Browse Forums Building A New House Re: Cairns 2010 - plan and pool now posted 41Dec 24, 2009 6:36 pm Love the pool design - it's very similar to the display version of my house. Same shaped al fresco room, pool in the corner just outside. I agree that sticking it down the back yard is far from ideal. Pity we don't have the pool. Re: Cairns 2010 - plan and pool now posted 42Mar 04, 2010 12:11 am Plans have been approved but I am still waiting on a few odds and ends in the way of confirmation of specifications. The wait is frustrating. I just hope the build is a bit smoother. Can't beleive it was November I gave the go ahead and I am still yet to see anything happen Re: Cairns 2010 - Canopy's Edge Slab to go down 26/3/2010 45Jun 04, 2010 9:50 pm Looks great dadandsue! Where are you up to now? RF Build: viewtopic.php?f=38&t=34534 Flooring: viewtopic.php?f=7&t=39733 Chat: viewtopic.php?f=36&t=53303 Re: Cairns 2010 - Canopy's Edge Slab to go down 26/3/2010 46Jun 04, 2010 10:01 pm Almost at lookup stage now. NO MAJOR dramas so far except for the meter box on the wrong side of the house.
There's always things a long the way that need attention but it's all pretty smooth Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ I have only had one single day trip to Cairns since I signed the building contract. Last Photo from Orican (who is building opposite me) Re: Cairns 2010 - Canopy's Edge Slab to lock up in 11 weeks! 48Jun 04, 2010 11:07 pm orican hi dadandsue, i was there yesterday and saw your meter box has moved to the right side now. looks good. How good are you Orican - my own private home building spy. Thanks (dont think the electrican was too happy with me). Got to love this forum PS. Orican - Have not seen an update on your building blog since April 30?? Re: Cairns 2010 - Canopy's Edge Slab to lock up in 11 weeks! 49Jun 04, 2010 11:20 pm dadandsue orican hi dadandsue, i was there yesterday and saw your meter box has moved to the right side now. looks good. How good are you Orican - my own private home building spy. Thanks (dont think the electrican was too happy with me). Got to love this forum No worries mate, i'am only charging you $500 per photos. lol Re: Cairns 2010 - Canopy's Edge Slab to lock up in 11 weeks! 50Jun 06, 2010 9:15 pm Hi dadandsue great to follow your progress! what made you choose "better homes" over the other builders you considered? Were they the best on price? Our "Better Homes Queensland" Cairns Build viewtopic.php?f=31&t=40451 Current stage - 1st builder's clean done. Keys soon. Re: Cairns 2010 - Canopy's Edge Slab to lock up in 11 weeks! 51Jun 06, 2010 9:46 pm danrts Hi dadandsue great to follow your progress! what made you choose "better homes" over the other builders you considered? Were they the best on price? I have a strong sales/marketing background and was floored by some of the builder's attitudes in Cairns - how does "you want to build and move to Cairns? Don’t you know we have huge unemployment up here" sounds. Better Homes sales consultant was fast answering my questions, getting designs and prices. Some builders failed to follow me up for weeks or months. Wayne and Jenny Cavallaro are the owners and it's a family business - small enough builder to be personal but large enough to get on with the job. Better Homes were prepared to build my pool as part of the construction, saving me a bit of extra work and mucking about; the design had a number of inclusions missing from other builders. For example - better plumbing system, automatic higher cyclone rating, and better inclusions. I found a lot of their job sites and spoke to their tradies about issues including prompt payment for works. Other people had nothing but good things to say. Their BSA record is squeaky clean and they do a lot of jobs each year. Were they cheapest? NO. However their price included PC items at their cost. ie. $11000 for a kitchen has no margin and I pay what they pay. When I calculated out all the variables/differences they worked out to be 3-9% more expensive but to be honest I wouldn't have allowed some of the other builders to construct my dog kennel. To date I have had no major issues and I can be honest and say I doubt there will be any. Any minor issues they have been fast to deal with. That being said I am very thorough and I doubt they would want to get me off side (you have not met me). So, at this point in time the small extra cost to build with them was a good investment in a stress free build. I generally take the attitude that I don't want to deal with a builder who is not profitable. Better Homes are profitable and as such if there is a drama long the way they have some margin to absorb a loss on an oversight/mistake that with another builder would result in a court battle. Hope that answers it Re: Cairns 2010 - Canopy's Edge Slab to lock up in 11 weeks! 52Jun 08, 2010 2:21 pm Thanks for the comprehensive reply. I guess being remote, as long as you have a good supervisor who you can rely on to make sure they build exactly to the site plan (ie don't accidently make a room or the pool a different size) then it can make for a "stress free build". The photos of the progress of your build are great! I'm in the process of obtaining quotes myself to build and have found similar variation in response to queries etc. I suspect the ones that don't respond to emails they may just be too busy "on the job" or not really interested. Hence my interest in working out how to use Sketchup, I gave up cutting and pasting site plans and scribbling with red ink and taking photos of my floorplans and emailing them, at least now I have proper to dimension/scale drawings I can print off and 3D models I can give the suppliers an idea of what I'm trying to achieve. Sales people that can use REVIT are helpful but not all building companies have such people and initially I paid a builder's draftsman to draft up my hand drawn sketch but then I found it too time consuming trying to get him to change room sizes etc so I figured I'd try to do it myself and then hand them a more final drawing to be drafted up. Our "Better Homes Queensland" Cairns Build viewtopic.php?f=31&t=40451 Current stage - 1st builder's clean done. Keys soon. Re: Cairns 2010 - Canopy's Edge Slab to lock up in 11 weeks! 53Jun 08, 2010 2:26 pm Mark Davies or Jane Wescombe at Better Homes can do all the design work for you - Mark has been at Better Homes a number of years and Jane, who has a wealth of experience, joined them in 2009 after moving up the ladder from David McCoy. Mark did a design for me, making variations alterations and then I told him to start again ( and he did a lot of this whilst he was on vacation in Thailand). NOT a problem for him at all. Better Homes are bigger enough to offer this service/software and seriously it saves you all the time wasting. When he got back to me it was all available in 3D. And I had to do all of this by email/phone so if you are in Cairns and can sit down with him all the easier. At the end of the day if you dont go ahead with Better Homes, they have no problem, no charge. In fact I never paid them a single cent until after the plans were finalised and approved by council!!! Re: Cairns 2010 - Canopy's Edge Slab to lock up in 11 weeks! 54Jun 24, 2010 5:22 pm Any news or new pics? How is it all going? RF Build: viewtopic.php?f=38&t=34534 Flooring: viewtopic.php?f=7&t=39733 Chat: viewtopic.php?f=36&t=53303 Re: Cairns 2010 - Canopy's Edge Slab to lock up in 11 weeks! 55Jun 24, 2010 5:31 pm They are doing plastering - that's about all I can report. This is the slow bit. One plasterer will take his time, then all the other trades to follow, basically I imagine one at a time. So I am guessing October sometime Re: Better Homes Queensland - Canopy's Edge CAIRNS 56Jul 24, 2010 5:30 pm hi Dad and Sue, just wondering what stage the house is at? Our "Better Homes Queensland" Cairns Build viewtopic.php?f=31&t=40451 Current stage - 1st builder's clean done. Keys soon. Re: Project X 57Jul 24, 2010 7:18 pm just came across your thread, the first thing that struck me was the view from the block - its just awesome your external colours have come up great, you must be pleased with that we are building a house that has a floor plan like plan no 1, its a little more extreme, not too many doors walls and rooms, big fan of open plan i have to say again i just love the location. Ive been a bit bogged down in the building process, this has sparked me up again Re: Project X 58Jul 24, 2010 8:01 pm Love the plan, love the location, love the colours! What more can I say-except bring on photos ofthe interior! Deemaree Kyndylan Capers: viewtopic.php?f=36&t=46852 My blog: http://www.sufficientlysufficient.blogspot.com/ Re: Better Homes Queensland - Canopy's Edge CAIRNS 60Aug 24, 2010 2:32 pm Looking good...and I love deep ocean blue...that's the colour of our facia and will be part of our balustrades as well. RF Build: viewtopic.php?f=38&t=34534 Flooring: viewtopic.php?f=7&t=39733 Chat: viewtopic.php?f=36&t=53303 1 10482 Building Standards; Getting It Right! We bought a house in 2015 advertised as a 7/2/2, 4br up, 3br down (7br), and to date, it’s a great house. However, we’ve just had it valued and it’s come in as a… 0 11987 I think you are getting different numbers because they all just based them on "other jobs" even though each job is unique. Often, with builders, unless you're speaking to… 3 3232 |