Pools and brokers!

For a while, I have been wondering what to do about the fact that EBH let us put a PA for a pool into our initial contract yet the pool company are not actually a part of EBH. The pool is on a separate contract and paid on a different schedule.
Yesterday, I spoke with our wonderful mortgage broker (Paul Pappas from Mortgage Choice, Pitt St) who advised us to take the pool PA out of the contract and get a separate loan for that. Paul also confirmed there was no hurry to get formal approval for the construction loan - November would be ideal. Phew!!

Eden Brae are proving to be SLOW at the moment

And this is being experienced by a few of my fellow H1 members too. This is more a to-do list for me but these are the things that need following up.
1) Quote for a bulkhead in the laundry 07/08 - not needed according to CSA 16/08.
2) Quote for the change in front doors & rumpus sliding doors to Madison 06/08 - received & accepted
3) Follow through on wardrobe shape in main 02/08 - not needed as will leave as is.
4) Quote for extra aircon vents to the laundry, main bathroom & ensuite 14/08

Also waiting on.....
1) Kitchen, bathroom & laundry 3D drawings from Kitchen Culture 17/07 received 22/08 accepted 22/08
2) Answers from electrical guy to tie that variation up 14/08 (DONE 17/08 - accepted)
3) Details from Di Lorenzo for tiles, carpet & kitchen splashback 14/08
4) Quote from Abbey Blinds though won't hold my breath - someone is still waiting on their quote from NOV 2011!!) 14/08
5) Quote from Genneral Stairs for balustrading 14/08 - received & approved
6) Relocation of gas point from inside to outside 14/08
7) Images of wardrobes from HOG 07/08  Received 24/08
8) Image of standard mirrors from HOG 16/08

And now with a change to the Front door colour

Lucinda, my gorgeous friend, photoshopped the front door colour as I was not loving the Nutbush colour. This is what we came up with.....

Much better...and I think we may even go a tad darker & greyer.

Facade colours

Found this mob on the web yesterday who will put your colours together for you...for a small fee. A great idea for visual people, like myself!

What do you think?

Fiddly bits and followups

It has been a while since I have posted an update. Nothing major has happened just loads more research on the forums to see what others are doing and going back through emails to see if there is any item that seems to have fallen through the cracks.

1) The pool contract is here for some light bedtime reading. Hmmmm, I just love reading all that fine print. I also need to talk to the mortgage broker soon to see if we need to take the pool allowance out of the EBH contract as Concept Pools are not related in any way to EBH. (This is more a little note to myself than of any great interest to anyone!)

2) Waiting to hear back from the estimators on the Madison front door and door to rumpus room as pictured below.

3) Still waiting to hear about the shape of our Bed 1 robes - the plan has them as Ushaped but the design of the fitout from Wardrobe World is named L-shaped. Don't want 2/3 of the robes not shelved!

4) Not being au fait with reading plans, I have been a little in the dark about measurements of certain things in my house. This has been highlighted when planing the luxuriously large laundry. No-one has told me what sort of material the laundry cupboards will be made of - laminex? No, gyprock inside, architraves and flush doors. No heights, depths etc. Discovered the height of them which does not go to the ceiling. Now I am waiting on estimating to get back to me on a quote for a bulkhead over these cupboards - I really do not want an open space above the cupboards for dust and lint to collect (or for me to dump stuff!) I am guessing that the picture below, from a display home, are the standard height.

 

5) Caught EBH out on a little error this week too. Reading through a PCV for me to sign there was an extra charge for $494 to install 2 upgraded freestanding baths. Pretty sure that the baths I selected were not freestanding (don't want them) and even if I did, there was no mention of this when I signed the Cooks Plumbing quote. A quick apology was made when I pointed this out to them. I reckon some clients might just sign away without checking too carefully.

6) Finished all my variations (I hope) with Kitchen Culture for the kitchen (obviously), bathroom vanities and the laundry benches. Waiting on my 3D drawings and plans which will take approximately another 2 weeks.
I really wish EBH used more than one company for their fittings etc (kitchen, electricals, flooring etc) These companies know that we are 'stuck' with using them so there is no competitive pricing at all and customer service could be better.
Whilst I am on suggestions for EBH, I will note here for future reference (mine) that my idea would be to have another level of inclusions called Platinum (or the like) for clients like me who seem to want all the upgrades. They could include things like, but not limited to, glass splashback, stone tops in kitchen & bathrooms, wallfaced toilets, raised ceilings/doors, softclose drawers, pot drawers, 2 DPOs per room, more TV points, more data points, overhead cupboards in kitchen & laundry, higher category of carpet & tiles.......
Anyone else on my wavelength?

Ramble over now. Excited about Tuesday's appointment - electrical, window coverings, staircase and floor coverings. I am sure there will be a big post on Tuesday or Wednesday!

A great start to the weekend

I have just received an email from EBH to confirm that we can use the fill from the pool excavation on the house construction. In our house contract, we were paying $4300 for additional fill and in our pool contract we were paying $6000 for fill removal! I spotted this last week and saw $$$$$ (savings/more spending!) We will need more fill than the excavation provides but I have just saved us $8K. Happy dance....

Mainly shelves today

Today I spent a fair bit of time following up on loose ends because I received replies to emails that I had been busy sending.
1) Questioned the shape of our wardrobe fitout as it is listed as Lshape whereas our robes are more U-shaped. I would prefer for the whole robe to be done not 2/3s of it. HOG is checking this out with both EBH and Wardrobe World who are doing the job. I can see more $$$$ coming! In looking at this, I began to think about how we already had shelving/hanging rod in the 5 robes and we had not been given a credit for it. Sent an email to EBH who told me that I wasn't entitled to a credit as we were upgrading from the standard wire shelves. This didn't make any sense to me nor my cohort on H1 forum. I copied some of the credit examples they gave me to EBH and voila (!) the estimating team are working out what I am owed!
2) After I signed my 'final' Kitchen Culture variation, I realised that there were colour items missing from there. We decided to upgrade to a white silk finish on the main bathroom vanity and that had not been quoted or recorded and one of our standard choices for the ensuite was not recorded either.
The really big oopsie on my part was that we are having a large bench run the length of the laundry with a shelf underneath it where we can put some baskets for bits n pieces. Didn't really think about the washer and dryer that will need to fit under that shelf - well, it won't (!) so we will need to cut the shelf short!
3) It seems strange but we have never actually seen an image of the large feature front doors that we have agreed to pay nearly $2K for. I think I just trusted the lovely sales person when he said that I would want to upgrade to a nice feature door. I have never been able to find this particular door on the web. Finally today, HOG have been able to produce a picture and I am not sure I like it :-(

This is THE door but we have 2 of them with sidelights and a highlight - too much glass and not enough door in my eyes. Agree?!

I prefer something more along these lines......

 

I think my next project is to research more front doors.