Electrical & tiling appointments

Our second and final day of selections is here. 

We weren't too sure what to expect at the electrical appointment and therefore were not fully prepared. We met with Malinda whom was very nice and patient with us. She called our job up on the screen and we proceeded to go through each room and decide where to position each power point, tv socket, light switch etc.  We didn't anticipate spending more than a couple of thousand dollars on electrical upgrades, but ended up spending over $5,000! Its amazing how quickly it all adds up. 

Some of our upgrades consisted of the following:-

• Switch wire for 7 x fans throughout the house
• Provision for 3 x wall mounted TV's including extra noggins and bull nose wall plates
• Under cupboard light boxes (for kitchen cupboard downlights)
• Double floodlight for backyard
• Double Fluoro light for garage
• 4 x junction boxes (for outdoor lighting to front facade)
• 2 x dimmer switches
• 8 x additional double power points
• 3 x additional single power points
• 1 x additional outdoor power point
• 3 x additional TV points
• 1 x additional motion detector for alarm system
• Additional battens for future pendants over the kitchen island and downlights in a number of the rooms
• Pre-wire for NBN
• TV antenna
• Upgrade alarm to the Navigator package

At the completion of our layout the computer played up and our job was lost. Malinda advised she would do another mock up after we left and email it to me for checking.  Of course if this was going to happen, it was going to happen to us.

We left HOG and headed over to Di Lorenzo (after a quick stop for lunch at the Bella Vista Hotel).

At Di Lorenzo Tiles we met with Elisa for our tiling.  We believed we were completely organised for this appointment as we had spent countless days and hours at Di Lorenzo contemplating various colour schemes. Admittingly, all the preparation in the world doesn't remove the second guessing that comes with making major decisions. 

We decided on a larger wall tile in the standard tile selection for both our ensuite and main bathroom, and standard floor tiles for the bathrooms and main floor area. The only upgrade was our feature bathroom tiles. There were additional costs to lay the larger wall tile but apart from that, we managed to keep the costs down.

We then met with Tilly for carpets. We upgraded our underlay to the blue rubber underlay at $8 per m3. The standard underlay was almost as thin as a sheet of paper.  We chose carpet within the standard range as we agreed that we would re-do our carpets in a few years.  This appointment was very quick as we had already decided which carpet we wanted prior to this day.

Having finished our colour selections, we were excited to get the land registered and building under way. It was all a waiting game from this point on.

Pics of our tile selections...

Bathroom & Ensuite wall, floor and feature tile

Bathroom floor tile (matt) with mail floor tile (shiny)

Carpet

The fun stuff...

Colours, Kitchen, Landscaping & Plumbing 

Today is day 1 of our colour selection process....I have been looking forward to this day since signing our tender.  For the past few months I have spent most nights on the internet researching and preparing for this day.  Homeone has been an invaluable resource. There are so many helpful and knowledgable people that are happy and willing to share their expertise and experiences with you. I highly recommend this website to anyone whom is building their own home.  There is a link to the website on my home page. The exciting part is knowing you have total control over the colour scheme and finishes in your home.

Our appointment was booked for 9am and we were on time and filled with enthusiasm and anticipation for the day ahead. Don't get me wrong, I was feeling a little anxious and uncertain that I was 100% prepared and ready to make the right choices.

First up, our colour consultant for the day took us through the exterior colours.  Our selections went like this:-

Bricks: Gravel

Roof: Monument (Colorbond)

Gutters, Downpipes, Meter Box & Water Tank: Monument

Fascia: Dune

Garage Door: Dune

Cladding: Dune

Front Door: Dune

Eaves: Surfmist

Windows: APO Grey

Next we moved onto door handles for the doors throughout the house, including the front door, kitchen and bathroom cabinetry handles and WIR door handles. As we had increased the ceiling height to the entrance, we decided to upgrade the main bedroom doors. We also added a solid timber door and lock to our internal garage door (door added at tender stage).

Then it was over to choose paint colours. This was a little difficult. We knew what we wanted, but couldn't find the colour within the limited colour choices provided by EBH. In the end, after much procrastination, we settled on Kidskin for the walls and Crisp White for the skirting and architraves.

The last of the colour choices was the kitchen and bathroom vanities and bench tops. This took us some time as the colours in the brochures were not a true representation of the colour samples at HOG (It could have had something to do with the lighting). With regards to kitchen colours, we were planning upgrading but was advised by our colour consultant to choose a colour for the file and this would be over written once we had our kitchen appointment.  So our colour selection was done and dusted.

