Masterton Homes - The next thread 4.0

Gibson · Dec 19, 2018 8:43 am

A few more photos , post landscaping

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Fred C · Mar 22, 2019 7:48 pm

Wow looks great. Is am looking for some clarification and advice.

I am building with Masterton and so far so good. Bricklayer recently completed and today the roof tiles were delivered. Unfortunately they put 6 pallets of the roof tiles on the council nature strip. I assume if the
Council see this they will issue a fine. I advised the site supervisor however he did not seem to phased about it and indicated the crew will be out Monday to do the roof. I am not sure what the fine from council would be but my question is who would be responsible for paying the fine?

brettbert · Mar 22, 2019 7:52 pm

Not you. They have control of the site. Sit back and relax.

Fred C · Mar 22, 2019 9:04 pm

brettbert

Not you. They have control of the site. Sit back and relax.

Thx Brett

Fred C · Mar 22, 2019 9:05 pm

Thx for clarylifying Brett.

JuliaRuthRoss · Aug 06, 2019 1:38 pm

fingalbrad

Thunder. We had air con done on Tuesday. There was supposedly a frame inspection done yesterday. I have a meeting with the senior supervisor Scott McLean on Friday. Week definitely be hitting him up about how long we have left

What happened in the end with Masterton? I would be interested in hearing about your experience.

Gibson · Aug 06, 2019 11:13 pm

Hi All,

We have been in our new home for a year now and couldn't be happier with the house.

The plus side is the quality is very good, we have had no major issues with the build, the house hasn't moved , settled or cracked etc.
There have been some issues with the Solar hot water but that's down to Dux not Masterton. We had the solar panels freeze when the frost valve failed. Dux refused to honour a fix under warranty but Masterton still sent out their own plumbers to see what they could do & painters to fix up the water damaged ceiling.

The design, quality, included features on the house are in my opinion exceptional, other builders just couldn't compete on the standards or price. When we started we took the Masterton build specs to another builder with a lower base price. Once the other guys priced up the M Spec they were $60k more expensive.

The downside: our build was frustratingly slow. Weeks would pass with no workers being on site. Masterton were a pain to deal with at times and never admitted any wrongdoing or conceeded anything when we complained. Even though the build ran 6 months over time they used every excuse to reduce the liquidated damages to a pitifully small amount.

We know people who had their build completed ahead of time, so it all in the luck of the draw.

If you're just starting your building journey, good luck & hang in there. It will be painful but you'll have a great house in the end.

Gibson

microd · Aug 08, 2019 4:15 pm

Gibson

Hi All,

We have been in our new home for a year now and couldn't be happier with the house.

The plus side is the quality is very good, we have had no major issues with the build, the house hasn't moved , settled or cracked etc.
There have been some issues with the Solar hot water but that's down to Dux not Masterton. We had the solar panels freeze when the frost valve failed. Dux refused to honour a fix under warranty but Masterton still sent out their own plumbers to see what they could do & painters to fix up the water damaged ceiling.

The design, quality, included features on the house are in my opinion exceptional, other builders just couldn't compete on the standards or price. When we started we took the Masterton build specs to another builder with a lower base price. Once the other guys priced up the M Spec they were $60k more expensive.

The downside: our build was frustratingly slow. Weeks would pass with no workers being on site. Masterton were a pain to deal with at times and never admitted any wrongdoing or conceeded anything when we complained. Even though the build ran 6 months over time they used every excuse to reduce the liquidated damages to a pitifully small amount.

We know people who had their build completed ahead of time, so it all in the luck of the draw.

If you're just starting your building journey, good luck & hang in there. It will be painful but you'll have a great house in the end.

Gibson

Thanks Gibson, that’s encouraging as we approach the very end of our painfully slow building process!

3lilpigs · Aug 10, 2019 11:27 am

Hi
We are at the stage where we are attending our tiling, flooring, kitchen, stairs etc appointments and have found that we are generally required to sign on the spot but then after we think about it we want to change our choices. Generally, we have been able to without much fanfare. Just wondering whether someone has a list of paint colours Masterton has in their standard range so we are well prepared before the colour appointment as we know we will probably be bamboozled at the time again. Thanks

chica72 · Aug 10, 2019 12:59 pm

[quote="3lilpigs":3qvsda0k]Hi
We are at the stage where we are attending our tiling, flooring, kitchen, stairs etc appointments and have found that we are generally required to sign on the spot but then after we think about it we want to change our choices. Generally, we have been able to without much fanfare. Just wondering whether someone has a list of paint colours Masterton has in their standard range so we are well prepared before the colour appointment as we know we will probably be bamboozled at the time again. Thanks[/quote:3qvsda0k]

Hi, I found this very helpful, hope you do too. From memory it’s the same range that Masterton used, well at least when I was building.
http://edenbraelivingstone23.blogspot.c ... s.html?m=1

Gibson · Aug 10, 2019 1:26 pm

3lilpigs

Hi
We are at the stage where we are attending our tiling, flooring, kitchen, stairs etc appointments and have found that we are generally required to sign on the spot but then after we think about it we want to change our choices. Generally, we have been able to without much fanfare. Just wondering whether someone has a list of paint colours Masterton has in their standard range so we are well prepared before the colour appointment as we know we will probably be bamboozled at the time again. Thanks

Hi 3lilpigs,

Of course they want you to sign on the spot but you don't HAVE to. Contracts require consent! Take the samples, colour selection books and prices home with you and take a few days to go through everything. I heard the old 'you can change your mind later' speech from M a few times, well no thanks. They charge a 'change fee' when ever you alter anything that's already signed off in the contract. So don't be pressured in to hasty decisions. In the end you want to see how all of your choices come together, to do that you need to see all of the options, not be forced to choose paint before you see the kitchen designer or tiles place.

