Thursday, March 11, 2010

IT'S ALL OURS!!!

Its Ours!

Everything went really well yesterday - still a couple of little things that need to be patched/cleaned up but nothing major and they even managed to get all our appliances installed yesterday so after unloading two cars of stuff we were able to have a nice long hot shower!!

At this point I have thank our SS who really stepped it up a gear after taking over from our previous SS and has done a marvelous job of getting us to this point and we cannot image how it would have finished without him.

We are doing our big move on Saturday but will probably take a few car loads of little things today and tomorrow after work. Also our tilers started this morning and should only take 2-3 days to finish everything so by the end of the weekend we can start unpacking things into the living areas - we will just dump everything into the garage for the meantime. Also we are having to tape garbage bags over the windows in the bedroom as our blinds are not being installed till next Tuesday...but as we dont really have that many neighbours it really isnt that much of an issue.

Once we have the internet connected at our new home I will post some pics (or maybe I will sneak a few into work with me) but I will probably wait until a room is unpacked before taking lots of shots. We still have heaps to do, flooring, fencing, blinds, landscaping....this list never seems to end

Monday, March 8, 2010

HANDOVER booked!!!

Well we are really close now as today I picked up the cheque from the bank for the final payment and we confirmed with Wisdom that Handover will be at 3:30pm on Wednesday 10th March!!!!

Problem for me is that this is my dear wife's birthday....how am I ever going to be able to top this as a birthday present?!?!?

Many pictures will follow once we move in.

Tuesday, March 2, 2010

PCI Done!

Well this morning we met our Supervisor out on site at 7:30am to do our Practical Completion Inspection and we are pleased to say there we did not have too many things that need fixing up - mainly a few paint touchups. They was also a tradie there today going around and making sure all the windows/sliding doors work properly.

The main thing to come out of this is that they should have everything ready for us to have handover sometime next week! All we are waiting on is for our interim occupation certificate to come through so we can send our final invoice off to the bank to release the funds.

So very exciting!!

Friday, February 26, 2010

Driveway Done!

As promised the concretors were back yesterday and poured our driveway and alfresco and we love how it has turned out. Like other councils out there ours only allows for plain concrete for the cross-over and our estate only allows plain coloured concrete - so you end up with a top deck looking driveway.






The other thing that arrived today was the motor for the garage door - I wanted to test it out but DW said I have to wait till we move in.




We also noticed that they still haven't installed the rangehood but that is really the only thing that is still remaining to be done prior to PCI next Tuesday and even then we don't mind as long as it is done before handover.

Fingers crossed for a smooth PCI next week!

Thursday, February 25, 2010

Carpet Done and PCI!!!

Well the last couple of days have seen lots of work being done at our place with Tuesday seeing the driveway formwork done on along with the cleaners going through the house. Wednesday saw the both the carpet and the kitchen splashback installed! And to top it off - according to our SS the driveway will be poured today (Thursday)!!!!!

We also have a date for our PCI which is next Tuesday 2nd March!!!! We are having Howard (H&K Ryan) come out and do his inspection on the Monday afternoon so we can take his report with us to the PCI with Wisdom - but hopefully there will not be much that needs patching and we can organise a quick handover. At this stage though we are going to be in the hands of the bank as to how quickly they can organise their valuer and release the funds.

It was a little dark when got to the house and so not many of the pictures turned out due to either not enough light or too much light from the flash - we will try and get some more soon.
Kitchen Splashback

Upstairs Lounge

Stairs

They even carpeted right around underneath the stairs!! Totally Unexpected!

So our list is pretty much done - still a couple of things.
Driveway - booked for TODAY!
Final Clean - sometime before Tues
Main Floor Tiling - after PCI (not being done with builder)
Appliances - after handover

Thursday, February 18, 2010

Shower Screens and Mirrors!

We still do not have any idea as to when our PCI will be as we are currently waiting for a date on when our driveway will be done. There is still work going on at the house however and yesterday when we went past they had done all the ducts for the air conditioning, fitted the shower screens and mirrors and they had sanded the floor upstairs ready for laying the carpet. They have also fitted all the shelving in the pantry/linen/bedroom cupboards however I forgot to take pictures of those.

I hope to hear from our SS today with a date so we can start to organise moving/packing etc

Aircon Ducts



Mirror in Main Bathroom



Shower Screen in Main Bathroom



Mirrors in Ensuite



Shower Screen in Ensuite




The list has now been updated to

Tiling -... done.
Electrical fit out - done
Taps and Baths - done
Door handles and locks - done
Pantry/Wardrobe fit out - done
Shower Screens - done
Glass splashback in the kitchen -... measured.
Carpet - booked for week starting 15/2
Driveway - TBC
Installation of Appliances - after handover

Thursday, February 11, 2010

Update with Pics!

Had a call from our new supervisor this morning asking if we had time to pop out and meet him at the house to go over where we are up to and of course we said yes!!

It was great to see that work was continuing on our place despite the change in supervisors and it looks like there will not be any delays due to anything apart from the weather. That was the one thing F mentioned - they were a little behind in the driveway department due to the constant rain we have been having. However he still felt that we should have it done as planned.

