Where to from here? Build Vs Established

The low val. forced us to rethink what we needed from our new house.  My husband was pushing to buy established, we found some houses which were semi-suitable, but we have so much stuff to fit into a house and whatever we found there was always going to be some compromises regarding space, storage, colours, kitchen etc. 

Our main needs were :

- larger garage with rear access for the boat/jetski/trailer
- 4 bedrooms with a study (study preferably downstairs)
- preferably three bathrooms and powder room
- swimming pool, or room to put a pool in
- rumpus room downstairs with enough space for our oversized pool table
- my husband wants a balcony

I persisted in researching practically every builder out there looking for a plan that could be slightly modified as cost effectively as possible to suit our needs. 

I literally went through every double storey design with all the builders, visited many more display homes. 

On the shortlist were Hotondo, Carlisle, Orbit and Henley. 

We got in touch with Hotondo after a recommendation from a friend.  They are a franchise builder and will fully customise or modify their plans to suit.  We absolutely loved the façade on one of their designs, love a good skillion roof, so I set about modifying the internal layouts to suit - needed a fair bit of modifications.  The base price seemed reasonable however when I looked at the inclusions brochure the inclusions seemed very budget and basic.  I could easily see the dollars mounting up to way above our newly revised budget. 



Hotondo Seaspray Façade

Whilst waiting to go through my changes (the builder was away so had to wait till they were back) I continued in my search.  Went to local displays and was not going to go in one display as I had a pre-conceived opinion of this builder being more budget, but my opinion was soon changed.  Enter the Orbit Aspire. 

This design ticked all the boxes, could be modified to fit a pool table (combine media & study), upstairs could be customised to include a study, two bedrooms with walk-through/shared bathroom, and one bedroom with an ensuite (as well as the master and upstairs living), and I could bring in my own appliances.  The display styling was similar to what I would attempt myself with regard to colours and furnishings. 

What I was also blown away by was the level of inclusions as compared to the Waldorf, such as 40mm stone, higher internal doors, larger skirtings, to name a few. 

My favourite part of this house was the lounge right next to the stairs, and how there was a sloping bulkhead under the staircase, gave the living area some character, and the large platform at the bottom of the stairs as displayed was a great feature as well. 

The base price was quite reasonable however once we started making our changes it soon became evident that we would have to make too many compromises to make this house work, as there were still things I wanted to add to the quote.  One of the things I have been finding in my new quest that some builders charge a premium for most of their facades, makes PD façade price list seem not so bad.  I was offered a reasonable discount, but after being told floor coverings were not included (even though I had a copy of inclusions saying the contrary), I pointed this out and was then I was offered the discount or floor coverings?

 

The sales person was quite helpful and considering our situation I was allowed to go to head office to see the selection centre beforehand if I wished, to see how colour selections would affect our budget. 

Still maintaining my research on our shortlist of suitable plans, another house on which was the Pavillion by Carlisle... tbc.

Something happened on the way to the Waldorf...

Okay, so it has been a long time since my last blog post, I had so many more posts planned with further colours pics, electrical details etc. 

We hit a bit of a roadblock - all was going according to plan.  We had signed the contracts and were waiting to get our mortgage documents to sign to get everything started, unfortunately the bank valued our build at $120K less than cost, which would mean we would have to put in a further $100K+ for the house to go ahead.  All the while that this was going on I was in a dispute with my current landlord over the rental house we moved into while our house was built.  Too long a story to go into but two VCAT hearings later, and six months after we moved in we finally received compensation of one months rent.   

Anyhou back to the story, we challenged the valuation but the bank took six weeks to get back to us, and they did not lower the valuation at all, our broker shopped around with other banks but it was still going to cost too much to continue.  So, after nine months of going through the PD processes, and investing so much time and effort on this house, we decided to terminate our contract (this itself took a few frustrating weeks) with Porter Davis, losing $9K in the process.  We did not want to put everything we had into building this house, and risk having nothing in reserve to complete it, and to complete the pool, and in case we need something to fall back on. 

I may have a seizure every time I drive past a PD billboard, but apart from that it is all good, we have found another house to build which meets our requirements, and more importantly will be much better of financially than if we did build the Waldorf. 

Suprise Alcove! (Contract Drawings)

When I received the first look at our house specific plans at electrical I discovered an extra alcove near the front entrance.  This alcove was created due to the facade we have chosen.  

My husband suggested that we should have turned it into a cupboard, but it might be a good place for a hall stand or hall table?  Or maybe even a mirror. 

I had never noticed the label for the "gallery" until just now!

The downside to the Kingsford facade is having a smaller balcony in comparison to the Hyde Park display.

The Hub of the Home (kitchen, galley & laundry plans)

if you squint while looking at this picture it gives you an idea of the kitchen colours and how they will look in the kitchen/galley!

kitchen & galley colour samples

laundry colour samples

The Powder Room

The powder room was my chance to do something a little bit out there with regard to the cabinetry.  I had been leaning to the stripey style timber laminex cabinets for a while, but in the end my selection is probably the tamer of the lot!  

