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Hi all,
I'm starting a build thread so I can keep track of where I'm at.
Building in Two Wells, North of Adelaide.
28th April Land contracts signed
10th June Build contract signed
20th June bank appointment booked
29th June land settlement completed
Soil report ordered
6th July prelim working drawings received
23rd July Submitted working drawings with changes - bring on the big as* laundry!
6th August signed off final plans
13th July Received footings report
14th July started making selections appointments
28 August Plans submitted to council
29 November approved council plans finally received
20 December Bank loan settled - pending Approval to build letter
Christmas shutdown!
17th January - Construction Approval letter.. with no start date..
6th March slab poured
21 March Framing started
10 April Facsia and gutters installed
23 April Roof installed
30 April bricks started
4 June Bricks complete and cleaned
11 June Gyprock begun
29 June Locked up!
6 July Joinery completed
24th July painting started
6 August tiling completed
28 August PCI
10 September garage doors installed,external painting completed
13 September HANDOVER
5th October Floor tiling completed
10 October carpets laid
12 October MOVING DAY
16 October Driveways
23rd December 'landscaping'
We have a footpath! Whoop whoop!
We have a footpath! Whoop whoop!
Oh yay!!
Will have to go on a trip out there on the weekend.
Our settlement is booked for the 29th
Exciting!
It’s a sharp cornered footpath from what we can see though 🤔
We recieved our preliminary working drawings today!
Any tips on how to read them?
Soil reports have also been ordered.
Hi Monkey55,
Can you please let me know the rough cost / sqm for your house? I'm getting a quote from Format too.
Re: Drawing
Check every single thing that it on the drawing to see if it is exactly what you want. Imagine yourself in the space and using it's features.
Cheers.
Hi Ohh,
Ive sent you a message
Master plans have been approved, footings report and variations received, and most of the selections appointments booked over the next few weeks. Yay for the fun part!!
Slowly getting there!!
Plans have been lodged with council.
Tiles pretty much selected - just waiting on Beaumont's to actually return an email with a straight answer.
Sanitary ware selected, appliances selected.
Kitchen/joinery appointment this week, electrical next week.
Then final builders appointment on 3rd August
Selections so far!
External:
Monument roof, gutter and window frames
Dune Fascia and downpipes
Austral Praline brick with Brighton Lite mortar, rolled joints
Beige something for external doors and rendered pillar
White something for eaves
Timber look panel doors (Price dependent) with Monument as the backup choice.
Belga Charcoal (450 or 600, price dependent) throughout the living areas.
Belga Charcoal 300s on wet area floors, and up the shower walls in both bathrooms. Standard white gloss for the other three walls.
Ensuite to have a marble feature
Inspo pic
Laundry splash back tile
The darkest on the left is the kitchen splash back tile. This was such a hard decision! We made all of our other tile choices so fast, then it came to the kitchen, and dear hubby decided, out of the blue, he wanted black gloss tiles! (I had the middle tile below in mind, as my 'splash of colour') We ended up not completing our appointment, which I am still trying to chase up... grrrr.
But I love them.
Alder Alto accessories. i love this hand towel holder!
Kali taps
90cm Freestanding Smeg cooker.. oh I cant wait for this bad boy
Selections so far!
Hey,
We are planning to build with format as well. How are their standard inclusions. Did you end up upgrading a lot? Can you pm me the build and variation costs if you don't mind.
My friends warned me about builders hitting lots of variations for selections after giving a lower initial quote. Just bit worried because of that
Thanks
External:
Monument roof, gutter and window frames
Dune Fascia and downpipes
Austral Praline brick with Brighton Lite mortar, rolled joints
Beige something for external doors and rendered pillar
White something for eaves
Timber look panel doors (Price dependent) with Monument as the backup choice.
Belga Charcoal (450 or 600, price dependent) throughout the living areas.
Belga Charcoal 300s on wet area floors, and up the shower walls in both bathrooms. Standard white gloss for the other three walls.
Ensuite to have a marble feature
Inspo pic
Laundry splash back tile
The darkest on the left is the kitchen splash back tile. This was such a hard decision! We made all of our other tile choices so fast, then it came to the kitchen, and dear hubby decided, out of the blue, he wanted black gloss tiles! (I had the middle tile below in mind, as my 'splash of colour') We ended up not completing our appointment, which I am still trying to chase up... grrrr.
But I love them.
Alder Alto accessories. i love this hand towel holder!
Kali taps
90cm Freestanding Smeg cooker.. oh I cant wait for this bad boy
Selections so far!
Hey,
We are planning to build with format as well. How are their standard inclusions. Did you end up upgrading a lot? Can you pm me the build and variation costs if you don't mind.
My friends warned me about builders hitting lots of variations for selections after giving a lower initial quote. Just bit worried because of that
Thanks
Hi there,
All of our tap and sanitary ware was standard, external selections were standard (including the lite mortar). Electrical we have spent a few hundred extra, adding some data cabling and a few extra power points, but the standard was very good. Tiles we upgraded a few items ($900) and joinery we upgraded a bit, adding drawers in the kitchen and shelving/drawers in the walk ins ($2700). We may still upgrade the front door,and garage door.
