Settlement is Tuesday...Yay, finally we will own the land. Just waiting on the Bush Fire official report (Eden Brae insisted we have an official one) and then they get us to sign off on the final plans, should start by the end of the month but I doubt it somehow....OFF to the Bank tomorrow to part with the $$.
Lesson learnt so far...
Choosing the fast 10 day method with a private certifier for Comply and Development is not faster!
Nor cheaper!
Port Stephens Council would of pre-approved our plans prior to registration and they would not off required an official Bush Fire BAL cert. And haven't we had many months prior to that we could of lodged these...Oh well.
The house next to us has commenced and they have very kindly dumped the most massive pile of dirt/mulch on our land, or should I say mountain !
Saturday, November 5, 2011
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
Land finally registered Oct 18 2011
well I thought this day would never come...Now we have to wait until Nov 1 to finally settle and we can finally start building...I won't make bets on much happening before Christmas though. It has been 2 years now since we sold our home and embarked on this project.
Saturday, July 9, 2011
July : (
It's now July ,the dreaded corner that held us up for at least 6 weeks is finished, and the houses behind are almost complete. The landscapers very kindly relocated our lovely Lilly Pilly Tree to our neighbours yard! The only positive thing to say is they have at least planted many trees along all the back fences that will shade our yard eventually from th
e west.
July 15 is the latest date we have been told the land will register, It
has actually finally finished except no sign of a street sign at long last. Next will be to finally pay for it, get approval for the building , finalise plans etc etc....start date likely September. Signed a new lease a few weeks ago for 10mths so we don't have the worry of moving before the house is ready. We can no longer ride our bikes madly up and down the street because it now occasionally has traffic, after watching Soph fly down the hill with no idea a car was right beside her I have had to ban them from the road, back onto the footpath and bike track. Luckily for us we have the bike track at the end of our street and it takes us all the way to Medowie.
e west.July 15 is the latest date we have been told the land will register, It
has actually finally finished except no sign of a street sign at long last. Next will be to finally pay for it, get approval for the building , finalise plans etc etc....start date likely September. Signed a new lease a few weeks ago for 10mths so we don't have the worry of moving before the house is ready. We can no longer ride our bikes madly up and down the street because it now occasionally has traffic, after watching Soph fly down the hill with no idea a car was right beside her I have had to ban them from the road, back onto the footpath and bike track. Luckily for us we have the bike track at the end of our street and it takes us all the way to Medowie.
Saturday, April 23, 2011
End of April....still waiting
While we wait for registration a street full of RAAF houses go up behind us and we gain a back fence. Completely frustrated we plant some trees for want of some action on our block...Another frustration is the Bush Fire assessment report, the maps council use are old so according to their map we are in the buffer zone, but they cleared all the trees to build our estate... we still have to fill out the form, shrub types,slopes, fire danger index aarrgghh...
Sunday, March 20, 2011
Still waiting...
It all looks finished except a small area of footpath, Registration is supposed to be March....I wonder how long it will actually take. We have been making the most of the nice smooth roads and no cars.
Friday, March 4, 2011
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
Too many Choices
The whole choosing colours has been a nightmare, I have driven everyone nuts with my countless trips to Brick yards and looking at random houses.
We have finally chosen PGA Brick POA, with a Barramundi grey roof colour, Ironstone gutter and facia, White garage door and windows and white mortar. The driveway is a grey colour paver.
Inside I tried to keep it simple but with child/stain friendly colours. Cream/Brown and earthy colours.
Kitchen is licorice Linea with a essastone white top(new crystal salt) that matches our floor tile, and aluminium and frosted glass doors on the top. Bathroom is the same but no stone top, laminate new ash dust instead.The wall colour is wrong but I don't really care, won't be long before we re-paint. Can't be bothered driving all the way back to Sydney to re-select it. And well now I am just over it all. I chose budget floor tiles for the bathroom much to Dans horror, it is a wishy washy brown also but I really want to afford air con and his shed so I started to cut costs where I could. I also bought solar panels for the roof which I had not budgeted for.
