Publicly exposed

Hank is now out to the public for viewing and lodging of complaints against his proposal for being built. It is a two week window and we have already met the neighbours directly behind us who seem pretty nice and we know the house next to us should be vacant now so that only really leaves the house on the other side. It is looking good and hopefully this step means that the council has no more objections to our plans.

It would be amazing if we actually started building before xmas as I have been telling our friends that I didn't expect to start building til Jan next year.

Onward and upward!

Scouts motto, be prepared!

About two weeks ago we decided to get ahead of the time to choose lighting placement and power points by visiting the display home and marking it down on the plans. Unfortunately while we thought we were getting ready early, we realised we should have done this before plans were finalised.

Upon looking at the layout on the 1st floor which had a large wall area between two doors that a flat screen tv was hanging on, we realised that the door placement was different from our original plans to maximise this area to enable a large screen to be handily placed between the doors. This allowed a lounge area to be placed opposite making the configuration nice. But we didn't notice this until now and our plans were already submitted. We were told it would be a few hundred dollars for amendments to plans once submitted.

Additionally downstairs in the great room, we were trying to plan out where the dining area and lounge, tv etc would be situated that made best use of the alfresco position and view. Again, if we had gone through this exercise before plans were finalised we would have positioned windows and doors in different places to maximise the layout of furniture. This was another change, would this mean another few hundred dollars? We weren't too sure but the change we wanted downstairs was not just a simple interior door placement, it would have meant change to council plans and more delays costing us money. So we would have to live with it.

Not entirely ruined but could have been better planned. Its one of those things you know, when you know Hank could have been a perfectly planned specimen but now we know he has some flaws that we overlooked. Still, one for the experience books.

Advice, plan as much ahead as possible before final plans.

Hank has gone to council!

Monumental step today, Hank has been submitted to council! Also, we asked for an update on the extra $2K issue for our change to bathroom layout back to standard and our sales consultant confirmed that she believed we had been charged twice for the shower option on the ground floor. We will have to remind her to amend our tender.

Hank, waiting patiently

Well we have been told it will take another 3 weeks before we present Hank to council. Not sure why but its been over a month since we signed off on the final design and landscape.

On another note, we requested pricing on having shower recesses in the two showers on the second floor as well as getting silver gloss window frames ... prices came back as the silver gloss colour being free but the two recesses came in around $900! kind of evened itself out but we really want them as they are neater and look cool... so we're thinking of cutting down on fancy tiling for the bathroom... we still havent decided on tiling for bathroom in terms of feature tiles or mosaic on the tubs but i think we can get away without too much cost as these tiles and the laying of the fancy tiles cost extra.

Hopefully with some nice accessories the bathrooms can look modern still, will have to go to display homes and see what kind of layout and design looks ok but still reasonably priced.

oh and Hank's neighbour is apparently for sale too which hopefully might mean they won't complain too much about Hank when they get notified by council. we really need to look at the fencing on that side as it is wooden and slanting towards us already but i haven't really committed myself to changing it yet... would want the neighbours to share in the cost.

First day of spring!

the Out-laws!

Well its finally happened, the outlaws have found a buyer for their home so they will be moving in around 6 weeks time when settlement is due. While it is a blessing as we have been trying to get them to live closer for years, there will be some frustrating times ahead trying to sort through the stuff they have gathered from years of hoarding. Plus we will also have to trim our own pile of knickknacks and dust collectors to make space for them.

All I can say is I hope they like Hank and that we will need Hank to be up and ready for us all asap!

The outlaws are greenthumbs so Nora should be pleased with the attention she will be getting.
now to start planning my vegie patch and herb garden!

Tender loving Hank

We've received our final tender most of which we are happy with but we need to check a few things and will remove some variations we asked for. Hank is shaping up rather nicely now. Allcastle came back to us to ask how we went with their tender to which we told them we had gone with our current builder as they were cheaper and we felt their design was more modern. The sales rep at Allcastle was surprised to hear they were more expensive and offered to renegotiate but we passed as their quote was higher and they hadn't even added the double handing and traffic control cost yet (which was again more than what our current builder quoted). At any rate, we are happy at the moment and don't want to delay much further as we figure each week of delay is costing us now that Nora has joined the family and isn't able to earn her keep!

So hopefully in the next few weeks we will sort out the details, sign and submit to council.
Next weekend we are off to the snows!

... introducing Nora and Hank

Well today settlement for our land was finalised, so we are now proud owners of a little rectangular patch of dirt. Here she is:

I've decided that its a 'she' since she's a slim little thing and have decided to call her 'Nora' for no particular reason. As you can see, she's wearing very little! And just to be fair, the house can be a 'he' whom I'll call 'Hank' in reference to David Duchovny's character in Californication cos I'm a bit of a fan of his.

oh and while i'm posting pictures, here's our ground floor plan:

Its based on the Fernleigh design from Masterton but with only 1 garage due to council restriction and with shower option on ground floor. The study has replaced the dining room to become more of a 5th bedroom with a built in too. Hank is a social butterfly and likes to entertain so we've added an alfresco area out the back with stacker doors. The top floor is pretty much the same, we havent changed much at all there so no photo provided.