From here we saw Jenni from Outback Landscaping for our driveway. J and I had come into this appointment determined we would have a cement driveway. But after listening to the pros and cons of each, and the general maintenance of both, we ended up choosing pavers. We chose the Baines Charcoal pavers, laid in a stretcher bond pattern. We opted to upgrade to have the council crossover paved as well.  Outback were offering a $2 promotion where they would provide additional concrete/paving to the side of the house. I am not sure of the square meterage but it worked out that we would receive paving to one side of the house, the length of the garage.

Next we were off to meet with Alex from Kitchen Culture. Upon sitting down and sighting our kitchen layout that Alex had printed off, we were surprised to see that there were no overhead cabinets. Who builds a kitchen without overhead cabinets?? Turns out, all project builders don't, and it costs you an arm and a leg to include them! We were a little annoyed because we remember specifically asking our Sales Rep at Homeworld Kellyville whether the overhead cupboards were included and he confirmed that they were.  So to be told that they weren't was a bit of a blow.

The kitchen is where you can spend a lot of money on upgrades. For example, here are our upgrades.

• Two sets of soft close pot draws either side of the oven
• Overhead cabinets with a 100mm overhang in lieu of handles
• A lift up door cupboard above the fridge space, 
• A light shelf in each overhead cupboard for down lights
• Bulkheads to overhead cabinets, including flyover panel above rangehood
• Laminated panel behind rangehood
• Sharknose detail to base cabinet doors and drawers 
• Gloss polyurethane finish to kitchen cabinets, panels, and kickboard.
• Catergory 1 Essastone - Crystal Chalk
• Glass splash back

If anyone wants to know how much any of the above cost, please let me know. I would be happy to share with you.

We also opted to have KC fit out our laundry rather than try and have someone do it after handover. 

Here are our kitchen and laundry plans.

3D Kitchen Layout

Kitchen Plan

Laundry Plan

Our appointment with Cooks Plumbing was next. We wanted to keep the costs down seem as we just went overboard at our kitchen appointment.  Here is a list of our upgrades.

• Gallery Leonardo Wall-Faced Soft Close Toilet (main & ensuite)
• Caroma Classic 1700 Bath (main)
• Novelli Disc Shower 200mm Square Rose & 300mm Ceiling Dropper
• Dorf Enix Double Towel Rail - 900mm (main & ensuite)
• Everpure Water Filter Std Tap Starter Kit
• Everhard Benchline 45L Flushline Tub (laundry)

And some pics.......

Upgraded Shower Head

 Upgraded Toilet - Leonardo Wall Faced Soft Close Suite

Standard Basin for Main Bathroom & Ensuite

Standard Mixer for Bathroom & Ensuite

Standard Mixer for Shower

Standard Mixer & Tap for Bath

Standard Towel Rail

Standard Toilet Paper Holder

Standard Shower Head for Main Bathroom

Standard Kitchen Mixer

Standard Kitchen Sink

Standard Laundry Mixer

Standard Laundry Tapware

Upgraded Laundry In-Bench Laundry Tub

Handles for Laundry & Bathroom Cabinets

Sophia Lever Handles (satin chrome)

Upgraded Feature Door to Main Bedroom 

Upgraded Gainsborough Oblong Pull Handle for Front Door

 

 

Bathroom lights / ceiling fan

 

Change of mind

Outside influences have forced us to change our brick selection. Without having to bore you with the circumstances surrounding the reason for the change, we have found it necessary to remove them from our contract, saving us $4,950.  Just in case you wanted to know, they are a category F brick.

Its a shame because we really loved the Nickel Flash brick, but we also love our second option, so we can make the most out of the situation. Our house will still be gorgeous!  

I contacted our CSA to advise of the change and it was deleted in our first of many PCV's.

A PCV is a post contract variation, something we will become very familiar with over the coming months.

Exciting times ahead

Contract Signing....

On the 5th October we met with Charles to sign our contract. By delaying the signing until October meant we would be eligible for the $15,000 first home owners grant.

We paid our 5%, which was scary. All your hard earned money being handed over in exchange for a hundred or so pages of paper in the form of a building contract.

Next step...colour selections. I was very excited to get this underway. I had been researching for months now and the husband and I had been dragging the kids out almost every weekend doing drive by's looking for the perfect colour bricks.

Our colour selection appointment was booked for the 22nd October, with the tiles and electrical booked in for 12th November.

I couldn't wait.

Research for our flooring & bathroom selections

We must have gone to Di Lorenzo half a dozen times leading up to our appointment, just to try and cement our ideas.

I never thought that choosing a colour scheme for your home would be so hard. The selection of standard bathroom and flooring tiles at Di Lorenzo is actually pretty good. The feature tiles though, we didn't find anything that really grabbed us.  In the end, we chose a feature tile that was not part of the standard package.

We spent hours wandering around trying to decide on what we liked.  I think it wasn't until the 3rd for 4th visit that we came to a decision on what we wanted. The feature tile we weren't too sure on at first, but we finally decided on Option 2.

