29.5.10

An exciting afternoon

Posted by Cath Swan | Labels: , , , ,

Two blog posts in one day is shocking I know. But I was so excited I had to do an update tonight after the last dismal post.


We got ourselves geared up to go out to the block this afternoon to start bludgeoning the dumped rubbish to bits. I had been to Bunnings and bought heavy duty gloves and plastic sheets to fill our car boots with rubbish. As it had also been raining and muddy, we were all dressed in old clothes and shoes.

Imagine our shock and surprise as we ascended our hill to
find our block cleared of rubbish, site scraped, and pink markers everywhere for the slab.

The rubbish had been bulldozed to the side, and neatly put out of the way so building can begin.

We will have to remove whats left of it at some point, but such a pleasant surprise to find that site start has begun and the rubbish can go at a later time.

They have even delivered a porta-loo, cut out the driveway and garage, and put down wooden slats in our driveway for easy access.

What a difference a week can make. As we live about 10-15 minutes from our block and both work all week we only get out there every weekend, so I'm thinking every Saturday is going to be a treat seeing what else has happened in our new home.

So we're underway, and because were building with Porter Davis we have a 20 week build guarantee, so stay tuned for lots more photos and updates!!

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29.5.10

frustration....

Posted by Cath Swan | Labels: , , ,


The great thing about this week is that now Porter Davis are ready to go, site manager is locked in and ready to start, the bank are ready to go, and we're ready to go. Just one little problem.... the land is not ready to go!


As explained 2 posts ago, we have had a whole lot of building rubbish dumped on our block from other builders, (shame on them)..... and everyone is ready to start, but we as the land owners have to have the block cleared before they can start.

'Shouldn't be a problem', I hear you say! Well, do you think we can pay anyone to come and take the rubbish away? No! Everyone is either too busy, too far away, or doesn't want to deal with that kind of rubbish. I've emailed, my husband has called all these different businesses that deal with rubbish, but they won't return our calls or emails.

We had one guy respond and he went out yesterday to have a look at our rubbish. His only offer was to pick it up with his truck and charge us $500, he said we would be better to do it ourselves.

You would think someone would be happy to get paid to take rubbish away, but nooooo that apparently is too hard.

So we are resigned to getting out there this afternoon with a sledge hammer and attempting to break up dumped concrete ourselves, and try and load it all into our cars and take it to the tip!

Maybe we'll pay ourselves and take us out for a nice coffee!!

Word to the wise: - make sure if you're block is standing alone for any length of time, that you either get your builder to put fencing up, or make your block hostile to possible dumping. Maybe buy a doberman and chain him to your land, or install floodlights and sirens for anyone who trespasses.

The banks and builders take ever so long to sort through their own redtape, the last thing you want is for things within your control to halt building. (not that you can control the actions of rogue builders).

stay tuned......

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22.5.10

Woo hoo - the smallest start!

Posted by Cath Swan | Labels: , ,

Today is Saturday! We apprehensively drove out to our block today to survey how much more rubbish had been dumped in the last week, as we are still waiting for site start and for the fence to go up.


Not only were we pleasantly surprised to see that the rubbish dump had NOT increased, but there were signs of building activity.

The first thing we saw as we ascended the hill to our block, was a wire cage, commonly used by builders to collect all the building rubbish. (Something other builders had obviously forgot about, hence using our block for their rubbish!) I guess if you're going to start a build, having a rubbish bin is a smart thing to start with.

Secondly as requested, the next door builder had removed all his bricks & trusses after parking them on our land. So it was looking much more cleared.

The thing that excited me the most, was the new water meter and pipe installed in the front yard. With new gleaming pipes and its store tag still hanging off it.

Progress!! It might only be a wire cage and a tiny little water meter, but to us it was pure joy!!

Almost one year since we settled on our block, building is about to start.

It's the little things in life that sometimes mean the most!!
:)

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15.5.10

Being the last block on the block.....

Posted by Cath Swan | Labels: , , ,


You may have mistaken this picture to be of a random rubbish dump. You would be forgiven for thinking that! But imagine if your beloved, expensive block of land turned into a rubbish dump.


This is the result of being one of the last blocks to start in the new estate of Laurimar. Apparently this is common practice for new estates, and commonly done amongst builders.

I mean where else are you going to dump your dregs of cement from the mixer, that annoying tree stump you just pulled out of your front yard. Broken bricks and half cut-off roof trusses. Even that broken pram you had filling the back of your ute. "Ahh theres an empty block that's not being used, and look there's already a pile of rubbish!"

Every week we've been out to our block, we've noticed more rubbish collecting. It seem the builders have a strict code of disposing of their cans and wrappers on someone else's block!!!

So boo to the care-less and selfish builders that grace our lovely estate! We will have to fork out around the $1000 mark to have our block cleared before building starts in a week.

But the beautiful thing about building with Porter Davis, is that unlike many builders, one of the first things they do is put up a fence around the entire block. So hopefully short of someone scaling our fence, we will be done with the rubbish dump!

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