Browse Forums Building A New House 1 Jun 17, 2009 3:17 pm Ok I have been thinking about this for a while but I think we should all add a point that has effected us in building. No emotions just points to help each other out, things that we have learnt that can help others when building. I need to start off with a few that may help. Know your budget right down to the last cent and what you need to pay for on top of the build.....carpets,gardens,blinds....for example $180k to build $75k for your fit out....$255k finished.....This makes it easy to speak to builders and don't get talked up. Write a list of Needs and Wants for your home.......3x2 , 4x1, theatre, games room Go to 3,4 or 5 different dispaly villages and many different builders and narrow down to your top3 before going back and re looking again and again. Look at your final 3 times before deciding. Don't let your excitement and want to get started as soon as possible over rule you decisions Research your builder and make sure they fit in with what you want. Ask your builder for a written list of inclusions and hopefully prices and compare to other builders. Work out what you can do yourself and what you want them to do as part of the build Ask a friend or your H1 friends to look over anything that you are not sure about. Be informed about everything before signing anything........ Specifically for us, we got everything we wanted, priced before we signed the building contract but we had paid a deposit and we were willing to walk away from that deposit if we were not happy. Just a few to get the ball rolling, what have you learnt that will help others. Re: What tips do you have that can help 1st time builders. 2Jun 17, 2009 4:46 pm Just remembered another one....especially for those building with brick.... always if suitable place your power points on single brick internal walls as its easier for a sparky to add more later to cavity walls. Always ask for your 1 included light point in each room to be central and free of any beams above in case you want to swap them out for downlights later and if you are putting more than 1 light in a room say 4 in a square ask for the 1 that they give you to be placed where you will be swapping it out from like a corner.......does that make sense? Re: What tips do you have that can help 1st time builders. 3Jun 19, 2009 8:32 am gweluphome Always ask for your 1 included light point in each room to be central and free of any beams above in case you want to swap them out for downlights later and if you are putting more than 1 light in a room say 4 in a square ask for the 1 that they give you to be placed where you will be swapping it out from like a corner.......does that make sense? Scratching head... please explain. Thanks for the heads up! Villina with Trend facade Sydney Re: What tips do you have that can help 1st time builders. 4Jun 19, 2009 9:30 am Hi BB, I know this was hard to explain...... So 1 light is included per room and you want it in the middle of the room. because batton lights(the ones with the chinaman hats) are screwed up to the ceiling it doesn't matter whats above them. lf you want to swap said light out for a downlight of some sort and then it sits in a canister above the ceiling so you need to make sure there are no timbers in the way for an easy swap that way no extra holes to patch. If you are planning to get your own sparky to swap out the batten light after but you have decided to do 4 lights, 1 in each corner of the room rather than 1 in the middle. Ask for your 1 included light to be placed in 1 of the corners..... You now don't have to patch the one in the middle and you simply swap out the batten in the corner for a downlight. This way you will never be stuck with lights in the wrong spots or unneeded patch ups. Sorry its so long.......... Re: What tips do you have that can help 1st time builders. 5Jun 19, 2009 9:39 am I think this is a great thread! We haven't actually built yet so I'm sure all the info in here will be most useful.. Based on our (limited) experience to date - have everything in writing and communicate as much as possible by email. Oh and being really organised helps too Re: What tips do you have that can help 1st time builders. 6Jun 19, 2009 9:42 am This thread is a good idea. My addition to the list ( I can think of several but will keep it short) Be prepared that the initial paperwork, before the build starts, can take a long time. We signed up just before Xmas 08 (of course you must allow for the 4 weeks or so of the Xmas break I understand that) but we are just now signing FINAL FINAL plans, contract and Variations. I envisage this to be done by the end of next week being 27th June - ish. We have been paying rent for 3 months and this is the stage we are at and no movement on the block. We did a few changes which required Variations to be issued, therefore I understand a small delay but it's getting a bit long in the tooth now. www.themaxbuild.blogspot.com forum.homeone.com.au/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=20717&start=300 www.leahspaperpassion.blogspot.com Re: What tips do you have that can help 1st time builders. 7Jun 19, 2009 10:29 am Be patient learn as much as you can and read as much as you can! Do not borrow to your full capacity When looking at a site, get it subject to soil test if your site fees are not fixed try to enjoy it 'A bottle of wine contains more philosophy than all the books in the world.' Louis Pasteur Vegie garden: viewtopic.php?f=19&t=27637&start=0 My Backyard Adventure Re: What tips do you have that can help 1st time builders. 8Jun 19, 2009 1:13 pm i am currently building my first house. try and find flat land with little fill on it and try and find out what class of slab the soil test have produced and this will reduce site costs. this means you might pay a little bit more for the land but there will be less suppises and better resale value. anything structual get the builder to do but things like down lights, flooring (unless there is a promotion which makes it alot cheaper). also when you do you electrical put power points if you can on walls were the can be backed off for power in a room on the other side of the wall. if you know a plumber that does heating and aircon get them to do it not the builder that will also save a bit of money. ask for references from the builder if you are not fimiliar with the builder. i am sure i have missed quite a few things but i hope this helps. Building PD Beaumont 35 (now 40) Pakenham Re: What tips do you have that can help 1st time builders. 9Jun 19, 2009 9:00 pm Hi there,
If there is a dispute the tribunal will ask you to write a report, a timeline of events, and your diary will be a good source for your case. Re: What tips do you have that can help 1st time builders. 10Jun 19, 2009 9:07 pm Buy a long measuring tape, a spirit level and a dumpy and check everything every day after the trades have left site.
