Porter Davis homes

Hello All,

For those following our progress, I just wanted to say that we have now signed the Tender Document (Yes we are going to be building with PD) and we have our Tile, Colour & Electrical appointments over the next 2 weeks followed by signing of the Contract a week or so later.

For those who are thinking of building with PD and have some concerns after reading the various posts on here I would like to take this opportunity to offer some advice.

1) If you have a specific question, try and locate the best person to answer it. I know that your CSA is the first point of contact (and by all means contact her first) but in parallel try and find the best person within PD and ask to speak to them as well.

To offer an example, we had some concerns about the actual design of our slab (as we are building something slightly away from the standard) and although we found our CSA helpful, she obviously did not have the relevant experience to satisfactory answer our questions. To overcome this, we asked to speak to one of their Engineers and although we were initially told that they were all busy, after some discussion we were finally able to speak to one.

Although the converstion with the Engineer only lasted 5-10 minutes, we were left feeling much more confident about proceeding with our build as our questions could be answered straight away without the need to go through a 3rd person which runs the risk of the information being unintentially distorted.

In regards to lack of prices at Hopetoun, which is an issue for most people, how we dealt with it was as follows:

1. Firstly, we visited Hopetoun on 2 seperate occasions (during the weekend) and reasonably accurately managed to select most of what we wanted upgraded. As a side note, for anyone not familiar with Hopetoun yet, please do not leave visiting there until your colour / electrical appointments. You will create unnecessary stress for yourself !!

2. During the same weekends, we also visited National Tiles and was able to get a feel for what tiles we liked. Although, pricing is available from them due to the number of people who are there at the weekend you may not get much time to speak to a member of staff. However, you can easily select the tiles you like on your own and before you leave, politely ask how much (roughly) they cost. With this info and the floor plan of your home (which you can get from your Sales person) you can reasonably accurately calculate the cost of your possible tile selections prior to actually having your official appointment.

3. For of the bigger upgrade items as well as any structural items we wanted changing, we communicated this information to our Sales person who was able to update the initial quote and give us an idea of price. As an example, although we hadn't chosen our exact brick, we were confident that we wanted to select one from a particular category, so as a result was able to get a price in advance.

4. For the lesser expensive items which we wanted to upgrade (Doors, Window Glass, Benchtops, etc) we communicated this information to our CSA prior to our Tender Appointment. These items were then included on the Tender contract so we had an actual figure. From Tender onwards, structual changes cannot be made but all other selections can be altered if necessary.

We now have our Tiles & Colour appointment approaching in the next few weeks, and (with the exception of the wall colour and a few small items) have our chosen selections already prepared.

Hopefully then, unless prices have changed a lot over a few weeks, we should have a reasonable idea of what we are expected to pay prior to our contract and if our budget cannot stretch to that amount at least we will have time in advance to make a decision rather than wait until we attend our contract appointment.

Hope this helps...

Chorlton

Chorlton,
it sounds like we are on similar timeframes as you, as we have out colour, tiles electrical and contract appointments all next week. This is to try and keep us to a January site start. I like your idea of getting prices prior to tender, too bad we missed that one

I'll be interested to see how your appointments go over the next few weeks and see if our experiences are similar.

ELECTRICAL APPOINTMENT

Hello All,

For all those who have had their electrical appointment, can you offer any prices for the following additional items please?

1. Double Sockets (Internal)
2. Double Sockets (External)
3. TV Points
4. Telephone Points


Many Thanks in advance,

Chorlton

Hi Chorlton,

We have a site start in January too. Finished all our appointments, except contract next week.

1. Double Sockets (Internal) $45
2. Double Sockets (External) $112 weatherproof
3. TV Points - not sure coz we did not add. But pay TV points are $168
4. Telephone Points - did not get a price for that.

Hope that helps.

JPZ

Hi Jess,

Thanks for the reply. Are you able to quickly run me through the process step by step for purchasing and building an ACCESS home (I have the PD procedure of purchase already). So you go for your colour and electrical appointments, make upgrades, changes etc. without knowing the exact cost. When do you find out or see the costs of all the changes and upgrades so that you can make a decision whether it is within your budget? At tender or on the signing of the contract? I read somewhere that for ACCESS that you do not goto tender but straight to contact signing? I presume at some point before you sign the contract you will get a total of what all ugprades costs?
My understanding is that you can't see a copy of your contract with your changes or upgrades prior to signing (just a copy of generic HIA contract). So on the day of signing you go in, review everything, make changes and remove things that may have been too expensive. If things are incorrect in the contract, do you request to make changes and NOT sign and book another contract appointment? Or are you expected to sign there and then and have the changes made post contract? Isn't it a bit dangerous to sign something and then have it changed after? If you want a copy of the contract to take home and have a lawyer or someone look over it before you sign it do you have to pay a 3% deposit? Does it mean you have to sign it before you can take it home? Any insight to the whole process would be much appreciated. I really like the layout of PD homes, but really scared of the process.

Thanks in advance

Hey charltan,
I end up getting an extra ph point. From memory I think it was 85 bucks!
Mel

I'm not sure how it can achieve it but the Lisbon 22 is a 5.8 star energy rated house, But I would put that up to maybe 6.2 -6.5 because I added Sarking to the roof and soundproof insulation to the bedrooms, I tried to get an updated report but unfortunately they can't do that..

Has anyone had their WIR's fitted (ie not just one standard hnaging rail) through PD - or even know if it is possible?

Ceiling Mounted Tiber Dumper 250mm Shower


We are currently considering having one of these in the Ensuite rather than the standard shower head. Has anyone else previously chosen one, and if you are actually using it now, how are you finding it? Pros & Cons??

Thanks in advance,

Chorlton

I think Clause 34 of the contract is the relevant part for this.
Building work can be extended due to "any other cause that is beyond the Builder's direct control". Not sure whether bad plastering job is out of their control, after all the SS supposed to watch over the building process & make sure the contractors are doing their jobs.
Then 34.1 states that they have to give you a written notice stating the cause & the extent of the delay.
If you disputed the delay then 34.2 states that you have to tive them a written notice.

That's just my thought.

Hi Audeyand Oscar

We didn't have WIR Fitted but as our ceiling height was 2740mm we asked to increase the height of the rail so we can have two rows of hangers instead of one so having one rail at 2000mm and another rail at 1000mm from floor level.
Making use of the extra space.

Regards
Yellow

Hi SSAZ,

thanks for the reply. We have tried to get an answer from PD but they are NOT replying our email. Pretty disappointed tho with the service, especially after we spent that much money.

Thanks Yellow

did you get PD to put in the extra rails or did you do that afterwards?