Format have very good inclusions, so we didnt feel the need to upgrade a great deal. Format also include things like a tiled alfresco, which others charge extra for. We got a quote elsewhere, which prior to selections was about $10k less that where we were at with Format, but would have spent a lot more upgrading items at selections, so I think it worked out on par, if not better.
Hope this helps
Selections so far!
Hey,
We are planning to build with format as well. How are their standard inclusions. Did you end up upgrading a lot? Can you pm me the build and variation costs if you don't mind.
My friends warned me about builders hitting lots of variations for selections after giving a lower initial quote. Just bit worried because of that
Thanks
Hi there,
All of our tap and sanitary ware was standard, external selections were standard (including the lite mortar). Electrical we have spent a few hundred extra, adding some data cabling and a few extra power points, but the standard was very good. Tiles we upgraded a few items ($900) and joinery we upgraded a bit, adding drawers in the kitchen and shelving/drawers in the walk ins ($2700). We may still upgrade the front door,and garage door.
Format have very good inclusions, so we didnt feel the need to upgrade a great deal. Format also include things like a tiled alfresco, which others charge extra for. We got a quote elsewhere, which prior to selections was about $10k less that where we were at with Format, but would have spent a lot more upgrading items at selections, so I think it worked out on par, if not better.
Hope this helps
Thanks for the quick update. Greatly appreciated. We are looking at going with them now.
In term of the footing costs, did the cost they estimated, in the beginning, came close to the real one at the end?
Also, do they provide you with a fixed price contract?
Thanks for the quick update. Greatly appreciated. We are looking at going with them now.
In term of the footing costs, did the cost they estimated, in the beginning, came close to the real one at the end?
Also, do they provide you with a fixed price contract?
They were very close with footings, out variation was $1400 extra. I believe thats fixed price (I really should re-read our contract at some stage)
Go see Ian at the Virginia display, he is awesome. And the Prescott is stunning!! Have you got a floor plan in mind?
Thanks for the quick update. Greatly appreciated. We are looking at going with them now.
In term of the footing costs, did the cost they estimated, in the beginning, came close to the real one at the end?
Also, do they provide you with a fixed price contract?
They were very close with footings, out variation was $1400 extra. I believe thats fixed price (I really should re-read our contract at some stage)
Go see Ian at the Virginia display, he is awesome. And the Prescott is stunning!! Have you got a floor plan in mind?
We are looking at going with a Custom plan. I have been in touch with Steven Riley from St.Clair Estate, so far he looks great. We have extremely reactive soil at our site and the footing cost should be almost 1100mm deep. So we need bit more accurate costing for the footing to start with than the sugar coated ones we were told by many other builders.
May I know how deep is your footing and how much was the cost of the footing they calculated?
Thanks for the quick update. Greatly appreciated. We are looking at going with them now.
In term of the footing costs, did the cost they estimated, in the beginning, came close to the real one at the end?
Also, do they provide you with a fixed price contract?
They were very close with footings, out variation was $1400 extra. I believe thats fixed price (I really should re-read our contract at some stage)
Go see Ian at the Virginia display, he is awesome. And the Prescott is stunning!! Have you got a floor plan in mind?
We are looking at going with a Custom plan. I have been in touch with Steven Riley from St.Clair Estate, so far he looks great. We have extremely reactive soil at our site and the footing cost should be almost 1100mm deep. So we need bit more accurate costing for the footing to start with than the sugar coated ones we were told by many other builders.
May I know how deep is your footing and how much was the cost of the footing they calculated?
Oh wow! Our soil is H1-D, and I think we have 200mm footings - though the whole soil report went way over my head! Our original estimate was 25k
Thanks for the quick update. Greatly appreciated. We are looking at going with them now.
In term of the footing costs, did the cost they estimated, in the beginning, came close to the real one at the end?
Also, do they provide you with a fixed price contract?
They were very close with footings, out variation was $1400 extra. I believe thats fixed price (I really should re-read our contract at some stage)
Go see Ian at the Virginia display, he is awesome. And the Prescott is stunning!! Have you got a floor plan in mind?
We are looking at going with a Custom plan. I have been in touch with Steven Riley from St.Clair Estate, so far he looks great. We have extremely reactive soil at our site and the footing cost should be almost 1100mm deep. So we need bit more accurate costing for the footing to start with than the sugar coated ones we were told by many other builders.
May I know how deep is your footing and how much was the cost of the footing they calculated?
We are building with Format also and are building on highly reactive clay soil, plus previous large trees which now have to be taken into consideration. Our footings ended up being 1200mm deep after the soil/engineers report. I had already said we need to allow for the soil when getting the quote. Increased our cost by around $6k overall. Its a bit of a hit, but I can feel confident the slab will be sufficiently sound
The figure will also vary depending on the floor area of your house, ours is quite large.
Also our neighbours work for a pre-cast concrete company and they were impressed with the quality of the footings and slab.
Our footing allowance is at 55k at the moment. We would need 1100 deep footings i reckon. May i know how much your footing