Browse Forums Building A New House 1 Mar 30, 2014 3:59 am Hi all, Not much on the forums about builds with Simonds in Brisbane, so I thought I'd add our "Harcrest" which begins construction next week out in Runcorn. Apparently it will be the first Harcrest design built in QLD so were feeling a bit special lol. We customised the floor plan slightly from http://www.simonds.com.au/mobile/home.php?mid=336 to expand some rooms out, add double shower heads etc. Happy to post plans if anyone wants to see Construction starts next week, eta end August. Will be very happy if that deadline is met! So anyway.. Stuff ppl probably want to know about before we got to this stage.. Initial Sales phase - the rep we worked with was excellent and unexpectedly realistic about costs. I appreciated her overestimating the site costs at 20k to ensure "no surprises" later as our land was still being subdivided (Site Costs ended up being only 6k, including some minor peiring for the slab, setback relaxation fees and three phase power upgrades. I thought was excellent value). Inclusion wise they threw in a 10k discount and a 30k "free upgrade" budget for their gallery/showroom stuff. Restraining ourselves here was really really tough. Our gallery Consultsnt was very friendly and I didn't feel excessively upsold to. We'd already done considerable research and knew showroom prices were pretty inflated. So, we focused on things not easily changed later. Eg raise both floor ceilings, wooden floor done by Simonds (pain later), but landscape and carpet ourselves post build. An example is carpet upstairs thru Simonds was 10k vs 5k from someone else. Comes down to convenience I guess. We also paid extra for non standard stuff like ducting rangehood to outside of the house (amazed this is non std), ducted a/c, etc. Big tip - for two stories, make sure to add all the lights you want downstairs on the plans. It's damn near impossible post build to add them freely due to the joists n beams. First floor/roof is easy though.., so we changed everything downstairs to GU10s and relocated the batton light allocation upstairs, at no extra cost. This means we can get a sparky to change them over post build for upstairs but not have to mess around downstairs. With several versions of plans and changes going back and forward it was inevitable mistakes would be made. We went thru every version with a fine toothed comb and cross referenced to our emails, etc. I feel not doing this is how people end up with surprises later on. Can't stress enough rechecking every single thing on every revision!! Final sign off day went largely without a hitch with only 2 very minor corrections on the day. So, so far a positive experience which is funny because reading a few sites around the net led me to believe I'd be having to push them intensely. I'll update the thread as build progresses Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 2Mar 30, 2014 7:18 am Congratulations Brissyguy !!! It's huge house, I love your floor plan. I also building Dakota with Simonds in Melbourne, hopefully we will move in new house same time with you Simonds Dakota Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 3Mar 30, 2014 6:36 pm Hey there brissyguy - my wife and I are looking at building a Harcrest with Simonds too. Absolutely love the layout - it's perfect for us, and we've been unable to find any other plans that really ticked all of our boxes. Congrats on the beginning of your build, and I would love to see your final plans! Please post!! It would probably help us as we are still trying to figure out what we want / need in our Harcrest in Victoria. Only just found the piece of land we wanted, so a long way to go! Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 4Mar 30, 2014 7:55 pm Loanmck - good luck to you guys! hope both our builds go smoothly!!! are you going to post your build progress online? zzhoward - No problem Here's the links to our finals. I highlighted our floor plan changes (I know, my artwork is amazing they call me picasso ) http://brissyguybuild.tumblr.com/post/81164154849/final-plans-with-a-few-annotations The big changes for us were: 1. we supersized the kitchen island bench, its 1.3m wide now. we entertain a lot 2. upstairs we flattened out part of the kink created by balcony on master/retreat to make it a more uniform space 3. shrunk rumpus on both sides by expanding retreat width 700mm and bed 4 by 700mm 4. remove a lot of RA's ('Return airs'). We don't need them in qld, I guess in vic you probably do? The cost of these changes was really negligible, about 2k overall I think of which around 1k was rebated because structurally they had to shrink the downstairs under the master by 500mm. I kind of felt walking into a super massive master (9m long x 4.5m wide) would make a massive wow factor for resale, plus this also gives one larger bedroom for 'older kids' or our long term flatmate in our case. Because of our block we jiggled around a door and window downstairs and enlarged the fridge space for our 2 fridges. Fingers crossed we made the right choices! Love to hear your thoughts! Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 6Mar 30, 2014 10:26 pm Hi Brissyguy - thanks for the plans! We are definitely stealing the idea to remove that wall between the WC and powder room on the ground floor - thanks! And I will work on my wife when it comes to the larger shower too - I really like that idea! Thanks so much, and keep us all updated on your build! Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 7Mar 31, 2014 7:58 am Hi Brissyguy, A few more questions if you don't mind What are the changes you've made to the WIR there that you've highlighted? Are those shelves or something? Are you putting in ducted a/c or evaporative? I have no idea what a 'return air' is... do you know? Do you have a higher resolution version of your plans available? Thanks again Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 8Apr 01, 2014 11:17 am Excellent! Another Simonds build to follow Love your plans and the adjustments, looks really usable and a great space to live in. We are building the Sierra in SA. We are about 5 - 6 weeks away from a site start, and have been thrilled with Simonds so far. Thread: viewtopic.php?f=31&t=66299 Slab: 16/6/14 Frame: 4/7/14 Roof: 22/7/14 Lock Up: 20/8/14 Fixing: 26/8/14 PCI: 9/10/14 Handover: 20/10/14 Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 9Apr 01, 2014 11:43 pm Hi zzhoward, Quote: A few more questions if you don't mind No problem Quote: What are the changes you've made to the WIR there that you've highlighted Two things - we added 2 sets of drawer units (just to use up our free upgrade money really). We so pushed the entire WIR out to make the retreat area bigger. Quote: Are you putting in ducted a/c or evaporative? Ducted a/c. Evap doesn't work up here in QLD Quote: I have no idea what a 'return air' is... do you know? Apparently it's for recycling the heated air or something around the house... A friend who is an architect said we didn't need then in QLD. They kept a few in the plan for running ducted ac I guess, we were able to remove probably 80% of them. Quote: Do you have a higher resolution version of your plans available Yep, I'll upload them tomorrow and link it here. Can't do it from iPhone sorry.. Wasn't sure what the copyright on them is but other people seem to post theirs so I guess ok: bringing them more potential business anyway . Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 10Apr 01, 2014 11:48 pm Thanks deluxes So status update: - Contract was finalized Friday 28/March - site was scraped today, Tuesday 1/April Super quick! SS says slab will likely go down this week and framing should start somewhere around the 11th April. Once there's a slab I'll take a photo.. Land itself is a bit boring. Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 12Apr 02, 2014 10:03 am Very interesting Brissyguy, we're a bit behind you having just gone finance unconditional on our block at Sanctuary Cove on the Gold Coast, so far we've been thinking of using Plantation but Simmonds looks worth exploring, we'll go see them - was it Rochedale you went to? Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 13Apr 02, 2014 10:06 am Oh my gosh, that is rapid movement! They arent mucking around Every Simonds build i've seen has gone so quickly, gives me a lot of hope that we'll be ok too. Our CRC has been so proactive with everything, just so no time is wasted for us... (we've had 12 months waiting for our land to settle, we signed contracts with Simonds back in November) so we are REALLY keen to move... that's not their issue though, they've been wonderful and bent over backwards for us. Looking forward to seeing your slab pics soon!! (We go out and stand on our bare land at least twice a week, so land isnt boring to us!) Thread: viewtopic.php?f=31&t=66299 Slab: 16/6/14 Frame: 4/7/14 Roof: 22/7/14 Lock Up: 20/8/14 Fixing: 26/8/14 PCI: 9/10/14 Handover: 20/10/14 Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 14Apr 02, 2014 11:10 am Hi brissyguy, it's great to see another Simonds Qld build in here. We're building with them on the GC. That big kitchen bench is a great idea, I look forward to seeing it all come together. Building a Sierra on the Gold Coast https://forum.homeone.com.au/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=68899 Full timeline on Pg 1 Settlement: 13/05/14 Retaining Walls: 20/06/14 Site Start: 02/07/14 Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 15Apr 03, 2014 7:35 am Hi brissyguy, congratulations on your build! Your floorplan looks fantastic, you must be so excited We're building with Simonds in Melbourne and are pretty much on the same timeframe as you, a few days behind so it's great to see how quickly they're moving with your site preparation and slab. We may allow ourselves a tiny bit of optimism about our build moving at a similar pace. We're deliberately remaining conservative in our expectations so we don't get disappointed, but it's hard when we keep reading how quickly Simonds move once land is settled and plans approved. Really looking forward to reading all about your build!! (We go for a wander around our little block of bare earth all of the time. We figure it's by far the most expensive thing we 'own' so it deserves some serious attention. We've already had a few guests come visit! ) Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 16Apr 03, 2014 9:51 pm freemike Very interesting Brissyguy, we're a bit behind you having just gone finance unconditional on our block at Sanctuary Cove on the Gold Coast, so far we've been thinking of using Plantation but Simmonds looks worth exploring, we'll go see them - was it Rochedale you went to? It was Rochedale yes - they only have a couple of homes there though. There's apparently a couple more at another display village further up towards sunny coast (sorry I forget its name, I'm sure they can tell you). Plantation were definitely on our list, and certainly they have a LOT of their range on display. We just loved the layout of the Simonds design.. I swore I wouldn't buy something without at least seeing inside it first and well, low and behold we bought off the plan lol. Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 17Apr 03, 2014 10:18 pm zzhoward Do you have a higher resolution version of your plans available? Sorry for the delay - I changed the blog's theme to something else and now the photos aren't so tiny. here's links to highlighted ones from my original post in a larger size, and some super large ones: http://brissyguybuild.tumblr.com/post/8 ... nnotations http://brissyguybuild.tumblr.com/post/8 ... -requested Re: Our Simonds Harcrest build in Brisbane 19Apr 04, 2014 8:58 pm Hi guys - Im very excited to find this post and look forward to seeing your updates. Congrats on building the Harcrest, your plans look great. We live in SA and up until 6 weeks ago had never heard of Simonds - then we stumbled upon there show homes and were impressed. We have signed for the Harcrest too and are busy looking through the basic plan - adding extras, removing unneeded and changing a few things and trying to get the cost reasonable before we sign the final contract. - must add the exhaust for the rangehood - never thought of that thx Its such an exciting time and as well as finding this site I have found Houzz - wow the ideas, dreams, costs! Will check back soon Hello Josh, This is Irving from PRIMA, we are a manufacturer of the staircase, railings, kitchen cabinets, windows, doors from China. If you have requirement to purchase… 0 3550 Hi, does anyone have a clue how the Brisbane Development website work in terms of how uptodate the dates on it are (developmenti.brisbane.qld.gov.au). I transfered… 0 3318 First time poster long story short we are planning knocking down rebuilding a house in Wavell Heights We are thinking to go with Omni built homes as they are but flexible… 0 1683 |