All the standard range with Eden Brae is far better than most other builders so the need to upgrade in my opinion was not necessary. I did spend 3 grand extra on electrical but this included energy saving down lights to living areas and kitchen/entry etc and extra power/phone and gas points.
I spent $1600 extra on the kitchen and got very little for this...While the overhead cupboards were thrown in free in our contract when I changed the layout from a u shaped kitchen to one with an island bench the over head cupboards had to be extended. The microwave that came in the kitchen upgrade package didn't include installation ie a space built in the cupboards...$530 later...(I was a bit pissed about that) and a kick board to cover the legs of the free-standing oven! Oh and two pot drawers. Not exactly excessive. The Lady from the kitchen company was not overly helpful once she realised I was not planning on spending up big on extras.
The electrical guy was great and 18 emails later we had it exactly as we want it. Funny how when I did it on my own I only spent $1100, came home and Dan said but......!!!!and it then cost $3000 more, but it's all done.
I spent a whole $43 extra on a bigger bath and was pleasantly surprised the shower niches were free : ) Sorry Dan you didn't get the $500 fancy shower head.
They over quoted on several things, not sure if this is deliberate or not but It is a welcome surprise when they include things free or at less than the original quoted price. If it is, it's great psychology!
We have finally chosen PGA Brick POA, with a Barramundi grey roof colour, Ironstone gutter and facia, White garage door and windows and white mortar. The driveway is a grey colour paver.
Inside I tried to keep it simple but with child/stain friendly colours. Cream/Brown and earthy colours.
Kitchen is licorice Linea with a essastone white top(new crystal salt) that matches our floor tile, and aluminium and frosted glass doors on the top. Bathroom is the same but no stone top, laminate new ash dust instead.The wall colour is wrong but I don't really care, won't be long before we re-paint. Can't be bothered driving all the way back to Sydney to re-select it. And well now I am just over it all. I chose budget floor tiles for the bathroom much to Dans horror, it is a wishy washy brown also but I really want to afford air con and his shed so I started to cut costs where I could. I also bought solar panels for the roof which I had not budgeted for.
All the standard range with Eden Brae is far better than most other builders so the need to upgrade in my opinion was not necessary. I did spend 3 grand extra on electrical but this included energy saving down lights to living areas and kitchen/entry etc and extra power/phone and gas points.
I spent $1600 extra on the kitchen and got very little for this...While the overhead cupboards were thrown in free in our contract when I changed the layout from a u shaped kitchen to one with an island bench the over head cupboards had to be extended. The microwave that came in the kitchen upgrade package didn't include installation ie a space built in the cupboards...$530 later...(I was a bit pissed about that) and a kick board to cover the legs of the free-standing oven! Oh and two pot drawers. Not exactly excessive. The Lady from the kitchen company was not overly helpful once she realised I was not planning on spending up big on extras.
The electrical guy was great and 18 emails later we had it exactly as we want it. Funny how when I did it on my own I only spent $1100, came home and Dan said but......!!!!and it then cost $3000 more, but it's all done.
I spent a whole $43 extra on a bigger bath and was pleasantly surprised the shower niches were free : ) Sorry Dan you didn't get the $500 fancy shower head.
They over quoted on several things, not sure if this is deliberate or not but It is a welcome surprise when they include things free or at less than the original quoted price. If it is, it's great psychology!
March 2011
Well they told us March, we just didn't expect it to be this march!
During the first few months we chose a builder, paid a deposit, had several price rises and a reduction in selections available. To cut a long storey short after we had gone through the agonising task of choosing a house and all the colours etc we changed builders, lost our deposit and started again.
Wasn't that the best decision ever! Our new builder has under promised and over delivered, right from the word go they have been organised, helpful and OMG gave a set start date and fixed price. Eden Brae I hope our journey continues this way. This house is almost identical to the first but has an extra room, a facade included and is costing us 30 grand less...And is almost complete when done, we only need to do fences and some yard work.
We paid our deposit in November and signed the contract in January, made our colour selections feb and now we await the final few weeks (hopefully) until our land is registered and we can lodge plans with council.
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