Construction List

I received a call from MJH today advising they had received the authority to commence from the bank. All they required was a final signing of the variation for exceeding the 150 days for the tender price. Signed and returned immediately and then received the following SMS..

Construction list SMS

 So now we wait :)

No more tree!

Finally, the tree is gone!

No more tree!

Tree gone .. almost

Received a call yesterday afternoon from Australian Tree Servcies. They were on site and the tree has been felled. Tomorrow, the stump will be excavated leaving us with no tree and a site ready to build on!

This is what it looked like last week..

Tree still standing

Nek Minnit!

Tree almost gone

Land settled and Council Approval!!

Well, today was a busy day! Within half an hour, we settled on the land and had council approve the DA and Construction Certificate! I have received SMS from MJH advising that it has come out of council and they will shortly forward me the stamped plans that we can forward to our lender so they can issue an authority to commence construction. Not long until we are on the construction list.. Fingers crossed.

Electrical appointment complete!

Well, that was pretty easy. Electrical appointment only took 2 hours. We went over budget by a whopping $265.00! Well, in fact we came in under budget so I changed the downlights in the home theatre room(Fancy name for lounge room) from 11watt downlights to 15watt dimmable downlights and this took us slightly over.

Here is our electrical layout. You can find more details on the electricals page at: Electricals

The good;
We got extra downlights in the great room that we did not plan on. so this should light the place up a bit. There was also some extra powerpoints that I did not expect so that was a welcome surprise. There was also an outdoor light as standard to the rear outside the main bedroom. I wanted an outdoor light so this was welcomed. Added an extra one anyway.

We  also changed the standard white double GPOs on the splashback to a grey coloured one.

The bad;
I had allowed $95 in my mind for the lighting under the overhead cupboards. Imagine my surprise when I am told those lights do not fit, and I will need to use these other ones that are $195/each! Thats more than double the price I allowed for. Not a lot in the whole build costs, but it all adds up.

The Ugly;
OK, so some regulation states that the coooker must have an isolation switch within sight. The only 45amp switch that Clipsal supply is a big fat ugly white switch that needs to be placed on to the dark grey splashback. Not really happy about this. Apparently Clipsal will have a coloured one(like our double GPO's) in the future. I will be keeping an eye out for that.. Or a suitable replacement.
UPDATE: After looking at the lighting plans, it seems we do indeed have a grey coloured switch for the oven. Still, large and on the splashback? At least it will be mounted on the sides and not directly on the back.

The NBN fibre equipment was to be located at the front of the garage right near the roller door. To be more precise, they wanted it right next to the power box. When I asked to have this moved I was told this is a McDonald Jones rule. It was only a quick discussion, but we did eventually move it to where I wanted... In the recess at the back of the garage. This makes more sense to me as a central location for our comms requirements. We will utilise some spare equipment I have laying around for the data network.

To see more of the selections, see the Electricals Page.

Plans submitted to council

I received the following SMS on the way home yesterday:

So, our plans are now in council! Everything is moving along quite quickly now after months of waiting.

Land Registered

I received an email from the Real Estate Agent today to advise that the land was registered on Monday. Have notified Broker, Solicitor and Builder so we can get this build moving! We bought a bottle of bubbly to celebrate tonight, but wouldn't you know it, I got recalled. I have not been recalled in over 9 months! We will have to have our celebrations tomorrow night.

Road completed

So the road has now been completed. Well, it was actually finished about a month ago but I have not been keeping this blog up to date :) I will try and do better.

Looking down the road from the roundabout. Our block on the left.

Looking at our block from across the road

I can even park out the front now!

Civil Works

Civil works commenced in April and Practical completion was achieved at the end of August. We are now waiting on council to approve the subdivision(register our land) so we can make a start on the build.

Here are some pics during the civil works

Fenced off

Felling tree's

Grading work

Dirt piled on our block

getting there...

Road building commenced

Gutters in

See that drain? Right were our driveway needs to go.. Guess that will be another hurdle a bit further down the track.

And so it begins..

It has been a long time coming, but we are finally on our way to building our new house. This kids have affectionately named it 'Kings Kastle'. Little bit too kardashian for Kel and I, but they are happy with it :)

Back in February we put down our deposit on the block;

We also signed a contract with McDonald Jones Homes to build the Santorini. The image on the homepage depicts the facade we have chosen, but the colours are not what we have gone with. See the Colours tab for more details

When we first looked at all of the display homes, there was a number of builders who's display stood out. McDonald Jones was one of them. We seen the displays at Chisolm and the Santorini just ticked all the boxes for us. The house on display there was the Santorini Manor, so we also went to Woongarrah which has the Santorini 4 Bed on display. Looking at the floorplans, the 4bed has a larger alfresco which I really like. The island bench is a standout, being 1500 deep it has a lot of surface to play with!