Browse Forums Building A New House Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 261Jul 10, 2013 9:11 pm Mars how exciting, having all the colours picked they sound great. When so they book colours? Is that after you sign the tender off? We are back at square one with colours, mainly bricks. Have to do the rounds again and check them out. Received the changed plans yesterday, they have a great turn around. Very impressed and excited, they look very closer. Very minor changes need to be done. Tender should come back in soon. Land is happening, all so quick, always when your away. Thank god for email, been talking with bank manager about what finance to get for land and then construction. Should all go through in a week I guess. Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 262Jul 11, 2013 1:43 pm Upsize, once you sign the tender you will get sent a product selection guide which is a little confusing. But really you just need to determine external colours or have an idea before making an appointment. Once you have the brick selected, you're good to go. We took a picture of a metricon house colour scheme to match, and the colour girl helped get close to it. Make sure to cross check your plans (especially window sizes) and tender before signing off as they tended to become less accommodating once we paid the next deposit and there was a minor error on their part which needed correcting. However I remained patient. Good luck with everything including the bank stuff. We're finalising the pool requirements tonight, since our plan and tender are set. Went to see 2 pools by Coral Reef....the 2nd one was really well done. We've decided to do the travertine tiles continuing into the Alfresco (Kurmond have credited the tiles). The pool we've gone for is the 8m Contemporary in Sapphire Starlight. Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 263Jul 17, 2013 9:05 pm Hi all, Been quiet on here, thought while watch state of origin i'll do some posting. Our land loan is ready to go just waiting for all the paper work from the land solicitors and that will go through. We ave been told by the 25th July. We are waiting for our final tender still, but not rushing that as I am so busy with work haven't got time to check it out. We went through our plans again and are now on revision F. LOL! Think we are done, but finding small things that need to be altered, have asked for a scaled size drawing as I need this to really check out everything. I like to look at all measurements to get a real feel for the size and spacing. We spoke to the pool company next week to go over things and hopefully some landscaping ideas and quoting. All coming together. How is everyone else going, unreal hope the council stuff is getting there, carak what are you up too? Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 264Jul 20, 2013 11:43 pm Hi everyone glad to see all the new builds, contacts etc are moving along. Just thought I would address kingofthegrove's post regarding the$1 a day penalty fee. We were lucky enough not to have rent to pay Thanks to my father having a place for us to use but we did have storage so certainly part of our final meeting negotiations with P in us signing was this being increase to cover our storage costs, from memory I think about $400 per month which was agreed. Our build time was extended to 8 months but was a big build and actual completion on our 53sq home was about 6 months with Xmas so didn't need it anyway. You can negotiate any part of the agreement if you really want to P went through it with his pen and crossed out added and signed pretty much most of our requests. Good luck Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 265Jul 22, 2013 1:17 pm Hi everyone, i've been lurking in the forums (predominantly in the EB thread) for the past few months while we've been riding the ups and downs of selling our own place and looking for a block to build our new home on. We were pretty much set on building with EB, a Hawthorne 31 - until friends of ours mentioned they were also keen on EB until they found that a number of things they wanted - specific brick, tiles etc were not included in the standard or upgraded packages and pointed us in this direction. So now were in a face off between the Hawthorne 31 & the Ruby 30 (the Kellyville display for the Ruby 33 has its grand opening on the 7th of Sept i've been told), i've checked out the Sierra 31 at Gledswood Hills (which is also where we have purchased our block) and it is a great looking home, the quality of the build is excellent, i simply prefer the design of the Ruby instead, and i'll like it much more so long as i can get away with a few minor changes to the design i have in mind. I've just a few quick questions for the moment im hoping i can get some feedback on - Aside from the initial costing for the builds / upgrade package did you find you needed to spend much more otherwise on things you didn't expect? My main concern here is the kitchen - while all the material types are specified i'd really just