Browse Forums Building A New House 1 Mar 01, 2013 7:46 am We just had a meeting with our sales consultant last night and our site costs have jumped by 7k plus they are trying to charge us an additional 5k to keep the current siting, or will drop that if we move the gge 1m from boundary instead of on boundary- apparently due to the batter at our frontage. Our block has a 1m batter within the first couple meters and then has a gentle slope of 400mm to the very back of the block. Our house is pretty small for the block size so should be under 300mm fall where we're actually building. She mentioned briefly its something to do with extra cutting and retaining walls, but seeing as the house isn't on or even particularly close to the batter I don't understand why they even need them. I read the notes the estimator sent her and even they didn't mention specifically why, just that it was going to cost a lot more. More concerning for me is that they want to move the house and cut into my lovely north side yard. The batter gets a bit steeper the further north in our frontage you go, yet they want to shift it further north by 1m. Any ideas why we wouldn't be able to build on the boundary? They are making it seem like a huge deal without being to explain why and its really bugging me. SC is hoping to get some more info for us but I'm just wondering if anyone has any ideas or if I should be calling BS, ie. they saw the batter numbers and decided that they could wrangle some more money out of us via higher fixed site costs. Re: Batter adding exponentionally to site costs? 3Mar 02, 2013 8:59 am we probably need a diagram to comment further sorry Re: Batter adding exponentionally to site costs? 4Mar 02, 2013 9:49 am I'll see what I can get from the developer this afternoon, my plans that include the batter measurements are too small to be able to translate it properly, ie. I can't read the numbers. But basically, the front couple meters of my block is a fairly steep slope (1m over 2 or 3 meters) and then it flattens out. Re: Batter adding exponentionally to site costs? 5Mar 02, 2013 10:54 am Photos too of the front help a lot as well.
The builder or developer should also be supplying you with the plans as full scale pdfs which you can upload here , not tiny thumbnails which no-one can read. 1m rise over 2-3m is very steep and they have probably had to do that to get a reasonably sloped driveway and crossing for access. That is governed by the BCA not an estate law or council. The other way you could do it is to leave the house where it is but drop the floor of the garage down a foot or two. You would need a couple of internal steps up to the floor of the house though. Stewie Re: Batter adding exponentionally to site costs? 6Mar 02, 2013 10:56 am Its hard to say without seeing a site plan..... but 'in general' if there is any sort of slope it is a fact that the closer you build to a boundary the more likely you are to need some sort of a retaining wall. The Harder You Try - the Luckier You Get ! Web site http://www.anewhouse.com.au Informative, Amusing, and Opinionated Blog - Over 600 posts on all aspects of building a new house. Re: Batter adding exponentionally to site costs? 7Mar 04, 2013 1:32 pm Heres the site plan. We are lot 219 and were supposed to be building on the southern boundary (shared with lot 220) Still yet to hear back from the builder as to what the doubled site costs include, or even see a plan that shows what they need to do. We've had a chat to a couple of builders who we know and they can't seem to think of a reason why it should double the site costs. Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ Re: Batter adding exponentionally to site costs? 8Mar 05, 2013 4:56 am If your garage is on the south side I can see the need for around 5m of retaining wall. Also if you are building right on the boundary there could be extra costs for drainage runs and boundary roof details. 7k seems a bit expensive for that though. The Harder You Try - the Luckier You Get ! Web site http://www.anewhouse.com.au Informative, Amusing, and Opinionated Blog - Over 600 posts on all aspects of building a new house. Re: Batter adding exponentionally to site costs? 9Mar 05, 2013 8:38 am Thanks Bashworth. I'm still confused though! They've gone from site costs of 11k to 23 for us to have it on the boundary, and that amount explicitly excludes retaining walls, so I'm still not sure what they're charging for. I'll update once I hear from them I suppose. Thanks again though Re: Batter adding exponentionally to site costs? 10Mar 05, 2013 10:20 am Request an itemised break down of their costs so that you know exactly what they are charging you for and for how much. Never accept a generic "site costs are $X". A large generalised figure always sounds like a blatant grab for cash to me so get them to break it down for you. Completed a knock down and rebuild in northern Melbourne. Handover completed 27/09/2013 and now moved in. Re: Batter adding exponentionally to site costs? 11Mar 05, 2013 5:48 pm That is expensive. We are building on a massive slope and have a few batters and our site costs are less than half of what you have been quoted. Be aware that if its in the contract as a provisional sum then the builder is required to show you the invoice from the excavation company and repay you any difference. Let them know you know that. Custom downslope build Build thread viewtopic.php?f=31&t=61873 Blog http://www.buildingroyalmanor.blogspot.com.au Re: Batter adding exponentionally to site costs? 12Mar 06, 2013 11:21 am We have built on a block that had quite a slope on it. To the point to achieve a level surface we had to import 1300 M3 of fill and have it compacted. This was necessary due an unexpected event with the soil itself. This took four days to complete and our total costs for all of this was only $7K. So given that I think your site costs are just a bit high. Settlement 1/2/12 New Shed 23/3/12 Slab poured 27/3/12 Frame complete 4/5/12 Roof complete 1/6/12 LOCKUP 29/6/12 Our new build blog http://kareenhillsownerbuild.blogspot.com/ Re: Batter adding exponentionally to site costs? 13Mar 06, 2013 1:00 pm Than ks for the replies. After looking at the slope HomeAngels and delatite13 are on I've emailed chasing a better breakdown of what the costs are for. I'll try to post a pic of the actual block today but its nothing like the slope you both were dealing with. I should be fair - they did actually offer to drop the amount by 3k but its still almost double. I am not sure whether Perth has its own way of doing things in regards to this. Most of Perth has class A (sandy soil), except for some areas near rivers or hills. 2 13103 Is anyone building with Mojo and have a recent site cost tender 0 15954 Henley should give you some indication of site costs. Too many variable to give you any reasonable accuracy 1 1889 |