Browse Forums Building A New House 1 Sep 09, 2017 10:01 pm Hi Everyone my name is Daniel
My wife and I have already started our building journey and have been scrolling these forums for a while looking for inspiration and advice This is my first post though Our Story begins in January of this year 2017 we decided we would knock down and rebuild on the current block we live in. Many weeks of searching online at builders plans we decided on 'The Grand' by Fairmont Homes We signed our contract in february and asked for an extension on the norm 5 month contract to 7 months which they accepted. We made a few design changes to the plans to suit our needs and got the final plans drafted and approved by april and then they were sent off to council. Fast forward to July and we finally get planning approval from council with a list of conditions we need to meet. All these things added up to a good amount of extra money we needed to now find which we were unaware of. After signing off on the conditions we only waited another 4 weeks to get our building approval from council which came through earlier this week. Then we put in council demolition approval and are still waiting for that bit of paper work to come through and also waiting for SA Power to come and disconnect the power from the house. Once we have that we can commence the demo process so Fairmont can come in and start their thing. We have had 2 of the 4 selections processes done already and the other 2 will be completed by this coming friday at our Final Builders interview Everything has progressed slowly but it has been very methodical but everything really ramped up since about 4 weeks ago its getting very exciting now. Ive done a very brief intro here but I cant really remember every little detail up to this point but I will post some pics of house design and our selections once i figure out how to upload them, might be today might be next week but it will happen. I decided to start this thread because I was trying to find kitchen designs and bathroom designs like what we have selected and cant seem to find many online pics that are anything like our design choices ( could be a bad thing lol ) So I thought I would help people out in the future by putting it up for all to see Thanks for reading Regards Daniel Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 2Sep 09, 2017 10:18 pm [url= Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ ]/url] Here are the plans we only made a few changes on the standard plan The original plan has robes on the wall dividing bedroom 3 and 4. We moved the robe to its current position and added the robe into bedroom 2 We took the robe out of Bedroom 3 and moved the wall towards the back to make room for a bigger walk in robe and ensuite. The ensuite design is from the Lamont which is on display at Munno Para along with The Grand We had to compromise on the size of bedroom 1 to make it fit I think we lost about 50cms or so but I think this design is much better and also gives us a bigger shower in the ensuite than before, aswell as a bigger robe Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 3Sep 09, 2017 11:57 pm Looks good. I like the garage how you enter through the pantry (nice and quick for shopping drop off!). I also like the courtyard type area behind the garage which would be an alfresco area. AND I also prefer the wider frontage too (even compared with mine) I don't know why I just do! I can't wait to see your kitchen and bathroom ideas! I struggled looking for kitchen ideas similar to what I had in mind, atleast with the colours i'm using. Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 4Sep 10, 2017 8:22 am beautiful big open living space - how exciting to be ready to start it all. looking forward to seeing pics of your kitchen and bathroom Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 5Sep 10, 2017 10:06 am Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ This is our front elevation We changed a few things on the standard look We dropped the front patio to the same height of the rest of the roof we didn't like it being higher and becoming a feature We also decided to put in 2 roller doors instead of 1 big one so we now have the brick pillar to divide the two. At this stage we haven't came to a final decision on bricks and fascia colours etc But I believe we are probably going to pick something like this Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 6Sep 10, 2017 1:52 pm Great to see another Fairmont build! I was surprised and frustrated by how slow the administration process was but are right, it is very methodical which I hope will pay off in the end. I'm another fan of your garage entry through to the pantry. We played around with something similar but wanted to use a laundry as a mudroom entrance too and couldn't get both to work. How did you find the process with direct interiors and supreme kitchens? Good luck with the build! Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 7Sep 10, 2017 5:38 pm Hey Dan, nice plan. Couple of small things - both the entry through to kitchen doors, and the cavity slider that separates the bedroom wing from the rest of the house are quite narrow. If you can increase the entry door to 920, and with the cavity slider I'd make that 1020. Don't forget with a cavity slider you lose a couple of cms unless it's flush. You'll find it much easier to get furniture into the bedrooms. The entry door doesn't matter as much; as you can get your furniture through garage and sliding doors - a wider door will just make it feel slightly more inviting, but the bedroom wing is pretty important. Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 8Sep 10, 2017 6:36 pm Good call PV but I'm not sure we can fiddle with the plans now as our final builders interview is on Friday.
