youngy73

it is just over a 1/4 acre or 1020 sqm. the house is 361 sqm on the slab and 400 sqm under roof.

youngy73

well its been just over a month since my last post. the trees have all been removed now. i started off been fairly selective trying to retain some of the more mature trees on the block. the borrowed chainsaw was getting to much use so i went and bought one ( birthday present to me from me). in the end i removed every tree from the block. maybe i got a little carried away with my new toy and the wife wasnt to happy but atleast i will have no problems later as the trees were quite large. i think it is better to start with a blank canvas and replant. i then got a guy in to remove the stumps and green waste. it has cost me $700 to clear the trees excluding the chainsaw cost.
we now have the plans certified and they have been submitted to council and are just finalising quotes at the moment. it looks like costing us about $180,000 to $190,000 to lock up staged ( basically the bare shell of the house) which is over our original budget of $170,000 to get it this far. we decided to fill the block (500 cubic metres of dirt required) and then retain it with a wall. this will raise the height of the home giving it more privacy and presence. also if we had cut the block ( the far cheaper option) we would end up with all sorts of drainage problems and the home would simply not look as good.this has added nearly $20,000 to the cost. i will post a spreadsheet when all the quotes are locked in. cairns is still booming even with all the interest rate rises which reflects the high price of materials and people basically charging what they want. we have had differences of up to $8000 on stuff that costs $30000.i guess it pays to shop around but ive often found that you do get what you pay for.

Timber Floor Au

Now your building on fill, this will increase significantly piering for the superstructure ( slab ).

How did this cost out for you mate?

snappy

Nice layout Youngy Which builder have you gone with?

Timber Floor Au

ISnt he OB'ing it?

youngy73

it doesnt make that much difference to the slab that the house is on fill.getting the correct fill is proving expensive ($8000) due to the volume required. i am reluctant to put a sign up asking for clean fill as you never know what you will get. it has just cost a freind of mine $6000 to get fill removed as it was no good for what he wanted and unless you are on site all the time it would be nearly impossible to gaurantee the quality of fill. there are a few deeper strips of concrete through the centre of the slab which you wouldnt normally get. the site will be benched up which means that it will be all compacted ready for a house pad. they add 100mm at a time the roll it. so on and so on until we have the desired height. the house will quite happily sit there without a retaining wall. the retaining wall is more for aesthetics and so all our land will be usable and private. as a rough guide for this type of slab (raft) you can say it will cost about $100 per square metre of slab. to get an idea of how much concrete you will need allow the whole slab at 200mm. concrete is around $200 m3 in cairns at the moment. this a an over estimation as there is no way i will use 72m3 of concrete. we have over estimated everything. hopefully this should reduce those nasty surprises.

youngy73

he is guy called Adel Tawdrous and hes in port douglas. hes an egyptian who grew up in the uk.hes an older guy and only does a few houses a year. he designed the house and drew up the plans. he will take it to lock up for me although i will pay all the contractors direct. i will pay Adel an hourly rate for his time. he will check the the formwork, slab, blockwork,plumbing, roof etc. he will be there to mark out and generally just keep an eye on things. we considered doing the whole thing owner builder but felt it was worth having a builder on site to make sure everything happens how it should.it should not cost us more than $10000 for everything Adel has done for us. this is quite reasonable when some people quoted that for the drawings and design.

Timber Floor Au

similar prices to down here. Albeit they prefer waffle slabs here.

73 cube tho is 7300 sqm at 100 thick !


You using concrete as fill !!!!!!!

Geelong Gent

R u sure mate?

I thought it was 361 sqm x .2 (200mm or 20 cm) = 72.2



We are paying now around $118 per cube for concrete (but we have been warned the prices are due to go up in April due to increased prices for aggregate)

Timber Floor Au

well most slabs ( are circa 4 inches = 0.1 m )

so 350 sqm = 35 cubic metres

( meant 730 on previous reply lol )

up here the slab is generally 100 thick, but thats on waffles.

Timber Floor Au

But yep on 361 sqm @ 0.2m th

Would be 72 m3

Priced here recently ( depends on strength ) but approx 160 / m3 + gst from Boral

youngy73

the slab will be mostly 100mm thick but between 200 and 300 mm thick in other areas. basically underneath the block walls and bracing walls. $118 a cube as apposed to $200. maybe we should move down south. everything is ridiculously expensive up here. we decided to use the same tapware, basins, toilets etc as our last build and they have risen over 50%. some over 100% in 3 years.

Timber Floor Au

Yer it soon mounts up huh !!

Mind you beats digging 1.5m footings 600 wide !!!

My place in uk, at 1 point we had a 12 m span on one footing 3m deep !!

Cost me a friggin fortune in "Muck"

Ste

youngy73

thats where my costs have blown out a bit. the is a lot of concrete and steel in the retaining wall. the engineer has covered his arse big style.

Timber Floor Au

Yer happened to friends of ours up road, they had a private engineer , prove the foundation slab.. and tbh you would think it was for a new Brisbane Opera House !!

Pisses me off, and he is on ROCK !!

No fill just solid rock !

My place was all cut, but top of a bloody big mountain, no fill.. so they just whacked it straight onto the ground. Easy !!

I feel forya mate. Maybe would have been cheaper doing a raised floor system !!!