Browse Forums Building A New House 1 Jan 10, 2010 9:26 pm Hi Everyone,
Have been a member here for some time, reading about building our first home. We have decided on our home and thought that I would share it with you, that is, if you are interested. We originally bought our block to begin with before anything as it was a bargain, and a great place to live with plenty of job prospects in the area (its a booming area for young families - as I am in my last year of Primary Teaching at university), had no covenents so we could build anything we wanted, in any way with hardly any restrictions. For Pictures of our land and other pictures see: http://cweedon.blogspot.com In November we decided it was best to build a home on it, in order to get the $30,000 first home owners grant from the government. We originally were looking at Henley homes, and almost put down the $1500 deposit but felt very rushed and they gave us no paperwork or anything and really just wanted the money. We decided to say no. About a week later we decided to go the Mernda display to have a look at some of there homes and came accross Sim..ds, which was a pleasant surprise. The lady there is very nice and gave us a lot of information. We really like the Valencia 2414 and decided to follow it up, but rather than go through the person at the office we decided to call head office, which in turn worked out very beneficial for us (more on this later). We then signed the original paperwork for our contract to be drawn up, but rather than go through a tender (not enough time to ensure the grant) we went straight to contract. Paid our $1500 and got our site survey completed (which was done 3 days after we signed (very quick!)). Not a bad survey, "H" class slab, low fire risk, no ground water. All exactly as we wanted to hear really, however site costs still came back quite expensive at around $12,000. But we really liked it, and every other builder said it would be around this price. We signed the contract on the 28th December, only needed a couple of changes: - Charged us twice for the facade, - Assumed we were married so put "Mrs" on my partners name, - Put an allowance in for site costs (which isn't a bad thing, however we did not want it there as they could possibly use it without any evidence. We would much rather if it was going to be more to pay it later). All in all it has been very pleasant so far with Sim..ds and would really recommend them so far. We got our drawings mailed to us and they arrived on the 7th January. Everything was excellent about them except for the site setback which was not as we specified at all and they said they would issue a change and it should be alright - still waiting to hear back from them. Our site build is set for the end of March, but could possibly be earlier. Just a matter of time! Any questions please ask, more than happy to answer them. Thanks! Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 2Jan 10, 2010 11:19 pm Yeah good luck with S!monds. We were going to build the Valencia as displayed at Point Cook. Its great and we loved it. However we walked out of contract appointment (see other s!monds related threads in search for further details) and didnt look back. Im eager to see your plans... Congrats on getting started. Bacchus is a good place my grandparents live in the Avenue. NO EXPECTATIONS, NO DISAPPOINTMENTS! Build Thread: viewtopic.php?f=31&t=27441 Landscaping Thread: viewtopic.php?f=19&t=43969 Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 3Jan 11, 2010 12:01 pm Welcome and congrats on starting your build soon! We are also building with Simonds and have been pleased with them so far, our slab is due to be starting this week. (see the thread or blog in my signature). Did you make any changes to the Valencia plan? Have you done your colour selection yet? Cheers Caz Caz & Co ALL MOVED IN!! Now comes all the hard work-decorating.... [b]Blog: http://cazoraz.blogspot.com/ Settling in Thread: viewtopic.php?f=31&t=36993 Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 4Jan 11, 2010 2:21 pm cweedon Hi Everyone, Have been a member here for some time, reading about building our first home. We have decided on our home and thought that I would share it with you, that is, if you are interested. Howdy Cweedon! Trust me when I say that we're busting to see how things go cweedon We originally bought our block to begin with before anything as it was a bargain, and a great place to live with plenty of job prospects in the area (its a booming area for young families - as I am in my last year of Primary Teaching at university). Male teacher, I salute you. Congrats on picking up a bargain, the surrounding country looks beautiful from your pictures in the blog. Consider taking a peek at http://www.nearmap.com/ to see satellite pics of your block! cweedon We really like the Valencia 2414 and decided to follow it up i just had a gander at the website. What a cute little house - the entry hall is a nice feature. The layout is very logical and makes good use of space, plus you've got a whopping great living/dining/kitchen area which is awesome. The elevation facades on the display page are stunning. cweedon however site costs still came back quite expensive at around $12,000. But we really liked it, and every other builder said it would be around this price. Don't worry, there are some threads floating about for people to compare site costs. Both you and I have the same range which is very reasonable, I just feel sorry for the people being charged up to $70,000 just for site costs. cweedon Our site build is set for the end of March, but could possibly be earlier. Just a matter of time! How exciting is that! When you get the final plans make sure you post them so we can fawn over them We're hoping to move in to our place about a month after you guys start, so fingers crossed we both get our ways! Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 5Jan 11, 2010 3:06 pm Congrats to your soon-to-start build, and at such a young age too. Don't worry too much about the "good luck with you building with S1monds" posting. I am building with S1monds too and my build is reaching lock-up soon - roof done, gutters in place, brick-works almost done, windows & temporary doors in place. My SS is pretty on the ball and my CSO replies promptly as well. I have no major problems with them, but of course I do realise there are people who experienced otherwise. Main thing to note is to keep an open line of communication, better put in writing as least you've a record and get an independent advice if you are in doubt. I use an independent inspector. Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 6Jan 16, 2010 2:04 pm Hi rocketleaves - thankyou. We really did look around for a builder and did look on this site, and many others about the builders and it seems that everyone has some sort of problem with their builder. We decided to then go by the look of the house and the quality and decided on S!monds. We figured as long as we kept on top of them at all the stages and made sure everything was right then there should not be many problems. Hi Vundaful! - took a look at the website that you gave. As we were regional, it had pritty poor quality images for us, but you were right that it is a great website. Spent about an hour on it looking around! I will post up our final drawings as soon as they are finalised, but we didn't make any changes except for a flip of the rear (5 Star Energy Requirement). boiselfish - thankyou as well, and I'm a bit curious as to why you walked out of your contract signing? cazoraz - thankyou - and I was already following your blog! Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 7Jan 16, 2010 2:05 pm Recieved a phone call from Simonds yesterday about out colour/electrical appointment...and then later in the afternoon a call from the tile lady booking us in for our tile appointment. We decided to have our tile appointment first, as we would much rather pick the paints based on the tiles, then the other way around. Not bad appointment times. Next week for the tiles and 3 weeks for the colour and electrical appointment! Pity they have not got back to us with our final drawings yet. (Set-back was not correct to had to be changed) Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 8Jan 16, 2010 2:05 pm Last week I called the council about a big hunk of concrete that had been dumped on our land to see if they had a service to remove it. They referred it onto another man who went out to check it and he called me to inform me that the block next door to us has dumped a mountain of dirt on our block, as well as that he can do nothing about the concrete! We went out to check it out and noticed that they did out next door neighbours cut and fill and has used out land as basically their delivery land until they moved it! (however it did seem to remove a lot of the weeds to which was awesome!) What worries us is that we hope that its not going to be a huge double story house as that would be awful living next to. (the block is over 1200m2) Does anyone have any ideas of the best way to remove it? It can't be picked up by two people! Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 9Feb 06, 2010 12:40 pm cweedon Last week I called the council about a big hunk of concrete that had been dumped on our land to see if they had a service to remove it. They referred it onto another man who went out to check it and he called me to inform me that the block next door to us has dumped a mountain of dirt on our block, as well as that he can do nothing about the concrete! We went out to check it out and noticed that they did out next door neighbours cut and fill and has used out land as basically their delivery land until they moved it! (however it did seem to remove a lot of the weeds to which was awesome!) What worries us is that we hope that its not going to be a huge double story house as that would be awful living next to. (the block is over 1200m2) Does anyone have any ideas of the best way to remove it? It can't be picked up by two people! This happened to us too, our neighbours concretors dumped all their rubbish and a huge slab of concrete (that they hid down the back of our block ) on our land before our house started. I dropped a note into our neighbours asking for them to move it please as we wanted to start on site soon, and he called back the concretors and demanded they come get it, which they eventually did Are your neighbours still building? Their builder is responsible, I would call their builder and demand they move it. Caz & Co ALL MOVED IN!! Now comes all the hard work-decorating.... [b]Blog: http://cazoraz.blogspot.com/ Settling in Thread: viewtopic.php?f=31&t=36993 Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 10Feb 27, 2010 7:20 pm How did your tile and colour appointments go?? Caz Caz & Co ALL MOVED IN!! Now comes all the hard work-decorating.... [b]Blog: http://cazoraz.blogspot.com/ Settling in Thread: viewtopic.php?f=31&t=36993 Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 11Feb 27, 2010 7:38 pm cweedon boiselfish - thankyou as well, and I'm a bit curious as to why you walked out of your contract signing? Im sorry I never replied to this post... We walked out as we were not permitted to take the contract to look over before signing. The drawings included in the contract were still wrong even after a few weeks of email and phone calls about the couple of minor changes requested. (our CSO for the time was great!) We asked about the incorrect drawings and were told to sign the contract and any required changes would be made via variation. As far as we were concerned this was not acceptable. SO much money we expect it to be right at time of signing not just slapped together and fixed later on as they suggested. This would have been my second house with Simonds so its unfortunate that it went pear shaped