Browse Forums Building A New House Re: shocking 3 year journey so far............can you top t 21Aug 25, 2011 8:54 am Oh finn, can't imagine what you've been through, salute!! All I can say is good luck with your journey, I hope the land value has increased a lot after 3 years, then when you want to sell it again, it will cover your $100K lost... Re: shocking 3 year journey so far............can you top t 22Aug 25, 2011 9:33 am well, some slow progress. half the frame is up, but the dates set for things keep getting pushed back and the site manager has said that i "can't be ringing every 3-4 days".....only call because his set dates never materialise and it can't be blamed on the weather all the time-plus hubbie says if HE calls, he'll lose his rag. the horrifying thing is, when we sneaked on site and walked around inside the frame, everything seemed miniscule. there is a huge deviation from the show home size and the size our home will be (about 20-25%) because the bloody council kept trimming off the size of the house for supposed boundary issues (when pre-existing boundaries weren't far off) and we just said yes to get it through out of sheer frustration. to see the practical impact is worrying. now the ultimate paradox will be that when it is finally complete, we won't want to move in.....ha..ha..after all of this time, and we either sell or rent it out! Re: shocking 3 year journey so far............can you top t 23Sep 22, 2011 8:01 pm I am also having issues with Leichhardt council for over a year but your 100k is top. I think the hardest part of building project is DA and you have gone through that so I hope your house will be finished on schedule. Goodluck to you and to me as well. I still have a long way to go haizzz. Cheers Re: shocking 3 year journey so far............can you top t 24Jan 23, 2012 3:10 pm So how is the house looking now ... nearly finished?? I'm keen to hear how this saga turns out .... 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: shocking 3 year journey so far............can you top t 26Nov 12, 2012 9:34 pm sorry to hear about your story! but do you think the fault is more with the DA approvals ? or the builder? seems like c1aredon probably wanted to reduce the loss they had.....and put it on you.... Re: shocking 3 year journey so far............can you top t 27Nov 12, 2012 10:56 pm dear all...................... sorry i have been shocking slow with my update. we finally moved in in may this year. there were plenty more farcical incidents leading up to it and after. they went over the build time by several months because they cocked up and built the front of the house with an incorrect gauge steel beam which couldn't support the house (!) they were informed by the subcontractors but elected to save money and cross their fingers and hope we wouldn't notice, until a crack appeared down the front of the building. they then had to demolish the front of the house and rebuild it costing us another $9000 in rent and $3000 + in professional fees. since we moved in, we have discovered many stupid things, like screws for cupboards going into water pipes so we have had several leaks when repositioning cupboards so have had to call them in to remove cupboards, saw through walls and fix several pipes. the house flooded in the first month when there was torrential rain and clarendon blamed the landscaping which was not complete when the water was coming through the interior of the house from underneath..................................... endless, we are still finishing off things-we are having decking done. the landscapers are finally out. of course we are overall happy that we are finally in our new home and we are settled and getting on with our lives (pool getting tiled this month!!!!) overall it is mostly the way we wanted it (more from my persistence than any service we have received) but the shocking mismanagement and the catalogue of unncessary avoidable disasters has put a dampner on the process. anyone thinking of building, think seriously if your mental health, wallet, family and your job can survive the worst scenario, and then minimise your risk of this happening by chosing very carefully who you build with and go on reputation from decent sources . if you get any sense something doesn't feel right, pay attention to it so it doesn't come back to bite you on the bum! oh and to answer the question about "fault"-it has been an unfortunate combination of circumstances, the council we deal with has a particular reputation, the builder obviously takes a huge chunk of the credit, but there were many landcaping issues too-our plot was also unfavourable (previous owners removed all drainage pipes from the garden which meant the plot was a gutter for all the road's pipes draining past our ). having a huge tree which council would not permit removal of got in the way of alot of stuff caused protracted delays. pool builder going bust was just bad luck, although i have been told if we had done our research better we might have known (we certainly did a reasonable but not excessive amount of research). but my subsequent owner builder stint with the half completed pool with an unlicensed builder could be seen as asking for trouble, but i worked out that overall we have probably saved $40-50k on the pool. so when it is finally tiled and the water isn't green and the kids don't die from deadly bugs and the water isn't not totally freezing, i will leaning on a lilo (or whatever you call them in aus) drinking my wine staring up at our house which hasn't fallen down with a very big grin on my face good luck to all of you waiting to get to the other end of the journey. it is nice to be on the other side, but there's still plenty to do! finn Re: shocking 3 year journey so far............can you top t 28Nov 13, 2012 7:14 am Sorry to hear it took so long. Glad to hear its finally over (more or less . Re: shocking 3 year journey so far............can you top t 29Nov 27, 2012 9:29 pm finn dear all...................... sorry i have been shocking slow with my update. ........ finn You have hit the nail on the head, my build has been very interesting to say the least. For Clarendon it is seems acceptable to cause damage to a home during the build process, their justification is that they will slap a fix on it at the end, we all know that such fixes are never the same as if no damage had been done in the first place. They also love fixing things at the end and even if you get your own inspector out they hide behind their favourite saying ... its is their opinion not necessarily ours.... even if you have an accredited qualified inspector and then you have to argue with them. Their goal is simple, build the house in the shortest period of time to basically get in and out to maximise profit, IMO their first interest is not in the quality of the build, close enough is good enough approach so to speak. To anyone considering get everything in writing and anything they promise you tell them to email you in writting outlining what they promised as this is all they are interested in when you get into a dispute. Re: shocking 3 year journey so far............can you top t 30Nov 27, 2012 9:34 pm finn ....i "can't be ringing every 3-4 days".....only call because his set dates never materialise and it can't be blamed on the weather all the time-plus hubbie says if HE calls, he'll lose his rag. hahaha sounds familiar, I ignore this everytime it comes up, I just ring. He is your site manager and is there for you not the other way round. You have a concern you should just ring (this goes for anyone). I was told categorically that I should not ring and do you think i listen . finn the horrifying thing is, when we sneaked on site and walked around inside the frame, everything seemed miniscule. there is a huge deviation from the show home size and the size our home will be (about 20-25%) because the bloody council kept trimming off the size of the house for supposed boundary issues (when pre-existing boundaries weren't far off) and we just said yes to get it through out of sheer frustration. to see the practical impact is worrying. that was the mistake you made, i had similar issues and simply took on council after Clarendon simply gave up without even trying just accepted what council told them. Interesting that when i dealt with it that all issues of council were addressed and nothing was changed, although it took an extra month but that's nothing considering it is a home build. The OP has gone The latch and striker are definitely not aligned but there was no point trying to help the OP understand that. Hence the reason they are no longer with us. 12 5678 Any advice on how to ensure the kit home granny flat that im thinking of buying will get council approval. The kit home companys wont release plans without a deposit and… 0 7222 Your house roof does not show rusting other than some surface rust on the flashings. In my opinion you dont need to replace or paint the roof other than treat surface rust… 1 10209 |