Charleston Homes - anyone worked with them?

Hi Sunny,

We are progressing well with the home build. Its coming along on track and though not finished yet but sometime mid next year. We are very happy with our site manager and the weekly communication we get from the head office on progress. Variations are expensive but they have been good at working through with us on them even though we have had to redo the design a couple of times.

Did you find that you had to do a lot of variations post commencing the build or were most of these accounted for prior to signing the contract.

Most of them we had signed off as part of our initial contract. And the others were as a result of us wanting the variation rather than a necessity.

Hello Manishg. Where things now. Has the construction finished. How would you say overall experience.

Hello Folks. I am at very early stage of building with Charleston. Any feedback.. of any sort.

Hi Dezza

We are progressing well. Almost finished but really happy with the end result. Hopefully another 4-5 weeks away from handover. Overall experience has been really great across the board and we found Charleston to be very professional in their dealings. What stage are you at with them?

By the way what exactly we should look into before we sign with them
Few points to look into will be helpful

I think the contract was fairly standard but we had some variations...suggest you look at the plans very carefully to ensure that you have what you need upfront so you don't have many variations post signoff. The windows be absolutely certain on that (colours and sizes) as we decided to change something which meant additional cost. Interior and exterior mouldings, window frames etc if you want any additions suggest you get it included now as it will much cheaper than a variation.

Floors, electrical etc make sure you understand what's included. Same with wardrobes as better that all this is known beforehand as variations cost a lot more and delay the project. There are items with Provisional Allowance and we went over on all of them as the project took longer than expected and the initial soil works were also more expensive so be aware that this is fairly standard and you wont be getting a refund on it rather will probably have to spend a little more.

Hi All,

We are considering to build with Charleston but rather unfamiliar with their reputation as a builder. Are they reliable, how is their quality and price and who are their main competitors? How do they compare to say Construction by Design or Meadowbank which seems to do nice homes too. We are building in north shore with CDC.
Any suggestions and advices will be really helpful please...

Hi Francisx we just finished building with Charleston and were extremely pleased with the process and the outcome.

Hi manishg

Thanks

Hi Francisx yes we had to pay the initial deposit for the house drawing to scale (I think it was worth it as we could then make it work to the size of our house rather than the display home). I thought I could negotiate on the final price but to be honest I could not at all ...we have friends who built with other builders and they shared the same experience with their builders where they could not negotiate at all off the price quoted. To be honest we ended up spending a lot more on our base price by the time we added in all the finishes etc we wanted which I think is also quite normal based on several people we spoke with.

We are nearing the end of our charleston and it has been an up and down experience tbh. The variations we have requested at this stage is almost 300k and counting. For the first time home builder I think the processes could have been friendlier to make the whole experience more of a immersive experience rather then stressful

Hi all,
We've been looking at builders for the past 3 months, mostly project builders like Metricon due to their larger sized houses (we're looking for anything between 40 and 53 SQ), gravitating towards a custom builder, having been impressed by Construction by Design previously (having seen their display in Kellyville), and having viewed Charleston Homes display in Box Hill within the last couple of weeks, where we really like the classical feel and American take on French Provincial that they have.

We're a bit in the dark about how they work as we've only met with them once. From this thread it seems the costs are about $2000-$2500 per SQM, would that be about right?
Were anyone able to get approve via CDC?
I'd be keen to see any photos of your completed builds if you'd be willing to share?
Did they cover things like solar panels, smart home electrical, landscaping, driveway, or is that all additional - and is the additional reasonable or would it be worth finding our own providers?

Really keen to hear anyone's thoughts on the above.

Thanks!

Hi all,

This thread is really useful. Our land is due to register by December, so we have been looking at various builders and house designs. We have narrowed down to three: Somerset 51 by Metricon (Signature range), Waldorf 50 by Eden Brae and Mont Clair by Charleston Homes. We have made slight changes to the layout from their display home at Box Hill but so far, they are the most expensive, with Metricon close behind. We love the display home and are getting most of the inclusions (except flooring and staircase stone). The Charleston home is smaller than both Metricon and Eden Brae - its around 44sq.

Keen to follow this thread and learn from your experiences. We have gone for tender with both Metricon and Charleston and are expecting our drawings to come through in the next couple of weeks. We found Colin (sales guy at Box Hill) to be extremely patient with us and very helpful. But I believe we will be dealing with the builder directly from here on. Will share our experience.

Thanks.

Hi everyone,

Thanks for all the helpful tips in this thread - it's very useful! We are also first time builders looking at a knockdown/rebuild project with Charleston Homes on the lower north shore of Sydney. We are also considering Homestead Homes. Meadowbank has ruled out building on the lower north shore at this time. Any tips/learnings/wisdom from dealing with Charleston Homes in particular would be very much appreciated!

Thanks very much

Hi KJT

We just finished our build and have moved into our new Charleston home a few weeks ago. We could not be happier with the outcome. We had a couple of issues recently and the building manager came out to repair those things immediately. Throughout the process we were extremely happy with their communication. On the other hand we have had a friend build with Homestead at the same time and they have had quite a few issues.

Good luck with the build. It took us a while but worth it all in the end.

Hi Manishg,

Thanks so much for your fast and helpful reply! I really appreciate it! I'm really glad to hear you had a great experience with Charleston Homes. I'm sorry to hear that your friend had issues with Homestead Homes. We had also reached out to Homestead a few days ago, and they asked us to just send them an email (which we did) and they never got back to us.

Anyway, I hope you are really happy and enjoying your lovely new home!

Thanks again,
K

Hi Ritz123,

We are also looking at the Mont Claire home by Charleston. We absolutely fell in love with the design and finishes of the house. We have also cut out all the heavy extras like flooring and staircase they have on display, marble in the bathrooms and the fireplace (amongst other little things). Are you planning on getting the alfresco built by them as well?

Despite all of this, we are coming over budget by about 60k-80k (depending on the final tender we get) and this is largely due to the Site costs & concrete piering which we were expecting to be much lower than they have quoted.
Most other builders (like project homes) have some of the regular site item costs included in the base price, so when they quote you site costs we can't really do a like for like comparison.

Do you know if after you put down the initial deposit of $8k, you get a better idea of the site costs or they really don't change?

Thanks, keen to share our experiences!


- Kani

Hi Kani,

We put down the intial $5k for them to do the survey and draw up the architectural drawings. The site cost will be confirmed once the survey and soil test has been completed. For us this hasn't happened yet as our land is in the process of being registered. The only caveat they put is if they hit rock than that might increase the cost but that cannot be confirmed till they start digging.
For the Alfresco, we will keep as part of the house build as for us there wasn't that much difference is pricing and it would be better for Charleston to pour the concrete regardless. However, you can save upto $10k depending on what type of alfresco you are wanting.

Cheers,
Ritz