Thought I might ask the community to share their site costs with their fellow forumites.....of course that requires us to talk on a common basis, so I'm proposing the following proforma:
- Site Classification:
Final Footing Design:
House Size:
Location:
Wall Construction:
Cut and Fill Requirements:
Retaining Wall Requirements:
Drainage Requirements:
Special Requirements:
Cost:
Where do you get this info from?
From your soil report and drawings. It seems most people get their soil report at the contract stage....ask for it as soon as the builder has said he's completed the soil report - it's yours your entitled to it, and you can start preparing yourself one what might be coming re: foundation requirements.
What goes under each heading?....glad you asked:
Site Classification:
Site's are classified according to AS2870 as shown in the following table.
Often there will be a "D" added to the site slassification, eg. H-D that's important because it means that there's a likelihood of deep seated movement.
So just put in the Class letter in this part....
Final Footing Design
There's basically five types - please nominate the type:
1. Stumps - although builders by and large avoid them like a plague
2. Strip footing - A relatively small strip of concrete placed into a trench and reinforced with steel. Each footing supports the load of the wall above it.
3. Raft slab - A concrete slab with stiffening beams incorporated around the perimeter and at set intervals (say 4-6 metres) across the span of the slab
4. Waffle slab/ Waffle Pod Slab - An egg like box comprising a series of deep but relatively thin steel reinforced beams running at 90 degrees to each other to give a stiff structure. The floor slab is placed at the same time as the beams.
5. Piles or Deep Edge Beams - generally required because your on substantial fill can be concrete or screw piles and generally in combination with a H-class slab
6. Other - please describe cos' I can't think of one.
House Size:
Please provide you house size in square metres or squares - remember one square equals 10 ft by 10 ft or 9.29 square metres. Whatever your comfortable with.
Location:
Rough location such as Western Melbourne, Rural NSW, etc, this can have a bearing on prices.
Wall Construction:
Wall type and height and roof material, such as brick veneer, double storey, colorbond roof or light construction, single storey, tiled roof.
Cut and Fill Requirements:
It's gross generalisation but there are three types of site:
1. No cut or fill - minor site scrape and straight onto ground
2. Fill only - minor site scrape on sloping ground and house is predominantly on fill
3. Cut and Fill - site scrape with some cut that is used in fill
Retaining Wall Requirements:
Did you need a retaining wall - generally applicable to cut and fill sites - height and length would be useful.
Drainage Requirements:
Was there any drainage requirements - generally a retaining wall will require agricultural drains.
Special Requirements:
Special requirements can include root barriers
Cost:
The all important question.
I know it's a bit of information to gather but it should be there in your contracts....and it may help someone else budget for their site costs.....if nothing else it will make you look at your drawings again...not a bad thing....

So please use the proforma and see whether we can inform ourselves better....so here's the proforma again.
Site Classification:
Final Footing Design:
House Size:
Location:
Wall Construction:
Cut and Fill Requirements:
Retaining Wall Requirements:
Drainage Requirements:
Special Requirements:
Cost: