Registration Getting Even Closer!

The last week has seen some great progress and the beginning of the actual building phase is drawing nearer.

Firstly, the bank valuation came back and has exceeded my land and build price, which is great news and a relief!  The home loan and off-set accounts are already showing up in my online banking and hopefully once the signed mortgage forms get back to the bank this week I will have an available balance showing!

Secondly, I received this letter from LendLease, so hopefully registration is only a week or two away!  How they managed to get council to sign off on the estate before foot paths, etc are completed beats me though....

Nearing Registration

After over a year of waiting for this land to be built and slowly watching the progress being made, I received the letter shown below in the mail.  Needless to say i was overly excited to recieve the news that settlement is on track for June 2016!

For my finance I chose to go through a mortgage broker and the last couple weeks has been busy getting together all of the required paperwork, including costs for blinds and landscaping.  I received pre-approval quickly enough for my construction loan and I am now in the process of waiting for the valuation to be ticked off by the lender.  So far the process has been easy and I certainly wouldn't hesitate to recommend Paul and his team at Choice Home Loans Wollongong.

Electrical Selections

After signing the building contract in August 2015, I then had my electrical selection appointment in September 2015.

The upgrades I paid for were as follows:

•  2x Batten holders for outdoor lighting ($110)
• 14x Down lights to the living areas ($1400)
• Dedicated circuit for the fridge ($305)
• 4x 2-way switching for lights ($220)
• 15x additional GPOs ($825)
• Outdoors GPO in the alfressco ($165)
• 2x Glass splash back cut outs for GPOs ($100)
• Additional TV antenna point ($70)
• 4x Cat 6 Data Points ($640)

The down light and Cat 6 pricing is pretty steep however, the rest of the electrical upgrade pricing is reasonable enough.  At the end of the day I had put an allowance of $4000 in my contract for electricals and I came in under budget at $3835. 

MDJ also only had expensive options for bathroom heater/fan combos, so I will be installing those myself after handover.  Likewise I plan to install some ceiling fans and change out batten holders for proper light fittings after handover.

Electrical Selections Plan

Electrical Selection Plan - Legend

Interior and Exterior Colour Pallete

 

All images I use in the blog can be viewed in their full resolution via my Google Photos Shared Album: https://goo.gl/photos/6iGZqyrBQeA4cPMU9 

Colour Selections Appointment

I did my Colours Selections Appointment in July 2015 at MDJ's Oak Flats studio and had Vicki to guide me through the process.  Prior to the appointment I had spent hours reading through the folder of choices I had and had gone to numerous display homes to try work out what I wanted.  

Going into the appointment I thought I had made pretty much all of my colour choices, however Vicki was a great help and we really managed to fine tune it out to something that I think I will be very happy with once it's built.

The other surprising thing was that for majority of the items there was a decent selection of standard inclusion items (ie. kitchen handles, bathroom tiles, Caesarstone bench colours, etc).
 
Below I have created a list of the selections I have made and have included where there was a cost for the upgrade.

 External

• Bricks: Austral Everyday Life Engage
• Mortar: Off White with Ironed joints 
• Bag & Paint:  Taubmans Coach House NH41 to the front of the master bedroom.  Over the front door and garage will be face brick.
• Roof - Surfmist Colorbond
• Fascia and Gutters - Dune Colorbond
• Roof Tank - Woodland Grey (to match developer's specified fence colour)
• Garage Door: Surfmist Colorbond in the Slimline profile
• Windows: Surfmist powder coating ($720 for fly screens)
• Front door: Hume Newington XN5 with translucent glass ($150) and painted
• Front door hardware: Gainsborough Trilock Align Satin Chrome ($260)
• Downpipes: Taubmans Dune CB
• Eaves: Taubmans Surfmist CB23

Insulation

•  Roofing Insulation: Anticon blanket ($3090)
• Ceiling Insulation: R4 Batts (Increased from R3 for $640)
• Wall Insulation: R2 Batts (Increased from R1.5 for $190) and Wall Wrap ($1080) 

 Bathroom

• Vanity Benches: Caesarstone Walnut 3350
• Vanity Panels: Polytec Melamine in Mountain Pepper Matt 
• Handles: hettich Clivia CC128 Stainless steel
• Vanity Bowl: Manooga Bowl
• Bath - Caroma Newbury 1675 island bath
• Toilet - Porcher Quatre close coupled toilet
• Shower Hob and Mirrors - White powder coating
• Wall Accessories and Tapware - Reece Mizu Drift 

Kitchen

• Kitchen Bench: 40mm Caesarstone in Urban 2040 ($1590)
• Kitchen Panels: Polytec Melamine Classic White Matt
• Kitchen Breakfast Bar Kick Panel: Polytec melamine Belgian Oak Matt
• Kitchen Handles: Hettich CLIVIA CC128 stainless steel
• Appliances: Miele (included as a promotion)
• Sink: Posh Solus MK II 1.75 end bowl sink
• Tapware: Reece Mizu Drift
• Cupboard above the fridge ($390)
• Ducting to Rangehood ($790)

 
Interior and Paint

• Doors: Standard
• Door hardware: Gainsborough Classic White Knob with Shadow Chrome back plate
• Skirting: Standard painted 67mm half splayed MDF
• Wall paint (all rooms except H/T): Taubmans Gothic Cream NH48
• Wall paint (H/T): Taubmans Candlewood NH40
• Ceiling and Cornices Paint: Taubmans Illusive White NH29
• Windows and Skirting Paint: Taubmans White Spirit NH74
  

Flooring

• Bathroom Floor Tiles - Kakadu Stone 300x300mm
• Bathroom Wall Tiles: Kakadu Stone 450x300mm
• Living Area Tiling: Hunter beige 400x400mm ($8280)
• Grout - Mudberry 285
• Carpet to bedrooms and H/T: Godfrey Hirst Eco+ Sunrise in Koala 180 colour ($3953)

Misc

• 1200mm cupboard above the laundry tub ($450)
• Actron ducted air conditioning (included as part of promotion)
• Aircon WiFi control ($640)
• Sound insulation to 3 rooms
• Wardrobe upgraded to melamine ($1450)
• Wardrobe drawer unit in WIR ($340)
• Wardrobe double hanging rails in WIR ($85)

I have also received an estimate of $12,060 for the driveway and front path from MDJ, however, they can't confirm price until the land is registered and a site survey is completed.

Floor Plans and Facade

The floor plans I went with was mostly the standard Cordova One design, except I did make a couple minor alterations:

• Raised ceilings to 2.55m ($4000)
• Install dual cavity sliding doors to the Home Threate ($880)
• Install a hung door on the walk in robe ($270)
• Brick in the walk in pantry window ($280 credit)
• Provide frosted glass to the kitchen window ($120)

As for the Facade I chose to go with their classic design as I did not see the value in paying an extra $5000 for the facade upgrades, especially given LendLease stipulate you need substantial plantings of trees in front of the house.  The changes I did make to the standard facade are as follows:

• Deleted the brick stack on the left hand side
• The brick stack next to the entrance will do right up to the roof height
• Eve over the front of the garage (developer rule)

MDJ were actually very reasonable here and said that since I was deleting the brick stack they wont charge me for the eaves or entrance brick stack.

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All images I use in the blog can be viewed in their full resolution via my Google Photos Shared Album: https://goo.gl/photos/6iGZqyrBQeA4cPMU9

The Beginning...

Evidently I have been quite slack at updating this blog, but with land almost registered I figured I probably should get around to starting it, so here goes...

Purchasing the land
Originally I had been looking at building in  the Brook's Reach estate (Horsley/West Dapto), but with the local property market going gang busters the land costs just got ridiculous and out of my reach.

It was actually just by chance that I came across the ad for Calderwood Valley in the local newspaper (which I don't always read) in mid-March 2015 for the first release that was happening at the end of March 2015.  The next week was a frenzy of crunching the numbers, talking to builders, my mortgage broker,etc to make sure I could afford the build.

Fast forward a week and I was lucky to secure a place on the second day of their appointments to purchase a block in Calderwood Valley Stage 1A.  Initially I had wanted a 450sqm block, however, all the decent ones were gone by the time I had my appointment.  Luckily though, I did get to purchase what had been my first pick out of the 375sqm blocks.

Picking a builder
From looking at all the builders in the Brooks Reach and Shell Cove display villages, I had narrowed down my options to Allworth, New Living and McDonald Jones as being the main options within my budget and having designs I liked to suit a 450sqm block.

When I instead ended up with a 375sqm block it really complicated matters, because 12.5m wide lots are a lot harder to find decent designs for than a 13+m wide lot. 

Ultimately I settled on the building Cordova One with McDonald Jones as I was keen on building a steel framed frame with a Colorbond roof and MDJ's display homes seemed to show a better quality standard.

I ended up putting down my deposit with MDJ in early April 2015 to lock in my prices before their upcoming price rise.