Porter Davis homes

magicjen17 · Jul 29, 2011 10:16 am

Can someone please tell me that they have had moments during their building process with this company where they just wanted to give up? Surely I can't be the only one?!?

I am honestly not sure whether we should continue down this road any further but if there is light at the end of the tunnel I would love to know! I don't want to throw in the towel but am losing faith.

Good news stories anyone?

tstr1a · Jul 29, 2011 10:19 am

magicjen17

Can someone please tell me that they have had moments during their building process with this company where they just wanted to give up? Surely I can't be the only one?!?

I am honestly not sure whether we should continue down this road any further but if there is light at the end of the tunnel I would love to know! I don't want to throw in the towel but am losing faith.

Good news stories anyone?

Hey magicjen17

What stage are you at with your build?

magicjen17 · Jul 29, 2011 10:26 am

tstr1a

Hey magicjen17

What stage are you at with your build?

Hi tstr1a,

Hard to say really.. it's a long story.. we haven't started construction yet. We were told that our file was going to be handed to construction this week which turned out to not be true, so another week passes. We signed our contract in March and several things have happened outside of PD's control since then but I feel totally disheartened with how things have been handled and tbh it isn't giving me much hope for our build.. if it even gets to that point.

I love the Waldorf btw, that would have been my choice if we were a bit richer!

I've always wanted a room just for my cloaks.

tstr1a · Jul 29, 2011 10:48 am

My experience so far with PD has been exceeded my expectation and it’s all due to having a brilliant building coordinator. My SS is also fantastic and is on top of things. I must say that at the sales process I nearly walked away as it was difficult trying to get prices and estimating costs.

Building a house can take it’s time and definitely raises your stress level. I found dealing with PD to be quiet fluid and easy. I sure that I will experience situations during the build which will stress me out but I have an excellent SS which will resolve problems which come along the way. Best of luck with the build and once you start

building1 · Jul 29, 2011 10:51 am

magicjen17

tstr1a

Hey magicjen17

What stage are you at with your build?

Hi tstr1a,

Hard to say really.. it's a long story.. we haven't started construction yet. We were told that our file was going to be handed to construction this week which turned out to not be true, so another week passes. We signed our contract in March and several things have happened outside of PD's control since then but I feel totally disheartened with how things have been handled and tbh it isn't giving me much hope for our build.. if it even gets to that point.

I love the Waldorf btw, that would have been my choice if we were a bit richer!

I've always wanted a room just for my cloaks.

Honestly, I think everybody has times in their build that they want to give up ::hyst::

BUT
Once it gets started it's mostly great.
We signed for December site start, but ended up starting on January 17, now that peeved me off but there were problems with council which held us back.
Being told your file is being handed to construction is literally that, your file moves on, gets allocated to a SS who starts booking trades to start work.
Hopefully you get a good SS, ours was great, on top of things, and has great attention to detail.
Another thing, once it starts, if the jobs get done well, don't complain if they take a little slower, less things to fix later on ::lol::

building1 · Jul 29, 2011 10:52 am

tstr1a

My experience so far with PD has been exceeded my expectation and it’s all due to having a brilliant building coordinator. My SS is also fantastic and is on top of things. I must say that at the sales process I nearly walked away as it was difficult trying to get prices and estimating costs.

Building a house can take it’s time and definitely raises your stress level. I found dealing with PD to be quiet fluid and easy. I sure that I will experience situations during the build which will stress me out but I have an excellent SS which will resolve problems which come along the way. Best of luck with the build and once you start

Wonder if you have the same SS we did??

Team PD · Jul 29, 2011 12:10 pm

magicjen17

Can someone please tell me that they have had moments during their building process with this company where they just wanted to give up? Surely I can't be the only one?!?

I am honestly not sure whether we should continue down this road any further but if there is light at the end of the tunnel I would love to know! I don't want to throw in the towel but am losing faith.

Good news stories anyone?

Hi magicjen17,
I’m sorry to hear that you are struggling at the moment. I understand where you are coming from, the build process can sometimes be stressful at times but those first steps into your new home will be worth it. Tstr1a and building1 have given you support with how you are feeling, also I’m here as well if you need help or if you have any questions. Being on the forum is a great place to vent out any kind of emotions and to know that you are not alone. Please keep me in the loop with your progress. Cheers, Ebony

rammy · Jul 29, 2011 5:33 pm

building1

tstr1a

My experience so far with PD has been exceeded my expectation and it’s all due to having a brilliant building coordinator. My SS is also fantastic and is on top of things. I must say that at the sales process I nearly walked away as it was difficult trying to get prices and estimating costs.