KNOW YOUR PLANS INSIDE OUT! Accept that everyone can make mistakes, it's how much effort they put into correcting them that counts. edit: these are probably mostly appropriate to OBs JB Re: What tips do you have that can help 1st time builders. 11Jun 19, 2009 9:12 pm Get everything in writing. Pick your battles.... if it's unwinnable, don't bother fighting no matter how "right" you think you are. The true cost of your land is purchase price and site costs. Understand the requirements of your land before you commit to the purchase. If you can't get at least a ballpark estimate of site costs, don't buy the land. Sometimes a block is cheap for a reason. View these two, land and site costs, as a complete picture. When it comes to site costs..... budget for worse case scenario... then add 25%. Get everything in writing. Don't get hung up on the individual cost of items, you'll win some, you'll lose some.... keep an eye on the over cost psm for your build. As long as you feel you are getting overall value for money, does it really matter that the mark-up on one particular item is 75%? Get everything in writing. **There's quite a few threads similar to this floating around if you want some more ideas. I leave you to fend for yourself, figure things out yourself. Terrence Malick Re: What tips do you have that can help 1st time builders. 12Jun 24, 2009 4:54 pm It's hard sorting through all the options when you're trying to find a plan / block / builder combination that works best. Especially if, like us, you're on a tight budget and really looking for value for money. It's really hard for first-timers to get an idea of the total amount they're going to have to spend. We found it really important to get as informed as possible about the costs we might come across. Site costs are particularly hard to predict! We made up a spreadsheet that listed as many expenses as we could think of for each option so that it was easier to compare costs (real or estimated), pros & cons. Here's a list of some of the expenses we discovered along the way, but of course there are heaps more things to consider depending on each situation! Base prices: - House - Block of land Site costs: - Agricultural drainage - Temporary fencing - Permanent fencing - Connections to services - Site cut & fill - Slab upgrade (depending on results of soil test etc) - Rocks on site? - Trees / vegetation on site? - Soil test - Retaining walls - Other developer requirements?? House upgrades: The options here are endless - it depends on the standard inclusions. Some builders offer promotions and deals that include just about everything. It can often be cheaper to organise things like flooring or driveways etc yourself. And there will often be changes you'd like to make to the original floor plan. Other fees - Conveyancing for land purchase - Land registration - Stamp duty - Loan fees (eg. establishment fee) - Mortgage Lender's Insurance (if you're borrowing more than 80% of contract price) But really, no matter how much you inform yourself, I guess there will always be unexpected costs - it's just the nature of the industry. All part of the adventure! I'd advise people who have a limited budget to keep a good buffer so they don't end up spending more than they can ultimately afford. Re: What tips do you have that can help 1st time builders. 13Jun 26, 2009 11:57 pm technically I haven't really build yet, however this is my contribution don't select a house / pan simply because it looks stunning, can you really affored all the same furniture or upgrade options like the display house?? imagine what how you will live in the house you have chosen so you can modify the right bits or place power points, lights etc a the 'right' spot for future use as it very hard to change it if door is small or room is too small, windows in wrong spot etc as with previous point the little things matters, you are going to be annoy with that thing you though will be 'ok' cause the builder said so. Imagine / visualise hard and insist it be changed to what your like. However do some research so you don't end up doing something stupid which other regretted. have plenty of money! seriously don't do rough estimate, do them as accurate as you can down to the cents!!! spend time to setup a budget in something like Microsoft excel where you can change particular fields and get an estimated position you will be in. There are free pre made loan projection excel files you can download and use to estimate your loan and repayment which you can then tide in with your budget to see the payment effect etc. It took us months to do one and we are still improving it weekly. You won't need to rely on your banker or broker to work it out for you every single time your costing changes Thank you so much. This has been very helpful. We definitely wish to settle and get these people out of our life. They are trying to charge us interest on late… 7 14280 Hi there, We’ve recently had plans approved to add a 1st storey addition to our existing house for a growing family in Sydney. With the current cost of building… 0 4306 Just be careful with building stability during construction, that is when the structure may be weakened, refer to your engineering drawings for stability methodology. 1 7231 |