like a definitive 'this is the kitchen cupboard design thats included doc' - and i've heard (to me they are horror stories) stories about these sorts of things not being fully included in tenders, you dont hit the issue until you get to your kitchen appointment - not specifically with K, but with EB and a few others anyway. - The Kurmond Design studio, i think before paying for a tender i'd like to head out and visit to see what options are included and which cost extra, did anyone else do this? Were they accomodating (and where is it? Is it just at the Sovereign Pl location?) The inclusion levels (on paper anyway) seem to be much better than what EB can offer, but im thinking we'll try and check out both design centers before taking the next steps anyway (hopefully asap), the 3 design revisions also are what definitely stand out for me. Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 266Jul 22, 2013 1:25 pm As a side note reading back a few pages on media streaming between rooms etc I've noticed alot of people are keen to put in cat6 cable over cat5e, im just curious as to why - cat5e is rated upto 1Gb in throughput, Cat6 (and now Cat6a) are rated upto 10Gb (specifics can be found - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twisted_pair) unless you are putting serious server equipment in your home you wont see any difference - the NBN can only come into your home at max 4 x 100Mbps at the moment - but it can scale to 1Gb in the future, but would you pay the monthly $$$ to get this at home?? As for centralizing media playback we have a great solution at home, ive got a raspberry pi connected to each TV in the house running openElec (which is XBMC), i store all our media - movies / tv shows etc on a central server (its a HP Microserver). The server also hosts a central database of all our content, each of our pi's connect to the database so each TV has access to the same information / content. If you want to move between TV's simply hit the stop button, find the show you want on the other TV hit play and it will let you resume from where you left off. It wont cater for a central apple tv type service, but it may be able to handle the PVR option depending on your setup. But its cheap, each Raspberry Pi might be about 40$ (if your TV has a USB port you can use it to power it), the server loaded with 4 x 3Tb drives night be about 1k, the openelec software is free. So yeah, im also looking for a place to hide a half height rack at the moment in the Ruby design At the moment its just hiding in one of the kids wardrobes ;P Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 267Jul 22, 2013 3:25 pm Hey Binski We've just put down the $1500 for building the Allure 37.5 at Jordan Springs. We were taken through the colour studio by our sales rep which was really handy and got to see the standard carpet range & inclusions. So far the "must upgrade" items on our list have been the cupboard handles, cupboard finishes, bathroom vanities, toilets and front door handles. The rest we've kept standard although I'm sure there'll be other things we decide upon when if/when we actually get to the appointment. I'm interested in hearing what other people have upgraded though! We were originally building the single storey Metford 28 with Rawson but pulled out due to a variety of reasons. Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 268Jul 22, 2013 3:44 pm Quote: - Aside from the initial costing for the builds / upgrade package did you find you needed to spend much more otherwise on things you didn't expect? My main concern here is the kitchen - while all the material types are specified i'd really just like a definitive 'this is the kitchen cupboard design thats included doc' - and i've heard (to me they are horror stories) stories about these sorts of things not being fully included in tenders, you dont hit the issue until you get to your kitchen appointment - not specifically with K, but with EB and a few others anyway. - The Kurmond Design studio, i think before paying for a tender i'd like to head out and visit to see what options are included and which cost extra, did anyone else do this? Were they accomodating (and where is it? Is it just at the Sovereign Pl location?) Binskin, Good timing. I'm just looking at the kitchen cabinetry options at the moment. I'm a little confused as to what is included. The brochure says polyurethane. The catalogue we've been given shows a range of Polytec Melamine (bronze), Createc (Silver) and Thermolaminated (Gold) finishes. I need to check with the colour consultant which one applies to the Diamond upgrades package. So far we've upgraded the garage door from B&D Panelmaster to Panel Lift timbercoat and some facade options. Looking also to upgrade to a premium bamboo floor finish. They do have 2 included bamboo floor options. As the previous post said, handles seem to be the only upgrade I would do in the kitchen perhaps. The benchtops were reasonable to upgrade the stone to 40mm. We opted out of the waterfall edges. I'm up to revision H on our plans...they're now getting stricter on changes, but so far so good. Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 269Jul 22, 2013 3:49 pm Binskin As a side note reading back a few pages on media streaming between rooms etc I've noticed alot of people are keen to put in cat6 cable over cat5e, im just curious as to why - cat5e is rated upto 1Gb in throughput, Cat6 (and now Cat6a) are rated upto 10Gb (specifics can be found - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twisted_pair) unless you are putting serious server equipment in your home you wont see any difference - the NBN can only come into your home at max 4 x 100Mbps at the moment - but it can scale to 1Gb in the future, but would you pay the monthly $$$ to get this at home?? The cost of CAT6 shouldn't be much more, so I'd rather be future proof. Good point on the speeds, however we can never tell what the future will hold. The raspberry pi sounds cool. I'll look it up. We're building the Sierra custom 34.14sq and designed a storage room where the NBN NTD, alarm and rack will reside. The Ruby is a nice design, however we wanted a larger Children's Activity room, so made a few changes to the Sierra design to accommodate this. What are you thinking of changing on the Ruby? I'm sure the display homes will be ready by the end of the month or early August actually. Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 270Jul 22, 2013 4:28 pm Lilac Hi everyone glad to see all the new builds, contacts etc are moving along. Just thought I would address kingofthegrove's post regarding the$1 a day penalty fee. We were lucky enough not to have rent to pay Thanks to my father having a place for us to use but we did have storage so certainly part of our final meeting negotiations with P in us signing was this being increase to cover our storage costs, from memory I think about $400 per month which was agreed. Our build time was extended to 8 months but was a big build and actual completion on our 53sq home was about 6 months with Xmas so didn't need it anyway. You can negotiate any part of the agreement if you really want to P went through it with his pen and crossed out added and signed pretty much most of our requests. Good luck Thanks Lilac. Much appreciated Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 271Jul 22, 2013 9:29 pm mars78 What are you thinking of changing on the Ruby? The main thing i would like to do is incorporate a study, similar to the Hawthorne 31 has, and to get some extra room in the master bedroom (the study would use some of it) extend both the bedroom / ensuite out an extra .5m to 1m. Extending that section of the house out will also help up qualify the side feature we need - were on a corner block, so we need to carry the facade around the front 1/3 of the house. Other than that all i would like to do is swap bed 2 and the main bath room around, so that all 3 bedrooms are not on top of each other, i'd like to have one of the rooms to not be on top of the other 2, incase the kids need a bit more space than just their builtins lol and it would also give guests a bit more space if we had anyone staying over. I do like the Sierra design, but its just missing that one rumpus type living space and also a study ... i NEED somewhere for all little bits and pieces i tinker with, and somewhere to actually 'work from home' when i need to lol. EDIT: Actually looking at the Sierra design, i would almost want to take the master bedroom / retreat combo, narrow the retreat a little and turn it into the study ... ill see if i can put my crappy ms paint skills to the test as im sure im confusing you all lol Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 272Jul 22, 2013 10:52 pm Binskin As a side note reading back a few pages on media streaming between rooms etc I've noticed alot of people are keen to put in cat6 cable over cat5e, im just curious as to why - cat5e is rated upto 1Gb in throughput, Cat6 (and now Cat6a) are rated upto 10Gb (specifics can be found - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twisted_pair) unless you are putting serious server equipment in your home you wont see any difference - the NBN can only come into your home at max 4 x 100Mbps at the moment - but it can scale to 1Gb in the future, but would you pay the monthly $$$ to get this at home?? Hi Binskin. Each of our TVs will be getting 2 cables - one for data and one for HDMI. I chose Cat6 over Cat5e. Cat5e will be plenty for Internet data for a number of years yet but I'm also going to be streaming HD video from room to room. The HDMI cables could be Cat5e for now too but the upcoming HDMI version 2 standard may require 18Gbps (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hdmi#Version_2.0). That will need Cat6. It's really just about future proofing. I don't want to have to pull new cables through in 5 years time. Cat6 doesn't guarantee that I won't have to but it will probably last longer than Cat5e. Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 273Jul 23, 2013 9:20 am Binskin mars78 What are you thinking of changing on the Ruby? The main thing i would like to do is incorporate a study, similar to the Hawthorne 31 has, and to get some extra room in the master bedroom (the study would use some of it) extend both the bedroom / ensuite out an extra .5m to 1m. Extending that section of the house out will also help up qualify the side feature we need - were on a corner block, so we need to carry the facade around the front 1/3 of the house. Other than that all i would like to do is swap bed 2 and the main bath room around, so that all 3 bedrooms are not on top of each other, i'd like to have one of the rooms to not be on top of the other 2, incase the kids need a bit more space than just their builtins lol and it would also give guests a bit more space if we had anyone staying over. I do like the Sierra design, but its just missing that one rumpus type living space and also a study ... i NEED somewhere for all little bits and pieces i tinker with, and somewhere to actually 'work from home' when i need to lol. EDIT: Actually looking at the Sierra design, i would almost want to take the master bedroom / retreat combo, narrow the retreat a little and turn it into the study ... ill see if i can put my crappy ms paint skills to the test as im sure im confusing you all lol Doesn't sound like too many changes now, but wait till you start. With the Ruby, there is a bit of space next to the meals area which we didn't know what to do with. We tried modifying the plan to suit, but it just didn't work. Any thoughts? We chopped and changed a couple of times! We ended up increasing the size of the Family area to approx 5.2 x 5m in the Sierra, making it more open. I combined the Children's Activity to become a kids study also, as I rarely work from home. It's approx 5 x 3.5. Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 274Jul 23, 2013 2:34 pm Hi Everyone, sorry I haven't posted for a while, still having a few problems - all to do with our sloping block - my advice - DON'T BUY A SLOPING BLOCK Good to see we have a few more Kurmondites (or potential) on HomeOne. Welcome Binskin, confusing isn't it when you see a design that you love and then you find another and another and then you change this and tweek that. Kurmond are very accommodating on changes that you want, we have completely changed to Glenleigh original design, so much so that you would probably not recognise it plus a few other people have made changes and not one looks like the other. In regard to what you get in the kitchen - we are not quite that far yet but have added a few things that we wanted to the tender e.g. waterfall edge, 40mm bench top plus a few other things. My advice, if you know what you want, ask for it to be added to the tender, that way you get the cost and if it is too much you can remove it from the tender. We haven't really added that much to the tender our biggest expense has been for site cost's because of the slope and the bushfire level requirements. The standard inclusions are great and when you get the Diamond Package you get pretty much everything that you need. If you have been to the home display centres the Sierra at Catherine Fields has all the Diamond Package items but we have also checked out the Design Studio, more advice, try and have an idea of what you what before you go for your selections - so many to choose . See if you can go along and check it out, it really is worth it plus go to Manago Tiles at McGraths Hill (5 minute drive from Windsor - Kurmond HO) you will be amazed at the tile selection. In regard to your CAT questions - sorry I am very technically challenged but we do have 2 cats they are in my Avatar. Hi mckz and welcome. Congratulations on building the Allure - I love the Allure. Good to know you have been to the colour studio, great place to visit and an even better place if you have an idea of what you want. Have you been to look at bricks - good luck - bricks are hard to decide, well we thought it was mainly because everyone that we like was gold level Mars and UpsizeTime so glad to hear that everything is going o.k. with you progress - what is your next step? unrealhome hope things start moving in the right direction for you soon, real soon. Lilac great to see you here and thank you for your advice, it REALLY is appreciated. Would love to see some 'after' photo's... If anyone wants/needs any ideas of Kurmond Inclusions check out Lilac's thread and blog - her home is amazing.... By the way, we checked out a home that is for sale at Hornsby on the weekend that has been or is nearly finished being built by Kurmond. The owner who bought the land, is building the house and selling even before it is finished, going to make a far profit as well. The workmanship is top class, bricks very, very good, carpentry excellent. It's good to see a home built by Kurmond that is not a display home, if you know what I mean. Looking forward to hearing about everyone's progress. Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 275Jul 23, 2013 3:20 pm Hi all, We have just paid the first payment to Kurmond for an Iris 34 (slighty modified to included WIR to master bed from Iris 37). selection narrowed down from 4 builders and i developed a spreadsheet to compare inclusions and Kurmond won. We have a block of dirt in Potts Hill (near Bankstown) on a new estated developed by Landcom. I have garnered a lot of info from Homeone but look forward to many more from Kurmond people and if i can contribute i certainly will. Short post for now - will try to give more background info soon. Cheers Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 276Jul 23, 2013 3:33 pm Hi Beanzy welcome to the Kurmond 'family'. Congratulations on your decision to build with Kurmond. Spreadsheets can be very, very helpful and certainly reveal a lot about builders & inclusions etc. Kurmond have some really great designs but I must agree the WIR from the Iris 37 is a better design than the WIR in the 34 but then that is my personal opinion. Would love to see your selections e.g. bricks, internal selections etc. Congratulations again, can't wait to see your progress. Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 277Jul 23, 2013 8:10 pm Hi Carak!! Good to see you again. I think the thread was stalling a little without you Sorry to hear about your slope issues. I hope the costs aren't going to be over bearing. Just think about how beautiful your house will look on the block. Carak, we've chosen our external colours and have just completed the Manago Tiles appointment. We've decided bamboo floors in the end. So the next step is security / electrical and Internal colours I believe. I've got confirmation that we get Polyurethane cabinets in the kitchen in any Taubmans colour. Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 278Jul 24, 2013 9:55 am Good morning mars - do you mean I talk a lot on the thread Would love to be able to talk a lot about what is happening but we are stalled at the moment, just hoping we can go forward with the build, depends on Councils regulations we weren't aware of which then adds additional/more costs for the slope. If the cost is over what we have approved by the bank, we will probably have to sell and forget building. All VERY upsetting at the moment. mars looks as though everything is moving along nicely for you. When did you sign the contract? Would love to see photo's of your tiles.... did it take long to choose the tiles? We want bamboo floors as well but haven't been told what we can have. What 'brand' of Bamboo is it? Was it a lot extra? We have put a provisional sum in the tender, just hope it is enough... I still get confused about the kitchen cabinets, I (well DH will) want a nice white kitchen with perhaps a grey glass splash back. Good luck with the next step and keep us posted where you are up to. Anyway we just have to sit and wait. Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 279Jul 24, 2013 10:45 am Hey Carak, Would it be an option to do a split level home instead? I know that would mean starting from scratch with the design, but it would suit the block much better and cost less. DW's dream home is still split level, but we're happy with single level. Hope it works out though... Here is our bathroom tile selection (picture is not focused) http://i1301.photobucket.com/albums/ag102/marsboy78/tiles_zpse72591b5.jpg There is a basic strandwoven bamboo flooring in 2 colours including coffee which is included, however we liked the upgraded Verdura in Merbau finish. We are waiting on the variation price for this still. http://i1301.photobucket.com/albums/ag102/marsboy78/bamboo_zps6694be8d.jpg Re: Building with Kurmond Homes 280Jul 24, 2013 3:35 pm mars the slope we have is probably not big enough for a split level, even though we have thought of it. We are looking at a step down in the middle of the house, it would result in about 3 steps so not that big, as an added bonus (or not - cost wise) we would have 10 or 11 foot ceilings in the family/kitchen which would make the views to the bush amazing. All depends on price and what we can cut back on but still have a beautiful house with all the must haves. Love the tiles, glad to see the green dots they are beautiful tiles. Love the bamboo, we have done a great deal of research on bamboo and the Ventura Brown Sugar is one of our favourites - lets just hope we can afford the house and then we can afford the floor. When are you having your electrical and kitchen appointment? Good luck to you and everyone else ...... REALLY hope nobody has to go through the hold ups that we have had to go through, it can be very upsetting. Ask for references and speak to them. If they are defensive or try to avoid the request, walk. 1 74717 I would never build with Fowler homes. I built with them in 2021 and till date maintenance issues are pending. All their existing trades and businesses don't work with… 14 105617 Hi there! Putting the feelers out there for those who have (or almost) built with Arli homes! Interested in your experiences who've built from their stock home designs… 0 23502 |