Building a house can take it’s time and definitely raises your stress level. I found dealing with PD to be quiet fluid and easy. I sure that I will experience situations during the build which will stress me out but I have an excellent SS which will resolve problems which come along the way. Best of luck with the build and once you start

Wonder if you have the same SS we did??

Hi Guys,

I have been following this thread and its very helpful. Thanks to all. tstr1a and humble: your thghts have been very helpful. keep'em coming. I have made few mistakes for not doing enough research before contract....and now PD doesn't agree to make any variations....so frustrating!!

The process at PD has to change...no clear visibility over prices and keeping all the surprises till the contract day. The whole process is clearly to lockdown the customer. Not happy with the process till contract, partly coz of lack of information and not doing enuf research. I don't want make the same mistakes again, so jumped on the web.

It clearly looks the building quality will be dependent on the SS. So question out of ignorance (for PD team too), can we get to chose the SS?? Any good SS in melbourne west?

I am waiting for the council permits and will be assigned an SS in 2 weeks time(hopefully).

Will be watching this space....

tstr1a · Jul 29, 2011 5:43 pm

rammy

building1

tstr1a

My experience so far with PD has been exceeded my expectation and it’s all due to having a brilliant building coordinator. My SS is also fantastic and is on top of things. I must say that at the sales process I nearly walked away as it was difficult trying to get prices and estimating costs.

Building a house can take it’s time and definitely raises your stress level. I found dealing with PD to be quiet fluid and easy. I sure that I will experience situations during the build which will stress me out but I have an excellent SS which will resolve problems which come along the way. Best of luck with the build and once you start

Wonder if you have the same SS we did??

Hi Guys,

I have been following this thread and its very helpful. Thanks to all. tstr1a and humble: your thghts have been very helpful. keep'em coming. I have made few mistakes for not doing enough research before contract....and now PD doesn't agree to make any variations....so frustrating!!

The process at PD has to change...no clear visibility over prices and keeping all the surprises till the contract day. The whole process is clearly to lockdown the customer. Not happy with the process till contract, partly coz of lack of information and not doing enuf research. I don't want make the same mistakes again, so jumped on the web.

It clearly looks the building quality will be dependent on the SS. So question out of ignorance (for PD team too), can we get to chose the SS?? Any good SS in melbourne west?

I am waiting for the council permits and will be assigned an SS in 2 weeks time(hopefully).

Will be watching this space....

Hey rammy,

your building coordinator should give you prices if you ask, ours did. With SS it's the luck of the draw, it like having a bad machanic and your car always breaks down.... LOL I'm not to sure if you can pick the SS but I think if your not happy with the SS during construction they may appoint you another one (this happend to a mate of mine but he build with Carlise Homes).

mel_mox · Jul 29, 2011 9:30 pm

Hi everyone,
Very happy with my SS! He is onto everything so far & communicates regulary on what's going on.
My husband & in are really pleased with PD ATM!
Hopefully it continues.
But I will admit there have been some things that I argued, but didn't win!!!
But overall the quality of our build has been good & not really mmy CSR as I'm onto no 4! So that has been disappointing but all 4 of them have been fantastic in efficiency & following thru on requests & questions!
I did pray for a good SS prior to our build starting & I did get one! Lol
I don't have anything negative to say about PD & we are at lock up stage!
Let's hope it continues!
Mel

karmaz · Jul 29, 2011 10:09 pm

Thats great news Mel! Good luck with the rest of your build too!!
Overall, PD has been great with sticky points and more often than not, have come to the party. I kept an eagle eye on our build, like some others here we were blessed with a good SS and that made a world of difference. I think I said elsewhere, we signed up with a small builder and had sweet nothing done for almost five months. With PD we have a house, and a pretty good one it is.
Magicjen, I hear you. Early on in the piece with the small builder, and in the early paperwork stages with PD, I felt as you did. Persist, and it does pay off mostly. It does get hard and seems like uphill work at times, but at the end of the day, when you are relaxing in your beautiful new house, it will have been worth it. Good luck, and chin up!

J & C · Jul 29, 2011 10:20 pm

Does PD always charge you if the build date has to be delayed as the developer has delayed land settlement or do they understand the situation and cut you some slack. Has anyone been through our kind of a situation. We have been informed by our developer (no reasons given at this stage) that our land settlement has been delayed by 6 months.