from they side. This is a lovley design. We had slected the same as whats on display at Point Cook. Im sure everyone on here is still waiting to see your plan... NO EXPECTATIONS, NO DISAPPOINTMENTS! Build Thread: viewtopic.php?f=31&t=27441 Landscaping Thread: viewtopic.php?f=19&t=43969 Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 12Mar 08, 2010 4:37 pm Well, it has been a while since I last wrote, and a lot has happened! To date, all the contracts have been signed and colour and tile selections went absolutley perfect with S!monds! We didn't spend to much in the tile selection, just standard inclusions except for a glass tile feature in the ensuite. The same in the colour appointment, with only money being spent on locks and a different shower head. We did however, get a lot of inclusions as part of a s!monds promotion which was great and saved us heaps! We tried to break the concrete that was dumped on our block ourselves with a sledgehammer, but only managed to break a bit off and we decided to leave it there, and they have worked around it which is good. Site start was on 26/FEB/2010, however we are experiencing problems with the site cost, to which we were initially quoted a provisional $1500 for the cut and fill, which has now changed to $10000. Which is quite excessive and we believe cannot be charged. However, I went to the block today to find the site cut and fill complete, as well as a dumpster put on our nature strip. VERY EXCITING. So not sure what is going to happen now, seing as we haven't signed off on the site costs, and the face that they have already started.... Oh, and our site start date was initially set for the end of march, and they brought it forward a month which is fantastic! Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 14Mar 08, 2010 5:56 pm Hi! It is very exciting when it starts too happen. Hope you don't encounter too many extra costs during your build...from $1500 to $10,000 is pretty steep but then we just received our bill for removing rock which came to $7,000....all part of the fun I suppose. Going to have a nosey at your photos now...all the best! Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 15Mar 08, 2010 6:35 pm Pebbles Hi! It is very exciting when it starts too happen. Hope you don't encounter too many extra costs during your build...from $1500 to $10,000 is pretty steep but then we just received our bill for removing rock which came to $7,000....all part of the fun I suppose. Going to have a nosey at your photos now...all the best! We kind of expected site costs to be high, however they initially quoted us $1500 and then, when no work had even started just changed it to $10,000. That was very unexpected and our CSO has referred it to management, and we still haven't heard anything in about a week and a half. I agree, it is very exciting, it should all move very quickly now, but so far it has been a really pleasant build. Everyone is doing the right thing, and quickly too which is great. Good luck with your build! Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 16Mar 13, 2010 8:41 am Maybe the site costs were quoted wrong accidently in the first place and only for the cut and fill? The slab may have needed to be upgraded from the included class so this would push the cost up after the soil test was carried out. Im looking forward to watching! NO EXPECTATIONS, NO DISAPPOINTMENTS! Build Thread: viewtopic.php?f=31&t=27441 Landscaping Thread: viewtopic.php?f=19&t=43969 Re: Chris and Anna's - Simonds Valencia 2414 Build 17Mar 15, 2010 4:07 pm We have been up again to our property and have noticed some minor but pretty cool changes, and it's starting to get really exciting! - The fences are up, but front gate wide open! - Port-a-loo is there. - House has been pegged out, so as anyone would do, we went and stood around the different areas, admiring the views! Hopefully this week, plumbing will go in and if we are lucky, the slab as well. They have been progressing well i think.... boiselfish Maybe the site costs were quoted wrong accidently in the first place and only for the cut and fill? The slab may have needed to be upgraded from the included class so this would push the cost up after the soil test was carried out. Im looking forward to watching! We have our site costs seperated on our contract, so it was and always has been only for the cut and fill and others were quoted seperately (such as fencing, bins, slab upgrade, etc), which are fine. The only issue is with the 660% increase for the cut and fill. They already had the soil test report, before we signed our initial contract, so even if this was the case, it does not apply. Also, as per the law, anything they quote as provisional and that they change has to be a reasonable increase or decrease as per the HIA contract, so even if they made a mistake the onus is on them. Re: Chris and Anna's - Locked-out! 18May 13, 2010 1:13 pm Well it's been a while, and a lot has happened. We have offically been locked out, however no bricks are up yet as they are having delays...I assume with finding a brickie, as the bricks have been on site for a couple of weeks now. However, internally a lot is going on. The plaster is going up (before bricks - is this normal?). Frames finished, as it the facia and guttering, plumbing is roughed-in, as it electrical and the bath and shower base are fully installed, along with the solar panel. We got tapped, only about a week ago...which was a bit weird but we don't really mind. It's starting to look good! Picture from a distance. Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ Picture from next door's block Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ 4 14255 Unless there is something in special conditions the builder does not have to give you timeline. If your demolition contractor has not removed Asbestos and it was found… 12 28775 Thanks for the informative response! I'll feed that back to the site supervisor. 2 4102 |