First Home - Vogue - Seaford Heights SA - *PCI Complete*

Hi Guys,

This is Me (Damien) and my Fiancé (Lanni) very first home we will own and we just want to share our experience with you all. Its been about 3 years since we started saving for our deposit and this year it finally paid off

We found a 328sqm block of land in the newly developed Vista Estate. The Plan we chose is the Vogue you can find the floor plan here - http://www.fairmonthomes.com.au/home-collection/Vogue

We have made some adjustments like moving the Kitchen to a Single line Kitchen with an Island Bench, 3m x 4m Alfresco (under main roof) and a 4 Panel Entertainment Stacker Door along with some other little things (We also had to add a couple more windows in for council etc) and we wanted to get the front rendered.

Brick Colour - Porcini



Render - Colourbond Dune



Roof - Monument



Windows - Black

The Block



Thanks for reading

Damo

Hi Guys

This is Lanni just providing some more info about what we have done with our first home but first just want to share a quick photo from when we found out that the sold sign when on our block



Like Damien said in the last post, we decided to build the Vogue with Fairmont Homes which is a little bit on the smaller side of what we were looking to build but we chose this so we had plenty of room to customise to how we wanted! Below is the floor plan of what we have done to the house.



What we did to customise the house was moved the kitchen to be in between the dining room and the living room, added on an alfresco area, added in an additional window for a kitchen splashback (we saw so many display homes with this and fell in love with the idea and it was surprisingly affordable to do!), extended the length of the main bedroom as we had to allow for an additional window in the bedroom due to building on a corner block, changed the doors in the WIR and ensuite to only have the one door into the WIR and upgraded it to be a cavity sliding door then just made an open doorway from the WIR into the ensuite.

We have also just finished all of our selections which we are extremely happy with! We got inspiration from the kitchen that was on display at the Supreme Kitchens display centre.



For the overhead cupboards (as you can see in the photo) we have gone with Formica Laminate in the colour Idyllic and also chosen this to be the colour on the back end of the island bench as a feature colour. We have chosen to have Laminex in White Silk Finish for the above fridge cupboards and the pantry and the remainder of the cabinets in the kitchen and finally the kitchen bench tops which we picked to be Laminex in White Valencia in Diamond Shine Gloss. We also chose to have the kitchen bench to be a waterfall bench with square edges.



For the bathroom we have gone with floor to ceiling tiles (we paid a little extra to do this but we were fine to do as the finished look is amazing!) and we have chosen to run the same colour on the floor (matt) and the wall (glossy). The colour we picked was new to the range at Direct Interiors and is called Matang Cappuccino.



As you can see in the picture above we have three choices picked out and we went with the middle option For the cabinetry in the bathrooms we decided to go with Laminex in White Silk Finish for the cabinets and for the bench tops we went with Formica Laminate in the Idyllic (same as the kitchen to make sure the house flowed).

The settlement date for the land is the 18th of August so we are now just having to play the waiting game for the house to start building!

Thanks for reading and we look forward to any replies

Lanni & Damien

Timeline - Pre Build

Contracts Signed - May 2015
Final Plans - June 2015
Direct Interiors Interior Selections - July 2015
Supreme Kitchens Kitchen, Laundry and Bathroom Selections July 2015
Council Approval - August 2015
Finance - September 2015
Settlement - September 2015

Timeline - On Site

Site Works - October 2015
Block Levelled - October 2015
Trenches Dug - October 2015
Slab Down - October 2015
Frame - November 2015
Windows - December 2015
Water Pipes/Gas Pipes - December 2015
Gutters, Fascias, Roof - December 2015
Bricks - December 2015
1st Fix Electrical - January 2016
Insulation - January 2016
Gyprock and Flushing - January 2016
Retaining Walls - February 2016
Kitchen & Cabinetry - February 2016
Tiling - March 2016
Final Fix Electrical - March 2016
Final Fix Plumbing - March 2016
Fencing - March 2016
Render - March 2016
Painting - March/April 2016
Roller Door - April 2016
Cleaning/Maintenance - April 2016
Practical Completion Inspection - 28 April 2016
Air Con and Appliances -
Handover -

Hi Lanni and Damien, congrats on your home build, I like the changes you have made to your floorplan, I love the window splashback in the kitchen, a real neat feature,I would have loved it in mine but my plan doesn't have the "sideways" kitchen. Your colours look great. Your facade sounds great also, very earthy and natural. The kitchen on display at supreme kitchens looks nice. Must be their new one as I dont remember seeing it when we had a look through, it's very nice! We are also building with fairmont but out north All the best and I look forward to following your build

Hi Lanmi & Damien, welcome to the forum! I love your colour choices! And the window splashback! We are building with Statesman out at Myponga...we just did our colour selections earlier this week and are waiting on council approval I look forward to following your build! Lisa & Shaun

Damien: Thank for your positive comments guys. We've now completed all our Selection and Electrical appointments, now we're just waiting on Land Settlement (18th Aug) and our Final Builders Meeting,

Hey @Damien_Lanni just wondered when you had your selections at direct, did you have to choose your porch tiling at this appt? and with your waterfall edge counter in the kitchen did you have a PowerPoint allocated at electrical selection included on the side? we are also planning on going with diamond shine gloss, just wondered if you had this added in at all?

Hi @heatherkam yes we did choose the porch tiles at our selections with direct. I can't remember the exact colour that we went with but it was a mid toned grey.