The colour samples photographed a little darker than they appear.  The colours have more brown than grey tones to them.  My big issue when it came to selecting the colours for the cabinets at Hopetoun was that I forgot to bring my tile samples with me, I had them sitting there ready to take.  Here is a tip from me - BRING YOUR TILE SAMPLES TO COLOUR SELECTIONS ;)  I was kicking myself all day for that!.  I brought everything else with me, heaps of paperwork that I didn't even need, but no tile samples...

this was the laminex design that had caught my eye (that I did not end up using), it looks pretty tame here, but in real life looks quite bold. 

For the Powder Room we upgraded the toilet to the more solid, squarer design since this toilet will be seen by most visitors, from a cleaning perspective it would be easier to keep clean with respect to around the base and back of the toilet.  

We have a similar basin and mixer tap in our rental house bathroom.  I am concerned now about the functionality of the tap the way it sits over the basin.  It doesn't protrude very far over our current basin and you have to be careful when you are washing your hands not to splash water everywhere (our rental house does not have splashback tiles too - it has mirror all the way to the vanity which does not help).  I find myself washing my hands like a doctor scrubbing in for surgery just to avoid making a mess with the water!

I also decided to put in a towel rail for the hand towels.  There were no small rails/holders in a style I liked, so I have selected a larger rail which will sit opposite the basin/toilet - lets hope no-one drips water allover the floor getting to it ;)

 

Bathroom 1 Selections

I am starting with the shared bathroom as I think I had more of a brief to follow/a clear direction when I selected the colours and tiles.  This bathroom will be shared by my daughters.  When asking my kids what colours they preferred for the bathroom, they went through photos I had added to my bathroom ideabook on Houzz, showing me what they liked.  My kids are also avid watchers of The Block (even my five year old!).  The colours/tile selections for this room were based on Kyal and Kara's bathroom - the one with the egg bath!

Basically we were going for grey tiles, contrasting white shower (with grey grout - not having any white grout in the new house from a cleaning perspective), and light timberwork (laminate).  

Here is the bathroom tile plan...

Here are the bathroom samples and selections...

 

I would have preferred a whiter bench top, however budget did come into consideration there.  I was not planning on putting floor to ceiling tiles anywhere throughout the house, but with sticking to mainly cat 1 tiles, it was not too much extra to do that.  

I chose the bath/shower wall for the floor to ceiling tiles, as it would also be reflected in the mirror, so you see it wherever you are looking from.  

I am going to get freestanding towel rails for this bathroom, in either a light timber or stainless finish.

cabinet handles

basin

basin mixer tap

shower rail

shower mixer

toilet roll holder

Kitchen Colours Selections

MY KITCHEN SAMPLES

I loosely based our kitchen colours on a design I saw on Houzz.  It was hard to try and get the exact cabinet colours.  In the end I had to upgrade to a crystal gloss finish to get a colour similar-ish to the one pictured below, as pretty much all cat 1 cabinets were a whitey type colour.

Modern Kitchen by Austin Architects & Designers Webber + Studio, Architects

I really liked this kitchen below, but was concerned the timber finish might date, and whether it would clash with the timber floors and be too many different types of timber finishes in the living area when you take into account our other furniture. 

Contemporary Kitchen by New York Architects & Designers Chelsea Atelier Architect, PC

A reminder of the previous kitchen which I designed :

Colour selections for the Waldorf kitchen/galley :

afa cubeline undermount sink

teknobilli square pull out sink mixer

interchange ab420 sink (for galley)

mixer for galley should look something like this?

laminex floor cabinets/draws in crystal gloss finish with square edge - stipple seal

essa stone benchtops (80mm edge with one apron for island), smaller thickness with shadowline to other benches including galley - colour is crystal chalk, all pencil round edges

 

laminex lamiwood natural finish - sublime teak (cock your head to the side as it is going to be horizontal grain!) for the overhead cabinets and above fridge cabinet

cabinet pull handles in satin chrome (no handles on overheads)

low-iron splashback in vivid white (during the block fans vs faves this year I had a revelation that I wanted mirror splashbacks but after doing research decided against it - firstly because of the cleaning, and secondly if you have anything on your bench it makes your kitchen look twice as cluttered)

 The paint colour throughout the whole house is Wattyl Astor White, and the floorboards for downstairs are Manhattan Spotted Gum laminate (used as the background for my sample palette below).

Kitchen Appliances

We renovated our kitchen a few years ago, absolutely loved my appliances, so I really wanted to get the same again, I have stuck to the same brands, Bosch and Siemens, but switched it up a little.  After being in our rental house for a few weeks I am struggling to be efficient in the kitchen, and can't wait to get into our new house as I am finding it quite frustrating to use the kitchen in our rental, it has made me appreciate how functional and easy to use my last kitchen was...

80cm induction cooktop

built-under dishwasher with cutlery draw

two pyrolitic electric ovens

steam oven

sirius undermount rangehood

fisher & paykel french door fridge

If you ever need appliances it is well worth while checking out E&S Trading.  I love their showrooms, and they will beat competitor's pricing (even internet pricing).  

It was not easy to organise getting my own appliances with respect to getting PD approval, and I am going to have to make sure plans for the kitchen are done correctly to fit them and make sure I keep an eye on the kitchen installation phase, fingers crossed it all goes off without any major issues.