Porter Davis homes

If after the PCI you have defects, and you pay the final payment, then the likelyhood of them being resolved is minimal, and if the PCI has a good solid list, then it is effectively a false start, as you are going to have to come back and do a PCI again.

If you get the inspection done, and then have those items addressed, inspected again, and passed, then you know the PCI will be fine.

Thats also my view....

Definately get the independant inspection carried out beforehand. Even if there is little or no time for PD to address any items raised from it before the official PCI, you will at the very least have an indication of what items to focus on when performing the PCI with your SS.

I'm yet to perform a PCI but I can imagine that trying to check everything during a single walk-through is impossible.

The other problem is that overtime things will start to play out, ie: you wont use a tap or have a shower until after you move in, tiles/leaks.. all that fun stuff.

However (i know i will) be taking hrs to do the PCI as every little nook and cranny will be looked over. That said, my expectations are probably higher then they should be. I know ill be a pain in the ***. OCD like.

i hear ya brother...i think i drive Rob nuts with my questions and looking things over...

Wifey does a good job, as long as I explain it all its fine. She aint into the details.. However, I am bigtime.

Least my CSC has been great, I think we are up to email number 10 already its only been 4 days... Now just to lock in the colours and we are set to party. Really looking forward to the tender on monday, we should be able to nail down most if not all of the major costs.

Hi everyone,

Just have a question about studs and noggins.

I was thinking of hanging heavy picture frames and mirrors around the house and putting shelving in the pantry and not sure if I need extra studs/noggins to be put in during frame stage or it can be done later?

Does anyone know if we need studs/noggins to hang things on the walls or we can just nail it to the plaster wall?

I'm kind of clueless here

thanks in advance for your comments and advice

Hey Puppyso,

they should be installed before the plaster goes up on walls and the ground floor of the your double storey house. It's a bit late now. Bunnings have screws and hooks which will support a weight loan on plaster (5kg max). With shelving you will need to find the stud (use a stud detector - bunnings - $20) and screw into it.

You will definitly need extra studs put in. Specially if the things you are hanging are heavy. Don't forget that those shelves will be used to put things on too, so that will create more weight. Plaster won't hold it up on it's own. I don't think you can add them in after the house is done unless you knock the wall down, and you don't want to do that.
We put extra studs in for things like heavy picture frames and wall mounted tv's. I just went up to the carpenters while they were working away one day asked them if they wouldn't mind putting some extra ones in. I offered to pay them but they were happy with a slab of beer! Hope that has helped you.

Humble, included some of my upgrade costs here to give an idea


I thought i'd add some colour selections (and prices for those interested)

Brick chosen is Austral homestead mushroom (Cat 2, 30sq home) extra cost $1020

Off white mortar $771

We also chose colorbond downpipes (paperbark), faschia (paperbark) & gutter (monument) $532 (small cost to never have to paint them again )

Rendering the front projection Dulux pale parchment

I hope it's enough of a contrast with the bricks

Roof is Sambuca (black )

We have extended the garage one extra spot $8657

And this is our laundry door, sooo excited about this one, it has venetians between the glass, the upgrade was $673

Other upgrades I can price up are

Caesar stone to powder room $233 add pencil round edge $115
Caesar stone to bathroom $192 add pencil round edge $130

Caesar stone to pantry $960 straight edge $390

Added a linen to the laundry $737

Small window 1800mm X 600mm to master $351

Pmad 104 Pivot door $1841

Internal doors X16 $3450

Add a cavity sliding door to master WIR $654

We upgraded underlay throughout $765

Aluminium sliding door to rumpus in lieu of window $309

basin and mixer add $159

Niche in shower $165

Might give you more of an idea

Thanks for sharing!

These are the figures we have so far. We are building a prestige, so some of those above are standards.

Wood Look Garage Door $1,230.00
Flyscreens $636.00
Door to House/Garage $434.00 (There isnt one on the plan! durp durp!)
Shower Niche $330.00
Fireproof splashback $139.00 (splashback included in the promotion but the fireproofing isnt? )
Caesar Stone too Bathrooms $199.00
Caesar Stone too master Bathrooms $309.00
Study Wall Cutout $314.00
Family Wall Cutout $314.00
Bigger Window in the Family $477.00

They were from the sales consultant, ill have that (and more on Monday)

We have also been charged 12k for site costs and $1700 for OH&S, the simplicity promotion states a 10k discount, however we were told we had no site costs as its a PD House&Land, all to be debated on Monday.

Thank you Bel&Marz & tstr1a for the advice *^_^*

Will see if the guys on site can put extra noggins and studs in for a slab of beer too

We have just finished all our selections, so we sent an email to our customer service officer requesting PD to price all of our selections/upgrades. We have been informed by our rep that PD does not provide for the prices of upgrades until we have signed our contract. The logic behind this defeats us.

How is one expected to give their bank a dollar estimate of the price if PD expects us to wait until we sign the contract. From this blog we go to understand that we have to have our loan formally approved prior to signing our contract.

Fortunately for us we were able to get the pricing of most of our upgrades at before our tender so we had a number to build on. We feel PD can benefit much more if they can be more transparent with the pricing as most people might not adopt a conservative approach.

Has everyone on this blog been through this or did you manage to get all prices before the contract.

Look forward to your responses.

Cheers,

J & C

I managed to get nearly all the prices.. or at least ballpark prices. Some of the prices I got by schmoozing the reps at nearly every display in Melbourne and sucking up big time to my CSC. But the majority of the prices I got from my fellow forumites here on H1.

The only shock we got was our floor tiles... it came in at 13k or something (we budgeted 8k) so we deleted a few areas to get it down to around 10k.

Hi Humble,

We are building a prestige home with PD and we got flyscreens to all opening windows as part of the promotions. You may wnat to double check your promotions.

thanks

Same here, I got the prices from our sales consultant, then at tender, and after that I emailed my CSA to get the balance of the prices. Most of the prices for electrical was from this forum, other upgrades I obtained from others who had already signed their contracts.

Bruno..the latest promo doesn't have as much stuff as the one that ended in about feb/march (PD Complete)

One thing which is quite annoying is when we upgraded to wooden windows they were going to put on metal flyscreens

We ended up swapping these fly screens from the windows we upgraded (x7) for flyscreens for the stacker door in the rumpus. Doesn't seem like a good deal but its something at least. We now have to get wooden flyscreens for these windows.

Has anybody looked into those cavity flyscreens for bifolds?

Lucky we locked in the promo offer before 1st of March..

B

Can anybody tell me please, if timber bifolds are varnished?
We're having ours stained (which we paid extra for) but i'm not sure if varnishing is standard (hope it is )

We didn't have to pay for staining for the bifolds, only the windows. That is strange you are being charged for that...we queried if the staining was included in the bifold figure and they said yes.

The charge for the window staining did not include varnish....staining alone is very expensive, I would hate to see the charge for varnish.

Hi J & C,

The pricing for your selections will be provided at the Contract appointment, but definitely before you sign anything. You can also elect to remove items if they exceed your budget.

You can't get formal (aka: unconditional) approval for your loan until you have a signed contract, which has a construction cost along with the specification. As such, there is a Finance clause in the contract. You can get conditional approval prior to the meeting to give you confidence and get the whole process started, but again, nothing formal until you supply the signed contract to the bank.

hth

Rups