Alternate Solution

So Wednesday came and went and we had our independent building inspector review our Frame. It was a fairly detailed inspection and while some defects where discovered, they where all relatively minor and rectifiable. Nicole will post another blog entry with some photos and details about it.

The frame is a credit to Porter Davis and our Site Supervisor for maintaining a high quality build and level of commitment with our biggest actual frame issue being a missing noggin near the meter box.

The night before the inspection it had rained lightly where sparked a conversation with our building inspector about water proofing. I was asking questions about process about roof installation and gutters when the inspector explained to us that a few of the large volume builders (inc PD) have started implementing alternate solutions for wet areas.

Essentially a clause in the our contract - see below

This alternate solution was never actually fully discussed with us at our appointments but essentially it allows Porter Davis to have a surveyor sign off on a solution that essentially replaces waterproofing in the wet areas with water resistant products.

Essentially leaving it up to the owner to ensure maintenance of the the wet areas is completed yearly to ensure no water seeps through the cracks literally. So when using the wet areas for their functionality, such as showering or a bath, if you get water on the ground, you need to clean it straight away.

Here is a copy of the solution.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2K3WTzivUZOUnBKcmFCdUdBZVI3N0hRZlZnNzFrNDJxZUkw/view?usp=sharing

The solution itself is a generic solution that isn't house specific from what I can tell. So in my case it doesn't factor in the changes made to my master ensuite shower for example.

What annoys me the most is that water proofing wet areas, especially upstairs to me seems like it should be standard practice (well it is based on the AS 3740 building standard), unless you provide a alternate solution. It just feels like the alternate solution is blatant cost cutting rather then actually providing a viable solution to ensure their homes have lasting quality and longevity.

I'd rather sacrifice those little chinaman hat light fittings (thats what they are called!!!) then the waterproofing of my bathrooms.

Now technically speaking, PD or any other builder providing the solution isn't doing anything wrong. However I feel that it compromises the quality of their homes in such a way that has provoked me to write such a lengthy post.

If nothing I hope at least this post makes future buyers at PD or any other builder aware of the option to upgrade if anything!

So far in my case PD have been wonderful to deal with and I'm very happy with how the build is progressing, I look forward to seeing my home with its roof on and gutters before work finishes this year! Otherwise.... you know the non water proof flooring might become water logged and swell :P

Framing almost complete

Went to the block today to find the roof trusses almost complete! We have our building inspector going out Wednesday morning as mentioned to go over the framework to make sure it is all to code - hopefully he wont find anything too major.

Today I was a bit game and I ventured up the ladder and took a few photos of upstairs - it is going to be so great, the view from up there of the golf courses was just beautiful, I can't wait to sit on our terrace and enjoy the view :)

They had also removed a supporting beam from around our back window so I could take a snap of the view we will be getting once the window is placed in our dining area:

We also noticed that our front door frame and laundry door (we think) frame had been delivered. To us the front door frame looks shorter than what it should be - hopefully we are wrong but we will get it checked as we opted for a higher door - 2.34m as we had raised our ceiling heights downstairs and also raised the door heights to match.

Lastly here are a few more photos of our upstairs :) The next post will most likely be about what our building inspector finds - until then enjoy!

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We offically have a double storey house

This week we have had a lot of progress on our house, they have started work on the first floor and its starting to look like a real house! I have had a chat to our supervisor who has confirmed that their planning to have the roof trusses up by Wednesday and then the roof, gutter, plumbing and house wrap will be completed before christmas. Then bricking will start in the new year when tradies start working again.

Our building inspector will be going through on Wednesday morning to inspect the frame work and the slab. Once that is done our supervisor would like to organise an onsite walk through of what has been found and what they will be addressing and how they plan to rectify anything that is picked up.

Some progress photos :)

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We have to stop saying "going to the block"..

Much to our delight Framing is well underway! This week the frame has really started to take shape within only a few days we now have a ground floor and some walls on the first floor! I have had a quick brief from our BC who said that their hoping to have the roof, walls wrapped & plumbing done by christmas. I will be calling our Supervisor tomorrow to confirm when he believes Framing will be complete so that we can get our inspector back out to take a look at the work. 

From what we can tell it looks pretty good, we have taken a few photos of things we want to have checked that its ok but overall looks like their doing a pretty amazing job. 

Below are a few galleries of photos recently taken, enjoy :)

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Here are a few photos of somethings that we have picked up that we are not 100%

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The start of Framing

We had put in our contract that our slab needed to sit for 2 weeks before they could start to frame as we wanted to make sure our slab had a chance to settle. There has been some issues with slab movement in the area we're building in so wanted to try and avoid any troubles in the future.

