Recommendations of Brisbane Builders

Hi Anne, we are building on the Gold Coast but still fairly close to you. If you want flexibility GJ Gardner are very flexible, but they operate as franchises and some are better than others. I wouldn't recommend the Gold Coast franchise based on my neighbour's experience, but the North Brisbane one might be ok. We are building with Plantation and have been very happy so far, and they have been fairly flexible about minor changes. There's plenty of Metricon builds about as you saw, although if you go with their "entry level" range they have no flexibility. Coral was one of our runners up before we decided on Plantation. There's a few Clarendons around too and their price seems fairly reasonable. Stroud does quite good packages where they are full turn-key and include everything you need to move in, including landscaping and window furnishings, although that may not be something you really need.

I thought there was a North Lakes thread but I can't find it now. You may like to check out the SEQ build threads collection here: viewtopic.php?f=31&t=76408 - there's a lot of volume and custom builds for both the Gold Coast and Brisbane areas mentioned there.

You mentioned you're moving interstate which makes it a bit harder, but if you can just go to as many displays as you can - North Lakes, Yarrabilba, Rochedale, etc. You'll get to see a lot of different builders and different examples from the same builder and get a feel for which builder's style you like. Don't get too hung up on which builder includes what - it's nearly impossible to compare apples to apples in inclusions lists, and ultimately you'll pay for everything you want - if one builder includes a specific feature you really want as standard, and another doesn't, you can pay to upgrade, but it would have been included in the base price of the other one anyway

Good luck!

So far I've been very happy with Plantation but others have had different experiences. My advice is to choose a builder you like the style of and get a good feel from, and have realistic expectations - something WILL go wrong, no one has a 100% perfect experience, I've found We liked the looks of Metricon displays and they had some plans we liked, but every single display centre we went to, we were treated very badly by the sales staff when they heard our budget. Whereas Plantation worked really hard with us to find a plan we loved that also met our budget. So while everyone can give you a recommendation and opinion, I guess you have to take them all with a grain of salt (including mine ). Sorry I can't be more helpful! I know it's a difficult stressful journey, especially doing it from interstate. Basically any of the big volume builders will be worth sitting down with really, and going with a volume builder will remove some of the stress as interstate builders because you don't have to supervise every single detail like you most likely would with a custom builder.