playbunny75

Sounds like you have decided want to do!

Good luck with it im sure everything will go smoothly from now on

fraser

I've just spoke to PD again who said no way would they budge any more, they then gave me a further $1500 off. In all fairness they have been ok since their salesman's bad advice.

I've also insisted that in the tender it has a clause subject to contracts being signed by the end of December.

So we have $5000 off their fixed price at tender, we'll also be taking out carpets, downlights and a few other extras.

We will still be $2000+ over budget.

It remains to be seen if we will have to sell when it's completed.

mercador

Sounds like you did a good job on negotiating, but why would you have to sell it when it's complete?

biggy

Hiya Fraser

When you get your contract it will detail out how much every single thing included in the price ie.

our had

Kitchen $3600
Lights, and fans $2000
Vanities $800

etc etc

once we got that...we went round places like Bunnings and looked at how much we could get stuff for

we priced all the lighting it came to $1200 a saving of $800 already
our local home hardware I saw vanities $320 each saving $600
our kitchen only came to $3200 saving $400

again with carpets u ask him what the allowance for them is and the amount required and off u go to the carpet shops........ask them what is perhaps going to be end of line etc

we did all this to keep us under budget we just told builder to take lights, vanities off the quote and we bought them ourselves.

Another thing u can save on is tap ware and shower fittings......these are things that can be easily replaced in a few years time so just go for the basic stuff. Also if you have a patio area and it is tiled....ask how much it would cost to have it in coloured concrete again we saved here....we can tile it later if we wanna

There are loads of places u can scrimpt and save so dont worry it will work out. We also got a rebate from the tiling budget as the tiler didnt take as long as he thought he would...think it was $600

playbunny75

That sounds really good! What does the price come out at with the discount if you don't mind me asking? ours is starting to be well over what we had in mind we have sorted the mortage part out but have had to borrow way more than we thought.We don't know the acutal cost yet until tender which they can't fit in until Dec 21st

fraser

We've already stripped it bare, the only luxury's are porcelain tile splash-back and fancy handles on the kitchen cupboards.

fraser

From what I can make out it comes to $170000 although I'm sure their's wll be different

We have no driveway or path, no flyscreens on any doors, no fences, no carpet, just basic baton lights and not enough of them.

I may have to sell if I'm skint when it's completed as I don't like the idea of living with no emergency money in the bank.

biggy

ours came out at $195,000 we brought that down initially from $220,000

but that included exposed driveway and path to front door......two other slabs at doors, slab for air con units and security screens throughout. We seem to have been very lucky with our builder, he threw in a few extras like mirror doors on robes and chrome showerscreens at no extra cost.............its a bloddy nightmare this bloody building lark......and I will never do it again

playbunny75

That sounds really good though our is coming out at $200,000 but that is when we worked out landscaping,driveways,fences,flooring,spa bath,lights and granite work tops and $3000 for fancy front instead of the free one oh and colour bond roof!.I think we we do the tender we will most likey take out the cooling, spa bath,granite and colour bond roof that will save some money.We have also gone for the upgraded version of the house on display and added a alfresco area twice the size of the PD and a home therate room which was an extra $15,000 so there is room to trim the price down it will depend on the land costs.The cost I have put is allowing for $10,000 but it may well be more than that.

I am sure you will have found work soon enough and you won't need to sell up im off to Morington market today with some friends and escaping the children were going to drive past the block hope it's not a car lot like it was last time we went down

fraser

Well we go back in to tender Friday and they say our contracts will be drawn up and we'll be able to sign them there and then.

Bhoywonder

Sounds as though you are having a hell of a time.

I am going through the same process with the same builder and couldn't be happier with the process. Not experiencing all the issues you are. I did however sign up for a land & house package which removed the issues of site costs as these are all included in the package. If there is a problem with the site then the builder takes that on the chin.
Went yesterday for colour selection and thought it was great. Started to see the house coming together. We are also trying to keep the build under $200k and looks as though there shouldn't be too many issues. Not really had to strip anything out of the deal as of yet however tender appointment is on Tuesday.
I'll keep you posted with the outcome.

Hope your problems start to disappear.

fraser

Glad it's going smoothly for you mate