Browse Forums Building A New House 1 Jul 02, 2019 9:24 am Hi I'm new to this, so please excuse my ignorance. Our builder has advised we can do the driveway, path and porch ourselves after handover. This will save us a lot of money on the extra concrete needed above their included sqm allowance. Should the builder be refunding us for the 6m length of driveway, path and porch with is included in the house price ? Re: driveway after handover 2Jul 02, 2019 9:34 am Hi, Have you already signed a building contract? Reason I ask is if you remove something from the building contract you should get a refund less the builders margin on the extra concrete. The HIA contract allows the builder to keep their markup even if you remove the item. For example say the builder was going to charge you $10K to do all the external concrete and you decide to do it yourself the builder is only entitled to refund you the money less their markup, say $2k, leaving you a refunded amount of $8k. If you have not entered into a building contract you should be getting the whole amount back. Also check to see if it was included in the first place. A lot of base prices exclude external concrete. Hope this helps! Re: driveway after handover 3Jul 02, 2019 9:45 am Hi Thank you for the quick reply. Yes we've signed the contract, which included 39m2 to cover a the driveway, path and porch. That was included in the house price. The extra concrete required came to $6209. After signing the builder said we could do the entire concrete job ourselves, and would refund us the extra of $6209. No refund for the 39m2 included as part of the house cost. I believe they should refund at their cost price for that 39m2 also. Re: driveway after handover 4Jul 02, 2019 9:54 am No worries! That's good they offered a refund for the extra concrete. They should also refund the 39m² less margin. Have you asked them to refund this? What did they say? If they won't budge, can you choose where that 39m² goes? Might as well get them to do what they've contacted. Re: driveway after handover 5Jul 02, 2019 10:04 am I sent an email requesting a variation to include refund of included amount 39m2 ($2311, that price would include markup) plus extra amount of $6209. The variation came back with a refund of only the extra $6209. I haven't spoken to them yet, as I wanted to see where I stand first. Re: driveway after handover 6Jul 02, 2019 10:20 am Okay, that's good. I suggest having a good read over your contract to see where you stand. Also since a contract has been signed the builder is not contractually required to accept any variations, it's normally at their discretion as to whether they accept or decline a variation. If they do reject the variation for the 39m² I would just have them do it. I work as a building designer for a building company in QLD and we rarely reject variations and if the client does request a refund we do refund the client less the margin. Let us know how you go with the response from the builder. Can you give advice on how to get missing certificates needed for a form 21? Our bank requires us to provide one but we are missing 4 building certificates from our first… 3 57169 yes it does, you've just not understood it. theres a difference. 4 2780 Your house should come in "as new" condition. It should be clean, and without stains 1 2857 |