Twiggy · Jul 30, 2011 7:31 am

eli-kay123

Wateman

Hi All,

Just a comment RE the huge mark ups on certain things.. The sales person my partner and I had been dealing with was very honest about certain areas where the mark up was quite substantial. He explained it saying something along the lines of 'As a volume builder, there are some things we would prefer not to do, so we mark those things up much more than others. If people are prepared to pay the price then we will do it for them, but there are a number of things that are certainly cheaper to do after handover'.
We happened to be talking about driveways at the time.

Just thought I would share that.. whether it's true or not, I thought it was a fair explanation. Our sales consultant was great, my partner and I was sad this week when he said he now had to pass us on to a building co-ordinator. I hope the BC will be as good!

Just wanted to endorse this. We're doing our carpet through them as well. We're doing the better part of a 41sq home installed for $5100. Would of cost us a lot more through either the builder or majore carpet chains.

Hi Waterman,

I agree with you 110%. PD do mark up pricing. We were charged an extra $5K to lay and supply Timber Top floorboards and we dealt with the same flooring company as they do. Obviously we are doing the floorboards after handover. When I asked why the high price the response was we have to make money somewhere, in otherwords they've given it a high price because they don't want to do the job.

As for carpet, we are also doing this after hand over as we have picked the Redbook range and PD don't offer this range. We were quoted a few different prices highest being $7000 after we dropped it from $7300 to the the cheapest being $5300 from Western Distributors for the exact same carpet. For anyone wanting to do carpet after handover maybe have a look at Western Distributors in Sunshine and compare quotes with places like Carpet Court etc..... They also do tiles and floorboards if anyone is interested. They've been in the business for 40 years, so they must be doing something right.

Victoria_g06 · Jul 30, 2011 7:57 am

[quote="rammy"]"building1" wrote: "tstr1a" wrote: My experience so far with PD has been exceeded my expectation and it’s all due to having a brilliant building coordinator. My SS is also fantastic and is on top of things. I must say that at the sales process I nearly walked away as it was difficult trying to get prices and estimating costs.

Building a house can take it’s time and definitely raises your stress level. I found dealing with PD to be quiet fluid and easy. I sure that I will experience situations during the build which will stress me out but I have an excellent SS which will resolve problems which come along the way. Best of luck with the build and once you start
Wonder if you have the same SS we did??

Hi Guys,

I have been following this thread and its very helpful. Thanks to all. tstr1a and humble: your thghts have been very helpful. keep'em coming. I have made few mistakes for not doing enough research before contract....and now PD doesn't agree to make any variations....so frustrating!!

The process at PD has to change...no clear visibility over prices and keeping all the surprises till the contract day. The whole process is clearly to lockdown the customer. Not happy with the process till contract, partly coz of lack of information and not doing enuf research. I don't want make the same mistakes again, so jumped on the web.

It clearly looks the building quality will be dependent on the SS. So question out of ignorance (for PD team too), can we get to chose the SS?? Any good SS in melbourne west?

I am waiting for the council permits and will be assigned an SS in 2 weeks time(hopefully).

Will be watching this space....[/quote]

I can say that I didn't like my build process, I wasn't kept informed at all; and that was because of my SS. He barely calledme, and when he did it was to fix a mistake! PM me if you want to know his name, I built in the west...

bobbie · Jul 31, 2011 9:28 pm

Victoria_g06

I can say that I didn't like my build process, I wasn't kept informed at all; and that was because of my SS. He barely calledme, and when he did it was to fix a mistake! PM me if you want to know his name, I built in the west...

plus one on that comment,
my SS comes highly recommended by my neighbours. but unfortunately i didn't have a satisfying experience.
SS can be replaced by a construction manager as in my neighbour's case.
They had repeating issues with crumbling mortar.

lowcocustomz

Hi guys, Im building the regatta 23 at the moment and we are at lockup. We have been at that stage for a while with not much movement. I have a couple of questions regarding the fixing of the frame before plastering and how do you know that they have fixed it if they wont show you the report?
It also seems that everytime well at least counting about 10 times that I have visited the house recently there has either been no one there and the ss never seems to be there very often. Has anyone else had this problem as it has been since fri the 15th that they finished painting.. and nothing has happened on the inside, only just put on the garage door this week.. I abit worred since the csc told us that tiling was to start on mon the 19th... its now 27th july and nothing has happened... no one has let us no... nothing has been mentioned when talking to the ss... im worried.... ::cry::

Your thought??
::surprise::

Thanks

hey lowcocustomz,

I had a similar experience- from lockup to pci, there was a standstill period. Apparently I got a new SS around that time (not sure when exactly since there's no communication) When I asked my SS, he pretty much blamed it on the previous SS. If you are not in a hurry to move in, I suggest you let them do their jobs and don't feel pressured if they want to rush you through the pci/handover stage. Also have you tried contacting you CSC? If SS's not communicating, CSC might be a better choice.

magicjen17

Can someone please tell me that they have had moments during their building process with this company where they just wanted to give up? Surely I can't be the only one?!?