It's definately something that I should of thought of since I'm an upholsterer and I move furniture through doorways all the time and get frustrated doing it through narrow ones !! But I know in our case not a lot of furniture will be going through into the bedroom besides desks and small furniture and beds so I don't think it will be an issue in this case but thanks for the input. Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 9Sep 10, 2017 6:43 pm Hi bubbles I found the process at direct interiors to be quite simple and painless we used all standard tiles because they had the colour palette we were after for the bathrooms and the right tiles for our splashback the interview was done in about an hour was pretty simple there. However supreme kitchens was a lot harder as they didn't have what we wanted in standard colours or finishes the 90 minute appointment was not long enough for us we stayed for another hour after looking through samples before we finalised everything. The people at both places were great though and made it easier for us to get to conclusions faster. Overall I was happy with both processes! Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 10Sep 10, 2017 9:49 pm Dan I wouldn't worry about the size of those two cavity sliders for furniture- You have that big glass slider you can get stuff through if you need it. It could be awkward to navigate through the pantry anyway?? My builder you pick everything onsite and I researched before going to my final colour day. As you may note from my blog we changed builders (thank god) twice but I did it 3 times. Anyway I asked to go in prior to colour selection to see the range and then went out into the big wide world to look at the bricks, carpets etc. You may be able to ring the brick company i.e Selkirks and Boral and get a list of bricks you like. We did this and drove over the countryside chasing our bricks (There is only two in my area and the rest we drove to Melbourne) It can be hard if they give you lot numbers rather than street address for the houses so be wary of that as it can be time consuming haha. Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 11Sep 10, 2017 11:37 pm We have our appointment tomorrow morning with clipsal to do our electrical plan will let everyone know what we are doing. But is there anyone who can give me some tips on things they did that they wished they didnt ? ie thought something was worth paying extra for but ended up not really being worth it or vice versa things they wished they did add that they either forgot about or overlooked Thanks in advance !! Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 12Sep 11, 2017 7:16 am we haven't done our electrical yet, but plan to put in an additional 19 (i think) double powerpoints. we have one at floor level in the pantry if we eventually get a robotic vaccuum we are making sure that there are also power points to outside areas for future lighting/ fans etc we have put in extra data points and points for tv etc. for bedrooms, we aren't putting in downlights (plan at the moment) and just want a single bayonet so we can put in a fan/light system Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 13Sep 12, 2017 10:54 pm We did our electrical plan on monday I think we did alright. The process was great, nice and easy The rep we had was knowledgeable on all the products and guided us very well I thought Its crazy how all these little things add up in the end the standard inclusions is definitely not enough for a house of my size. Well actually there was enough power points but when you upgrade them all to doubles it becomes costly. We didnt do anything crazy expensive either little luxuries we did add though were... A couple of 2 way switches A couple of 3 way switches 2 double power points to be installed on each side of the bed in master bedroom which have a built in USB port Also installed one of those double power points onto the side of our island bench Things I didnt think would have a surcharge on them are... Installing a power point into the island bench Installing a baton light onto the brickwork for outside lights that costs alot extra to save money you can install lights under the eaves and only pay the cost of installing a baton light if you have went over the standard inclusions Another seperate update is that we got our Electricity Abolishment Date confirmed as the 26th of September This pushes our planned timeline forward 1 week Which means now I have only 2 weekends to move out the house instead of 3. Its gonna be a hard couple of weeks We are still waiting for our demolition approval from council So cant book that in until we have that bit of paper So still on track but now we have to move out a week earlier than planned Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 15Sep 13, 2017 4:03 pm Hi Dan! another KDR! Great plan - looks like things are going well. The main thing is to expect delays! something will pop up granted. We burnt about two months (on top of a generous timeline) between council approval and slab pour! Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 16Sep 14, 2017 9:21 pm We have our final builders interview tomorrow afternoon We are still undecided about brick choices Today I went to the the paint shop and brought a sample pot of Spirit Grey and painted parts of walls in different parts of my house to see what the colour looks like in person. Its a lot bluer than the sample pic but it hasnt fully dried yet either so not sure how much lighter it will go. Its a hard choice because im not sure if i like it but it may be because I have other walls that are cream to compare it to so it brings out the blue more Im not sure but also the paint guy could of put a tad too much blue into it aswell maybe ?? I dont know its hard to decide What did everyone pick for paint colour of interior walls ?? Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 18Sep 14, 2017 10:07 pm We went with Augatella which is a warm white. painted a room in another house with it and it looked good. Hopefully it was the right choice!! Sometimes its hard to know until it all comes together! Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 19Sep 15, 2017 12:31 pm We got our final builders interview today in about an hour !! Excited the planning stage will finally be over ! Also got our demo approval from council today so all is on schedule !! Electricity will be cut on the 26th of September so now we can book in a day/s to get demo done !!!! Re: New House Build KDR Blackwood SA Fairmont Homes 'The Gra 20Sep 15, 2017 12:49 pm who are you getting to demo? we are thinking of magil, but love to hear if there are other good ones out there Hi, I am looking into doing a KDR in Melbourne and am contemplating using Kialla Homes. 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