We took some time going around each room and making sure everything was proceeding as planned and he was able to give us a rundown on what was happening over the next week and it looks like we will have one tradie or another on site for the next week or so getting everything finalised. He also said that we should have a date locked in for our PCI sometime next week!!!

My DW is so happy with F as she feels like he has everything under control and that all of her concerns will be answered/dealt with. Whereas with B she was always worried that he would forget about it.

Oh and yes I did manage to get some pics







The list of things to do has been updated:

Tiling -... done.
Electrical fit out - done
Taps and Baths - done
Door handles and locks - done
Pantry/Wardrobe fit out - booked for week starting 15/2
Shower Screens - booked for week starting 15/2
Glass splashback in the kitchen -... measured.
Carpet - booked for week starting 15/2
Driveway - TBC
Installation of Appliances - after handover

Fitouts!

I got an email yesterday stating that our SS has changed due to some reason or another (from the talk on the homeone forums it appears as though he has resigned) - we now have the construction manager handling the remainder of our build and hopefully we can continue on as planned.

We popped past the house yesterday late in the afternoon and found that a few more things have been done, such as the electrical fitout, and some of the plumbing fitout. We still need to have our downpipes fitted and we could see the bath through our study window, but a lot of it looks done. Other things that we noticed were that the proper locks/door handles have been put on all the external doors as well as the railing for the upstairs balcony being fitted. Unfortunately due to it being dark we couldn't take any photos but we are going to try and get there in the next day or so and hopefully we will catch someone on site.

So the list as it stands is:
Tiling -... done.
Electrical fit out - done
Taps and Baths - mostly done
Door handles and locks - done
Pantry/Wardrobe fit out - booked for week starting 8/2
Glass splashback in the kitchen -... measured.
Carpet -
Driveway -
Installation of Appliances -
Shower screens -... measured.

Sunday, February 7, 2010

No Scaffolding!!

Popped past the house yesterday and found the tilers hard at work finishing off all the grouting and the tiles for the front porch area as well. It took a little while for us to realise that the last bit of scaffolding has come down and we can now see our house almost in its finished state! We still have to get a portion of the facade rendered but we are doing this after handover.





The other thing that we noticed was that they had installed our new water feature!!!





jk - Penrith had its wettest January day in many a year with just under 100mm falling in a 24hr period!! I just hope that this weather fines up over the next week so they can pour our driveway and alfresco on time.

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Painting Finished!!

Went past the house today after work and found to my amazement that the painting was pretty well done. Had a quick chat with the painters who confirmed that they were definately finishing today until just before the PCI when they will no doubt have to come back for any patch ups etc...

Gotta be a record - 3 days for them to paint all of inside as well as half of the outside!

Our SS is going there tomorrow now to check on everything and said he will call me afterwards to give me the break down of the next couple of weeks.

Saturday, January 30, 2010

Update Photofest

We dropped past the house this morning to find that quite a bit has been done this last week. Starting with our water tank and attached pipework.

It was nice to see the garage door nearly all the way up as well...
But the main thing was the fact that nearly all of the tiling has been done! They only have to do a little more grout work along with the tiles for the front porch area and they should be done. Hopefully that should only take a day or two for them to do, but I will know more on Monday as our SS is going to the house to check on the progress and will let me know the next couple of stages leading up to the PCI... so incredibly exciting!!!!
Laundry Tub and Tiling



Balcony Tiles


Ensuite










Main Bathroom




Oh but wait there is more news - the reason we could get into the house today was due to the painters being there!!! That's right they have started the painting and they said that it should take about a week to paint the whole house along with the rest of the eaves/cladding!!
Will hopefully get a mid week update with pics of the finished tiles and the painting progress.

Monday, January 25, 2010

Kitchen In!

Well after many, many drinks on Saturday night, we stumbled past the house on Sunday afternoon to be pleasantly surprised with a delivery next to our new front door.



There was also a nice big pile of sand in front of the garage - we assume both are for the tilers which are scheduled for today to begin their work!

We then stumbled around the back and through the windows we spied this:






It appears it is all put together and just waiting the last few handles - plus they have to adjust the window frame as it appears that it will not fit with the bench in place in its current form.

Hopefully later this week our SS can give us a rough timetable as to completion as we have a few things to book in shortly....getting exciting now!!!

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Garage Door and Kitchen!

Popped past after work today with just enough light left to see: we were pleasantly surprised to find out that we have had our garage door fitted! We are really happy with how it looks and think that once the rest of the painting/render is done it will look fantastic.

Also we saw through the window that our kitchen (and assume bathroom vanities) have been delivered! Hopefully they can get them fitted in the next day or two so the tiling can start next week as per what our SS had hoped. Fingers crossed!


Thursday, January 14, 2010

They're Back!!

Well we popped past the house again yesterday after work and discovered that a few things have been done in the last couple of days. Mainly all the doors have been fitted along with all the skirting boards and architraves and the waterproofing in the laundry. This leads us to believe that this should also have been done upstairs but as we cannot get it to check we will just have to hope.

Unfortunately I do not have any pictures as it was absolutely bucketing down with rain and we were just grabbing glimpses through windows. We will try and catch a tradie on site sometime in the next week or two so we can get in and get some pics.

So the next stage for us I believe should be the delivery of all our kitchen cabinets followed by the tiling!!! So very exciting!