Another tip, the kitchen designer will give you a single all inclusive price for everything you select, push them for an itemised quote. After some objections , 'its hard to do', we got an itemised list and deleted a couple of things with stupid prices - like $600 for a plastic in-cupboard bin.

Some of the appointments only give prices on selections you ask for, not their whole range, so don't be shy - ask for prices on everything you like. Better to be informed when making your decisions.

Cheers

Gibson

3lilpigs · Aug 11, 2019 9:13 am

Gibson

3lilpigs

Hi
We are at the stage where we are attending our tiling, flooring, kitchen, stairs etc appointments and have found that we are generally required to sign on the spot but then after we think about it we want to change our choices. Generally, we have been able to without much fanfare. Just wondering whether someone has a list of paint colours Masterton has in their standard range so we are well prepared before the colour appointment as we know we will probably be bamboozled at the time again. Thanks

Hi 3lilpigs,

Of course they want you to sign on the spot but you don't HAVE to. Contracts require consent! Take the samples, colour selection books and prices home with you and take a few days to go through everything. I heard the old 'you can change your mind later' speech from M a few times, well no thanks. They charge a 'change fee' when ever you alter anything that's already signed off in the contract. So don't be pressured in to hasty decisions. In the end you want to see how all of your choices come together, to do that you need to see all of the options, not be forced to choose paint before you see the kitchen designer or tiles place.

Another tip, the kitchen designer will give you a single all inclusive price for everything you select, push them for an itemised quote. After some objections , 'its hard to do', we got an itemised list and deleted a couple of things with stupid prices - like $600 for a plastic in-cupboard bin.

Some of the appointments only give prices on selections you ask for, not their whole range, so don't be shy - ask for prices on everything you like. Better to be informed when making your decisions.

Cheers

Gibson

Thanks !

ManishH · Sep 04, 2019 9:48 am

Hi All, we are building our 2 storey home with Masterton and went in to their tiles and carpet store the other day just to look around to get a feel for the available selections and we weren't satisfied

. We are now considering to do flooring for both floors ourselves through an external person. Can anybody please help us to undetsand how much credit we will get back from Masterton for doing flooring ourselves?

Has anyone done this and how much credit did you received back?

3lilpigs · Sep 04, 2019 2:26 pm

We took out the provision for flooring before we signed the contract as we planned on doing it after handover but ended up using their masterton supplier anyway as it would have been all covered by mastertons warranty and they only allowed that supplier to go in to complete prior to handover. I think the flooring guy said we were lucky we did it this way as it was cheaper because the builder doesn't add their margin. In general you won't get much credit back. We had to bring in the whole one side of the house about 600mm to fit in the width of the land and only got about $1500 credit back. Smeg Rangehood credit only $500 because we wanted another rangehood to be done after handover. Best ask Mastertons what credit would be allowed for your flooring if you chose not to get Mastertons to do it.

ManishH · Sep 04, 2019 2:38 pm

3lilpigs

We took out the provision for flooring before we signed the contract as we planned on doing it after handover but ended up using their masterton supplier anyway as it would have been all covered by mastertons warranty and they only allowed that supplier to go in to complete prior to handover. I think the flooring guy said we were lucky we did it this way as it was cheaper because the builder doesn't add their margin. In general you won't get much credit back. We had to bring in the whole one side of the house about 600mm to fit in the width of the land and only got about $1500 credit back. Smeg Rangehood credit only $500 because we wanted another rangehood to be done after handover. Best ask Mastertons what credit would be allowed for your flooring if you chose not to get Mastertons to do it.

Just $1500 for the whole one side of the house?? Wow thats way to less. I will ask them today however based on your message i dont think i can expect much.

djforest · Feb 02, 2020 10:01 am

Hi guys, new here I have been passively reading the forum. We are looking at building the grange 60sqm. Does anyone have any recent feedback with the grange and/or Masterton in general for the last year? I get the impression that Masterton is quite slow and I should budget for a 2 year timeframe from tender to actual handover? Also, does anyone have a rough idea of how much percentage more I should budget for on top of the ultimate package? Thank you

originalcollector · Jun 28, 2020 8:06 pm

gibson Thanks for sharing your story.
Question...which other builders did you consider and what was it about Masterton that made you decide that was the one to go with? Was it the layout, style, customer service, inclusions etc?

Just trying to get a feel for the builders as we start out journey in looking for a builder for a KDR.

These stories have been great so thanks again

johnaxe58 · Dec 29, 2022 11:09 am

Hi Gibson,
Are you able to share build costs, from estimated to end cost ?

johnaxe58 · Dec 29, 2022 11:10 am

How did you go with the build, and how did the numbers end up ?

Fisher75 · Dec 29, 2022 12:45 pm

Hi Everyone,

Just wanted your opinion on the situation. I've built with Masterton, recently I had a flood downstairs, because the shower drain got a bit clogged and the water filled up about 15mm. It did not go outside of shower cabin. As the water was going through the drain some of it went under the tiles travelled to the bathtub drain area and went downstairs. Apparently there is a gap between the shower drain pipe and the drain hole, which is according to Masterton "by design", and this allows the water to travel between the floor tiles and the waterproofing. There supposed to be a little barrier around the hole in the floor where the bathtub drain pipe goes through. Apparently it is either not sealed or the water goes above it. Masterton called a waterproofer, who inspected the bathroom and said he will tell Masterton how to fix it.
Masterton came back to me later saying this is not their problem, as "the water filled above the angle which allows the water to go where ever. There is not water proofing problem. Need to keep floor waste free of body hair". I asked for a copy water proofer's report, so I have something in writing. Never got it. I refuse to believe that hair in the drain should be causing floods downstairs as long as the water does not leave the tiled floor of the bathroom.
What do you think?

Thanks.