We decided to check out our block today to see if anything had happened and we discovered that frame material had been delivered and that they had started to cut and place parts of the frame. Its great to see the rooms starting to take shape. We could see where all the doors are going to be but couldn't see on for our internal garage door, so will be interesting if it does appear when they start the real work. The rest of the framework should start to take shape from Wednesday this week. :)

This was taken just a few days after the slab was laid. Ryan is standing in what will be his study - the big thing with this photo was that he had been in hospital for the pass three weeks and unable to walk due to a rare virus that he got, all he wanted to do when he got out was to walk on our new slab :)

Our theatre room:

Our entry:

 Pantry:

Study:

Bathroom & Laundry:

Garage:

Family room, Alfresco & Dining:

Pantry & Fridge space:

Alfresco:

Slab

As you might have guessed from the title - our slab was poured today! Boy does it look huge! Got a call at 9am to let me know that it was being poured and after today we have a new site supervisor who will be seeing us throughout the rest of the build.

Below are a few photos that i took tonight when I went to the site. I only really have one concern regarding the pipe holding up the metre box being exposed through the side of the slab - I've emailed our inspector to see if it is something I should bring to the attention of Porter Davis or not. When we do our Frame inspection our slab will also be looked over.

Our Garage:

Front Porch:

Exposed metre box pipe:

Alfresco:

Looks like two different lots of concrete has been laid and one has dried before the other was laid:

Foundation Inspection

Its great to finally see progress and to see how quickly it all goes together! Today they boxed the foundation and managed to move the massive pile of waffle pods and get them to look like the beginning of a house.

As mentioned we have organised to use an independent building inspector throughout our build and the first inspection is Foundation which happened today - if you don't get the slab right the rest of the build could be a nightmare.

I set out to our block this afternoon to meet our inspector and for him to go over the site to make sure everything is ok before they pour the slab tomorrow. When I got there he had beat me and was straight into it, I could see that he noticed a few things and the guys working were great and amended what he pointed out straight away.

Once he had finished he came over and his first words were "I don't like to tell the builders this but this is the best slab I've seen, its very well engineered and the work the guys had done was great". This is great to hear specially for how much extra we have paid for the slab work! He picked up a few things but the guys on site fixed them straightaway, so this means the slab will be poured tomorrow :)

Even though everything was fixed before he left the site we still got a written report of what was found and photo evidence of what was wrong. David discussed with me an inspection he did last week where he found that many things wrong with the foundation that they had still not poured concrete and it was five days after he did the inspection. While everything was fine for us it is always great to get a professional opinion as this is our future we're investing in.

Here are some photos I took today:

Building Inspector

One thing Nicole and I thought was vital during the build was to hire an independent building inspector to oversee every stage of the build. While it is a considerable cost, should hopefully be worthwhile with keeping the builder accountable and ensuring Nicole and Myself get what we are paying for. A Stable and Good Quality Home.

We had several recommendations for building inspectors over the last couple of weeks. Deefeez46waldorf from H1 Forums recommended a company called Darbecca 

( http://darbecca.com.au/ ) to oversee the build. 

My Cousin has also recently used them on a build and highly rated them them in terms of their professionality and quality work. 

So here is their contact details if anyone in the Melbourne is interested in using them.

Progress!!!!

So we have had some movement since our last post. Things should start to flow a little faster now that all the Finance has been approved and Council Approvals received.

Over the Past week we have had a bit of progress now that construction has started.

Contract all final!

We finally have got our designed approved & have all our finally drawings! They have changed all our first floor windows to awnings with no cost to us. Yay finally we didn't have to pay for something!

Ryan likes to keep updated on the Homes One forum and found that the colour we chose for our cabinets in our kitchen and bathrooms had been discontinued. I contacted our BC who had just got back from leave who confirmed that it had been. This meant another trip to Porter Davis's World of Style to chose a new colour.

I had a look online before we went and I had a pretty good idea of two colours that I wanted to look at. We compared a colour that was slightly dark than the original colour and then a pattern that has grey tones instead of the brown. I've decided to go with the grey tones as most of our colours are grey, black and white. I'm quite glad that the originally colour was discontinued as I think the new colour will work better. As they as everything happens for a reason. :)

 This is the new colour for the island bench, over head & bathroom cupboards (its a lot lighter & greyer than the picture shows):

Some other great news - we have surveying pegs on our block! This means that all things should be a go a head for the first week of September. Its been a long time coming and I just can't wait to see it built!!

One step forward, two steps back

So first off good news as we all prefer good news right?!

We got our facade approved yay and got a better valuation done on the build so will  not have to pay LMI at all on the new build yay!!

Below are the drawings for the new facade and just an idea on colours, as well as the changes that had to be made to the privacy screening due to development requirements (the changes ended up being cheaper than the option they gave us originally which we never liked anyway, so slight win for us!) We also had to add an awning window downstairs to the living area, the finally changes all meant we had to pay more (seriously everything cost you money when you build!)

Now for some news which I got tonight which may turn into not so great news and again may jeopardise whether we do build. We just got advised that we now need awning windows to all of the upstairs opening windows (developers request). As I have previously mentioned awning windows are not cheap these changes could be upwards of $2000 and we're already at max budget. I think its about time we win the lotto, hmm might just go buy a ticket now and while I'm at it will water my money tree :P

Hopefully when we get our finally PCV in the coming days it has better news than what were expecting. In the meantime we will be enjoying a lovely evening tomorrow night at Porter Davis's new World of Style show room watching a cooking demonstration by Guy Grossi.