8.6.10

"Houston we have a slab"!!

Posted by Cath Swan | Labels: , ,

Today was going to be slab day.

Our building manager had informed us that today the slab would go down. As it has been raining heaps in the past weeks, we were a little worried the weather might dampen our plans, but today was sunny and dry, and being the only day in this week rain is not forecast we were very thankful.

I've heard a lot of people say that when they see the slab they wonder how their house will fit in that space it looks so small; well we were shocked at the size of our slab. We knew our house plan, the Camberwell 29 didn't give us much yard and was a big plan of 32 squares including garage, but we were amazed how big it actually looked on our land.
As we are on a hill and our block is quite flat the
edges of our land is sloped, so there will be a fair bit of landscaping and maybe even the need for a retaining wall.

In the photo to the left, the gravelly looking cement in the front is our Alfresco where we will eventually build a deck.

I think our slab will be higher than a lot of the houses surrounding because they have had to cut into their blocks, where because ours was so flat, they have put the slab on top. Exciting!!

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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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10.7.09

Corner block & Custom builders

Posted by Cath Swan | Labels: , , ,


Custom builders are great if you have a specific idea of plans for your home. If you're happy to just go with the standard plan, any mainstream builder will help you out.


But what if you need to move walls, add a room, or fit the plan to your block? Something we have learnt along the way is that if you make too many changes to a standard plan, you need to check that you are still eligible for the luxury upgrades so many builders include in their advertising. If there are too many changes to standard plans, it's then classed as a custom build, and you may lose the luxury inclusions.

We have a corner block, its around 19m wide and 32m long, its a 600m size block. Not huge but not tiny either. But because this block is on the corner, we lose a couple of metres of the front corner.

So whatever plan we choose, it has to fit on the block with the garage to the left and enough room for the corner.

The other thing that is a requirement for having a corner block at Laurimar, is we have to address the corner. Which means that whatever facade, windows, render etc we have on the front of the house, has to carry to a certain percentage of the corner and side. This can make things a little expensive, we have to allow about $3000 to our budget just for the corner treatment. Ultimately it will look great, but it's also finding a plan that has a good corner layout to fit our particular block.

For us we are looking very hard for a custom builder who will help us to build our home and not shoot us if we want to change the plan a little. As for luxury inclusions, you don't get something for nothing, so my advice is to always read the fine print and make sure you are aware of all costs hidden or not, because luxury inclusions will have to be factored into the overall price somewhere.

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3.7.09

The Land Has Settled

Posted by Cath Swan | Labels: , ,


Our land in Laurimar has settled!!!


What a good feeling to know our land is approved and settled. This happened a couple of days ago, and Saturday we went out to see if the for sale sign had a 'sold' on it. Still no sign, but it was quite a liberating feeling to know this little piece of land now belongs to us.

Houses are going up very quickly around us. When we first looked at this block there were no other houses in the estate, now they're all going up very fast.

I think the time it's taking us to find a builder, we'll be some of the last to build in the estate, but I guess the perk of that is that we won't have to live through the noise of houses being built next door. (sorry to our new neighbours)!

I continue to breathe sighs of joy, everytime we visit Laurimar. It is such a beautiful estate, and they haven't even finished developing the lakes and parkland yet. It will be a very beautfiul place to see my kids grow up.

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1.6.09

Sign on the dotted line!

Posted by Cath Swan | Labels: , ,

Over the past couple of weeks we have looked around at other blocks of land, compared prices etc, and still we are in love with the block at Doreen. All the others blocks of land just seem boring with no views and with nothing to really attract us.


So my husband has put in an official offer on this block of land and today we went in to sign our lives away, pending on getting our finance.

We have bought this block for $172,000 which is pretty reasonable for the area. It kind of felt surreal signing up for our own land. Im not really letting myself get excited until I know the finance comes through. At least we have a signed contract, so all going well this baby will be ours!

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16.5.09

Land ahoy!

Posted by Cath Swan | Labels: , ,

We have started the wheels in motion! Our financial planner (Martin) has begun the search for the bank that will lend us our dream.


We live in the northern suburbs of Melbourne, and have been looking to the outer suburbs, we're a bit tired of the city rush and we're hanging for some country air!

A friend who lives out at Doreen told us to call into the Delfin office in the Laurimar Estate. Doreen is beautiful, with views to the surrounding mountains and then back to the city skyline. Kangaroos roam freely throughout the rolling hills.

We casually went for a visit to the office and spoke to the salesman who told us there was not much left in the new estate. But he showed us a block on the map which was around 600m2 and offered to take us up to see it.

As we drove into the new estate, my husband and I both agreed this block, being one of the last, would probably be the worst block in the estate, in some dark valley no one wants. As we drove up a hill, our salesman turned into a nice new street and stopped and got out. We followed and thought it would surely be the block going down the hill, but we were very surprised as we walked onto the block right at the top of the hill.

The views were beautiful, the block was relatively flat, and we were blown away.

We both fell in love with it instantly, and after much pacing and dreaming, we told the salesman we were very interested.


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