We didn't get powerpoints on the island bench as we chose to have them as hidden as we could. We have one on the side of our pantry for the bench against the wall and we also have one in the pantry for the microwave. I was thinking about adding one on the side of the island bench but we felt that we wanted to go with a more seamless look and the powerpoint would just draw attention.

We had a big discussion in regards to the benchtop because Damien wanted to spend a lot of money on getting a stone benchtop for the main reason of he didn't want to see the edges of the laminate (which with square cut you will see a black seam). I finally convinced him to go with the diamond gloss which we paid extra for but we also paid extra to have acrylic edging place on so you don't see the seam.

Hope this helps!! How far along are you with your house so far?

Hey, yeah that makes sense, went with a dark patio tile in the end. We have one PowerPoint for the Island and it's along the side opposite the walkway so it's hidden from open view, hopefully doesn't stick out too much. I agree with not wanting to see the seam on the counter but will be choosing a cheaper option than stone to achieve this look, I hope it works out for us too!
We are due to do our kitchen / cabnitery selection this Friday and that's that for A while, our council approval went in a month ago so expect that to be complete soon, our land settles on October 15th and we are yet to sell our current home, about to go on the market next week, so we are busy with this house to notice the time it takes between things with fairmont lol. Site works at our block started a few weeks ago for main services etc so we won't know our final footing costs till the eleventh hour I don't think, makes it hard to know how much we have to play in the budget so we are keeping pretty conservative luckily we upgraded a lot in I our contract prior to signing. Our estate sells of the plan so they are a bit back to front witht hints but will be lovely in the end thanks for getting back to me, it's nice to hear what others are doing

@Heatherkam how did you go with your selections and what did you end up going with?

We were due to settle on the 18th of August but due to council approval not being in on time we had to extend this date to the 28th of September which sucks but had to be done! We've got our final builders meeting on the 31st of August so I should get a copy of everything cost wise in this meeting to finalise the mortgage (about time!) then once this is done I can bring the settlement forward and hopefully the land works will start right away.

Where about are you building with Fairmont? The good thing is with the Vista estate is that Fairmont themselves own the land so you purchase the land from them and then you can pick whatever house you wanted and you can move around with settlement dates because Realty SA and Fairmont are in the same building so they just talk to each other and I don't have to worry haha

How much did your footings end up coming in for? I was so excited when our soil work came back because the footings were what was giving me anxiety thinking that it is going to come in well over what we had budgeted for!

Hey @Damien_Lanni we have finished our kitchen selections now, il update my post soon with the colours but mostly greys and whites, with a hint of colour in the glass splashback it went well, went over by $2500 in the end but well worth it! I have a feeling our dates may push out also, seems to be the way with this stuff! Atleast your final building interview is booked In so things are in sight! Our house just went on the market today so we are a little bit off applying for finance but as our footings aren't official yet nothing can be applied for at this stage, they should come down from the 27,000 though as thr kerbs and roads aren't in yet and they effect the final for level so the footing shouldnt need to be as deep as they have drawn, I m also counting on them coming down we.have major landscaping that will need to be done later handy that vista are in bed with fairmont, should make things easier unfortunately as we are building in blakes crossing we have to wait for them to finish the site works which Started three weeks ago and they are making good progress at this point, hopefully good weather continues hopefully things keep moving along, so much to think about hey?!

Ok so we had our final builders meeting last week and have since had 100% finance approval so we can now settle whenever we want to.

Fairmont advised us that a slab will be down 3-5 weeks from settlement and the total build will take 6 months start to finish get excited

We are on a corner black and the side road and curbs havnt been put in yet either and that didn't effect our footings? maybe double check on that

Congrats on getting all approvals etc. That's exciting! We are getting close to builders interview but have to wait to sell our house etc. I read somewhere in the fairmont paperwork that the final floor level had to be finalised so the footings could be designed properly, maybe just the road infront.of.your block has to be done. Not so much the side of the road on your corner? I'm sure they would have mentioned it and it would have held you up if it was a problem. Can't wait to see your slab!

Update 15/09/15

We have now received our settlement date which is the 31st of September
We tried to move it forward as we have our 100% finance approval but weren't able to due to the conveyancers having to get everything together.
Site works will then commence and hopefully a slab will be down sometime in October!

Update 19/09/2015

We went to see the block today (as we do every Saturday) and we found that our side road has curbs and the bitumen is about to be layed all roads and curbs shud be completed by settlement

good to see someone else on here building in the same area im just a few streets over, my slab should be down next week

Hey Buddy, Nice to hear ur username sounds farmilliar, were you ever into the car scene? I Rekon we've met before. Anyway where abouts are you? And who you building with?

hey,
yeh used to be in the holden (vx calais and vz ss) scene a few years ago, and recently the subaru and evo aswell.

lot 82, building with hickinbotham, frame/roof should be up this week

looks like alot of people are going with porcini brick in the area, ive gone with austral grange which is very similar

Yeah I remember the white VX Calais, I had a black VXSS and a VX Calais Inter.
have you got ur own build thread started up yet? we originally wanted Lot 80 Harrison but there was already a hold on it and the guy wouldn't budge so we chose 232, turns out it was 26sqm bigger for 2k less so wasn't a very bad loss

BTW i think i recall driving past ur block on Saturday and all the timber for your frame has been delivered and all set out over your slab ready to go

oh yeah, i remember you now, crazy that where both building houses in the same area :p

i had around 3 blocks on hold at the same time because i couldnt decide which one i wanted lol

yeah ther where a few guys on saturday working and gettin all the wood laid out etc, frame went up today, hopefully roof will be tomorrow.

no thread yet, unsure ill post one up at this stage