Option 1

Option 2

Flooring (shiny tile for main floor area) & smaller tile for bathroom, ensuite & laundry

We wanted similar internal colours to those used in the Drysdale 27 on display at Homeworld Kellyville.  Below are some photos taken of the flooring in the display home.

These are the samples we had to choose from.  We ended up going with the carpet on the left (in the first picture below).

Trying to decide on a brick

It was time to choose a brick so headed on out to PGH to take a look at our brick options. I felt sorry for the kids, they hate being dragged around doing "unfun stuff"!

We want a brown coloured brick. Something warm, chocolatey (mmmm). Needless to say, that before we choose a brick, I am sure we will change our minds a dozen times.

There are so many beautiful bricks colours but we soon realise that they (all of the bricks we really like) are not in the standard range.

Standard brick choices are:-

The Summervilla Collection

• Vanilla
• Pearl Grey
• Mocha

The Alfresco Collection

• Chocolatto 
• Vino
• Expresso
• Sorbetto

I think there are some more but as they didn't appeal to us, we didn't pay attention to them (sorry).

Pearl Grey

Mocha

Vanilla

To assist us in making a decision, we obtained a list containing addresses from PGH for a number of brick colours we were tossing around.  Over the next few weekends we drove around The Ponds, Castle Hill & Bunya to view houses already built.

We were finding it extremely difficult to agree on a brick. We went from wanting a brown brick to a light brick, back to a brown brick, a darker brick, our procrastination was endless.

At first we thought we would select a brick in the standard range. We were originally going to go with Chocolatto until my friend, whom works for PGH, advised us against it due to it being a slurry (or painted) brick.  Therefore, we were swaying towards Mocha or perhaps Gravel (we agreed we would pay a little extra to upgrade).

House built using Gravel Bricks

Smoke

Nutmeg

House built using Smoke & Nutmeg

Loam 

House built using Loam

We tossed around the prospect of a smooth faced brick like Smoke (light) or Nutmeg (dark) but changed our minds because of the idea that many new schools and electricity substations use these two bricks, and in time, the brick seems to crack. I liked Loam but J didn't so that was out.  I liked Mild Steel, although a little lighter than we wanted, I really liked the texture of the brick, but J wasn't sold on this one either. J liked Blue Steel Flash but I wasn't fussed on the blue/grey tones, but then we discovered Nickel Flash. It had reddish brown tones and a really nice texture. We obtained the address of a house and took a drive out to see it. Believe it or not, we both agreed that this could be the one!

Nickel Flash was a category D (I think) upgrade. We decided that it was worth paying extra for as it would be the first thing you would see every time you drove into your driveway.

Nickel Flash

Our minds were made up....

Until they weren't :(

A bit of bad news...followed by some good news

In July Eden Brae held a information evening at the Home Option Gallery for people interested in building. We thought we would attend to enable us to gather some insight into what to expect when building. It was an interesting evening, but we realised it was not really that relevant to us as we had already started the journey. It was only after the presentation when we were speaking to a couple of the EBH sales reps that we found out the land was now expected to register around July 2013, and not March as previously advised. Now, this was a bit of a blow for us.  We were still living with my husband's mother and we were fairly certain we were starting to outstay our welcome.

The 3rd August came around fairly quickly and it was time for our tender presentation with Charles DeMarco.  Everything went well and Charles made things a little better by telling us that registration was likely to be in May with construction likely to commence in July 2013.  This was good news for us.

We went home feeling a little more positive than we had been when we arrived.

Good times ahead....or so we thought.

Eden Grange

It was only a month later that J stumbled across house and land packages by Eden Brae Homes on Realestate.com.au.  Prices for land seemed very reasonable so we took a drive out to the sales office on site to take a look at the master plan for "Eden Grange".  It was a quiet area, somewhat rural and old but with a lot of potential and definitely a place we could imagine raising our children in, so we headed down to Homeworld at Kellyville to take a look at the display homes and find out a little more information on the proposed development.

We spoke with Gaven, whom told us that the land was expecting to register in January 2013, with construction to commence approximately 2 months later (March 2013). He advised that we could choose any style of house, you weren't locked into the advertised house on each particular block. So we took a look through the homes that they have on display. We entered the Drysdale and instantly fell in love with it. We loved the floor plan and I particularly liked the gallery kitchen. I am a firm believer that the kitchen is the heart of the home, and the Drysdale's kitchen is right in the centre of the house. It was perfect. 

To cut a long story short, Gaven provided us with a fixed price package, taking advantage of $1 promotions at the time.  On the 3rd July 2012 we put down our deposit on the house and land package with EBH. This time we knew we had made the right decision.