Browse Forums Building A New House Re: Arden Developments 25Sep 16, 2016 1:28 pm Thanks Vellas, yeah, I sensed that when we had our first interaction with the Arden sales at their display house. Quite genuine and not pushy. I know it's just the start of a long process, but I am 100% satisfied with the service thus far. blackcurrent Thats Great Laijer. Based on good feedback, we are also keen to work with Arden for our first home. We have selected Votivo 43 as our plan and intend to make some changes to it. I would be keen to understand your changes and see how your plan looks. In relation to changes, did Arden charge a lot for making those changes? What is the process from start to finish with Arden? Am I in safe hands? Would the build quality be as good as volume builders?? Keen to hear your thoughts. Yep, I will upload the changed plans as i get them. Initially, it was just $500 to get them to start working on the redraw and they will give you an indicative price of what the changes will cost. They've said that generally, if your just moving rooms around within the floor plan, then there really is no change of price to the house, but if you're adding extra stuff like a bath tub, extra robes and shelving, extra windows etc, or increasing the size of the house; then that will attract extra cost. I don't know what those extra costs will be yet, but I will let you know once I hear back from Arden. Re: Arden Developments 27Sep 17, 2016 3:24 pm I want to share my experience with Arden, which was very disappointing! We were working well with them to build a custom Votivo, and we had everything locked in, until they backed out at the last minute just a day before our colour selection appointment sighting a cow manure reason that they could not build on my new block due to the amount of fill. (~3m) From my point of view, this entire thing happened not because of any technical difficulty in building on the block, but because I had questioned them in terms of why their quoted site costs (~72,000) was more than twice (~26,000) of what my adjacent neighbours paid with other builders like Metricon and Henley. For the record, my adjacent neighbours have almost completed their build and other builders are more than happy to take my business. They even had our soil tests results from day one, and in my view should not have wasted my time if they had any apprehensions to build on my block and should have made this clear upfront rather than waste 3 months in a design process. The last minute pull out has left me starting the design process from scratch with another builder and many $$$$ out of pocket as my land is already titled and ready to start build. Keep this in mind if building with them, and ensure that you all don't go through the same hell as I did - especially when looking at a custom build! Re: Arden Developments 28Sep 17, 2016 8:24 pm Sounds frustrating, sinbox Hope you can find a builder to create your dream. We've just broken ground with Arden and have had mostly smooth sailing so far. Being able to flex their standard plans to make basically a custom build was what sold us on Arden. And value for money too. We couldn't find another builder with so many inclusions. Hebel included was a bonus too. Hopefully they build us a gorgeous home. Building: a twisted & flipped out Milan by Arden Homes in Berwick Waters Follow our progress: http://balanced-at-berwickwaters.blogspot.com.au Re: Arden Developments 29Sep 17, 2016 9:03 pm BigRedDoor I am convinced that you will have an absolute dream building with Arden as we did. From start to finish and even after sales service Arden are superior in customer service and do a awesome build! Re: Arden Developments 30Sep 19, 2016 3:06 am Hi I too am looking at building votivo 37. Anybody has built 37 follow my build Arden homes Votivo 37 iin south east: https://forum.homeone.com.au/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=88622 Re: Arden Developments 33Sep 19, 2016 1:26 pm still new to this posting stuff - trying to figure out how to reply to a particular person or post some photos follow my build Arden homes Votivo 37 iin south east: https://forum.homeone.com.au/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=88622 Re: Arden Developments 35Sep 19, 2016 3:01 pm Hi sinbox. If you don't mind me asking, what suburb are you building in? 3m of fill is not the issue, it may be the soil type under the fill layer which is causing the issue. $72k is a massive amount of coin for site costs.....good luck! Re: Arden Developments 36Sep 19, 2016 3:56 pm Hi pEast, We made a lot of changes to our Votivo and added two cavity sliders. The extra costs was around $400. We made a host of design changes, pretty much wiped the ground floor and restarted again to make the house more open and suit our blocks orientation. No charge and the process was quick, easy and simple. Re: Arden Developments 38Sep 19, 2016 4:02 pm I would refuse to build with this company as when they built the house next door the damage they did to our property was a joke!! and to get it fixed was a bloody hard task! One of the worst ran companies I know!!! They refused to take ownership of the damages!! I would never ever consider this horrible excuse for a company Re: Arden Developments 39Sep 20, 2016 1:17 am Hi 3Peat r u building 37 follow my build Arden homes Votivo 37 iin south east: https://forum.homeone.com.au/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=88622 Re: Arden Developments 40Sep 20, 2016 8:33 am Yes we are. Found the 37 living too narrow, so moved some of the walls out and rearranged the kitchen, laundry and WIP to make it a little larger overall than the 43 display. We also removed the study, widened the external wall and made the theatre bigger. Garage was also widened. Overall the house went to 41 squares in the end. Upstairs was minor, just moved the bedroom and lounge area around to cluster the kids room all on one side of the house. Removed wall as you walk up the stairs to open the first floor up with some light. Overall the changes were well priced and the drawings were done in a quick and efficient manner! |