept 2010 Scraped; Trenching: 21 Jan 2011 Slab Poured: 28 Jan 2011 Framing: 17 Feb 2011 | Completed 24 Feb 2011 Roof & Gutters: 02 Mar 2011 Bricks: 03 Mar 2011 Wire-up: 12 Mar 2011 Thanks for the suggestion. The space between shower and sinks was too tight. I agree about the toilet location. So I have tried two other options: The lower one is… 3 6118 these look like missing batts. Go up and take a look. But yeah moisure meter is a completely different tool 4 9429 Ask for references and speak to them. If they are defensive or try to avoid the request, walk. 1 74219 |