1.8.10

Surprised!

Posted by Cath Swan | Labels: , , ,


We've had a busy weekend so we hadn't had time to get out to the house until this afternoon.


I was hoping to see the bricks finished and no green insulation in sight. Well they had bricked further around and finished the back of the house completely, but still haven't finished the front and side.

So I ventured inside to see any changes, and noticed the front temporary doors had blown open and all the rain was getting in the house, so I fixed the bricks against the doors so no rain could get in. I turned around and was shocked by what I saw.

The builder had called Jose on Friday to tell him the plasterers would be starting sometime in this next week, so we were waiting to see the next stage started.

Well to my shock, the plasterers had not only started but nearly finished. All the walls are up, all the ceilings are done, and all that's left to do is the cornice and the door frames.

They must have worked hard since last Wednesday, because it wasn't done before then.

It totally changes the look of the house and makes everything seem real. Instead of looking through walls, we now have rooms.

In the photo to the right, is our foyer with an extra 300mm height added to the already high ceilings through-out the house. It makes the whole house feel very spacious!

A very exciting stage to get to.


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1.7.10

Gutters 'n' bricks

Posted by Cath Swan | Labels: , , ,


As it has been freezing cold and raining most of the week, we wondered whether the builders would darken the door of our home this week. But when we went out today we found the boys on the roof putting up all our nice Colorbond Ironstone gutters.
Most of the gutters were finished when we went out there, so I think it would have been finished by the end of today.

And we were also pleasantly greeted with the delivery of all our bricks! As they were sitting up on our block, the first view we had caused us to panic as they were NOT the bricks we had chosen. We then realised we were looking at the side of the bricks that will be unseen.

Our real brick colour is as the pictures below!

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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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5.8.09

Builder locked in!

Posted by Cath Swan | Labels: , , ,


We have finally locked in a plan, a builder, and paid a deposit.


The builder is Porter Davis, the plan is the Camberwell 29, and the month set to start construction is January 2010!

After a couple of months of deliberating over builders and plans, ironically the first builder we looked at was Porter Davis, so after going through all the other builders we've come full circle. Our initial deposit has been paid and contracts are the next step. We've gone through the plan with a microscope and put everything we wanted into it. The only thing we wanted to change about the plan was putting an extra door from the garage into the 'mud' room and moving the laundry door to the 'mud' doorway (apparently a lot of people are doing the same).

The Camberwell is only a new release and is selling like crazy, so we're very happy it's taken us so long to decide otherwise we would have missed this new home.

For us walking through the display sealed it for us. It had everything we need for our growing family. The big appeal was the rumpus at the end of the house that had a doorway through to the kids bedrooms as well as the family room, so it makes it kind of like a kids retreat. Which is what we were looking for.

As our kids are heading for their teens, zones are very important for us, and the Camberwell offers this very nicely.

So much more to follow in this process, and I will post a plan up as soon as I can work out how to.


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25.7.09

Further research on Ashford Homes

Posted by Cath Swan | Labels: , ,


On further study well into the hours of early this morning, I found a few threads that disturbed me about Ashford homes, but I wanted to really read what other customers are saying as there isn't much about Ashford in reviews i've searched.


I found this thread on Homeone a home building resource website with some good customer conversations about their build process.

If you can take the word of a customer, then it appears that Ashford homes is a nightmare after you sign on the dotted line.

I'm beginning to wonder if there are any builders out there that actually do a good job and complete it when they say they will? Whatever happened to being a 'man of your word'?

Research will continue!!

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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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