I am honestly not sure whether we should continue down this road any further but if there is light at the end of the tunnel I would love to know! I don't want to throw in the towel but am losing faith.

Good news stories anyone?

At the end of that tunnel, you get to see your chosen plan mapped out in reality. you know everything's new and don't need to worry about maintenance or renovation. It's an opportunity to start our fresh, to create a world of your dream, and be who you want to be.
yes it might also come in with ceilings with circles, chipped skirting boards, windows and doors not sealed properly, termite protection that doesn't work...(i try not to complain to much

)
but it should be worthwhile at the end. let's face it, buying a house could be equally daunting.
are you a first time builder? I know how that feels like, the experience can even be intimidating at times.
Talk to people on this forum, they are the most amazing bunch!
maybe start a building thread, sure people would help you out with queries or simply support

cattycatcat · Jul 31, 2011 11:03 pm

Hi All,

Just a quick question..

We are about to sign on to build with PD after finally securing our block. We have paid our $1000 to hold our start date for September but now our sales assistant wants us to talk to Choices Home loans. Do we have to speak with them? and if we do how much information do we have to give them? We already have our pre aproval for our mortgage so why do we have to give all our personal/financial details to a stranger?? I really don't want to have to talk to a broker...

bobbie · Jul 31, 2011 11:13 pm

cattycatcat

Hi All,

Just a quick question..

We are about to sign on to build with PD after finally securing our block. We have paid our $1000 to hold our start date for September but now our sales assistant wants us to talk to Choices Home loans. Do we have to speak with them? and if we do how much information do we have to give them? We already have our pre aproval for our mortgage so why do we have to give all our personal/financial details to a stranger?? I really don't want to have to talk to a broker...

have you told your sales assistant about the pre-approval? sounds like he/she presumed that you haven't got your finance in place.

Wateman · Jul 31, 2011 11:16 pm

cattycatcat

Hi All,

Just a quick question..

We are about to sign on to build with PD after finally securing our block. We have paid our $1000 to hold our start date for September but now our sales assistant wants us to talk to Choices Home loans. Do we have to speak with them? and if we do how much information do we have to give them? We already have our pre aproval for our mortgage so why do we have to give all our personal/financial details to a stranger?? I really don't want to have to talk to a broker...

It's not so bad if you tell them you have approval already. When I did this recently they just asked some ballpark questions like how much are you looking to borrow, how much do you have saved, how much do you earn. You don't have to be specific, they just want to make sure you are capable of servicing the loan.
If anything I think they just make sure you are aware of what is required.
The Choice broker I spoke to was great and didn't push me to use them, just got the figures and said yep I can see you will be right. He then proceeded give me some further information, about how to lower the insurance etc. I even rang back later on to get more information from them, and ended up going with them as they were 1000 times more helpful than the broker we had already seen(this broker also recommended their own loan which is why I was glad to get some info from another party)
Anyway in short, don't worry about it if you are happy with your own finances. They won't check up on anything you tell them, it's just a formality

J & C · Jul 31, 2011 11:26 pm

bobbie

cattycatcat

Hi All,

Just a quick question..

We are about to sign on to build with PD after finally securing our block. We have paid our $1000 to hold our start date for September but now our sales assistant wants us to talk to Choices Home loans. Do we have to speak with them? and if we do how much information do we have to give them? We already have our pre aproval for our mortgage so why do we have to give all our personal/financial details to a stranger?? I really don't want to have to talk to a broker...

have you told your sales assistant about the pre-approval? sounds like he/she presumed that you haven't got your finance in place.

Our sales person made a suggestion to us too to use choice home loans, we mentioned to him that we will be going through our broker and do not want to go through choice at the end we had to provide them with a few details though. Looks like it is a PD process just to ensure you can get a loan from the bank so that they can be ensured of a sale.

tstr1a · Aug 01, 2011 12:00 am

They get choice to confirm that u can get financing as tHey don't wanna waste time. I agree with the process as most ppl have no idea about finances