escapedtonz

She's coming on.
Took 6 months to get title on the section then a bit of a delay until we signed the build contract and went for council consent but luckily consent only took 23 days and approved without any issues.
We are 6 full weeks in from starting on site and as far as we can tell still more or less on track regardless of the recent rain.
Roofer hoping to complete by Tuesday as windows booked to be installed that day with kitchen fitters coming Wednesday to measure up.
Kind of excited
All on track to be in before Christmas

MrsFychan

looking really good, hope it all goes smoothly

Hazelnut

So exciting and so quick! Thanks for posting the pictures and update and good luck for being in by Christmas

livinginnyc

That's awesome! and such beautiful scenery too!!!

garethwm

Looking good!

SSky

Wow that looks like a big house, even now as it's going up. Ours looked tiny at that stage and I was panicking that we wouldn't all fit in but as the walls got closed up with dry wall it started to look big again inside.

escapedtonz

Yeah it does look huge but I think it's the roof that does that. We've taken a proven standard design and changed it slightly. The design also came with Hip style roof lines but we modified those to be gables to add the effect of height to make it look better which it has done massively.
Size wise it's 240 sq metres including the double garage so when we move in we'll have 200 sq metres of living space but the plan is to carpet the garage and turn it in to a rumpus or snug which will give us another near 40 sq metres of living space. We've already specified double glazing and wall insulation in the garage as that isn't standard so getting it ready for a future change of use.
We'll then have to build a detached garage elsewhere but we have plenty of room as the section is 4330 sq metres.
It has looked small to the Mrs but probably because we didn't have a roof and we had bracing timbers all through the inside but now the roof is on and the bracing removed it is huge inside

Visited today and we have a virtually completed roof and weatherproof wrap.
Windows are going in Tuesday and should be having the electrical walk through this week

Snap Shot

Looks excellent. No wonder you're so excited ! You must be looking forward to putting up your Christmas decorations there......

It will be yours after living in rented accommodation since you arrived a few years ago.

I know someone who has sold their recently built for them new build in Tauriko and has bought a doer-upper place they bought at auction in Matua. It doesn't have a sea view though.

escapedtonz

Cheers. Yes we are looking forward to being in before Christmas....touch wood there's no delays.

Yes this'll be our first home in NZ. We've been renting for 4.5 yrs since we arrived back in 2012.

Sold their new build in Tauriko...sounds like it was on The Lakes ? Wouldn't live there for all the tea in China. It is a huge new subdivision and is going to be at least double the size it is now before it's finished as it is being extended right up SH36 in to Pyes Pa.
It's OK when you're in the thick of it, but it's right at the side of SH36 100kph road so lots of road noise and across that road is a huge industrial estate, so all the properties that claim to have "views", have views of huge warehouse units and a growing industrial estate......niiiiccccceeee! NOT!.
Completely understand people who have got in there early and bought a buy and build section (land and house package) as they are making a killing having not even moved in...$200 000 + as the houses there are going for insane prices.
Matua is a nice place to live but unfortunate it hasn't got a view as they are spectacular from the top of the hill

Snap Shot

Sorry, don't know.

It didn't sell for the mega bucks that the estate agent said it would.


That would have added a million dollars to the price tag they said.

Kotare

Given the average new build in England is about 80 sq m, don't you feel guilty squandering all those natural resources on your family abode - still you can feel good given it must be a lower standard than UK houses thus saving materiel :-)

escapedtonz

Nope.
No S H 1 T's have been harmed in the process whatsoever

SSky

When I go to visit rellies in the UK I can't get over how small the room sizes are.

Moses2013

But a friend of mine said the same when he visited rellies in Auckland from the UK. It's just standard to have 0.5 acres or more where I am and our house with 150 sq m is relatively small for the area. At the end of the day a lot of people don't want or need a 200sq m house and I wouldn't mind having a smaller sized house on a smaller plot as long as it's detached:-). If I look around most people don't even use the space they have anyway.

escapedtonz

UPDATE

So as of today we are 10 weeks and 5 days down the build process and further to previous photo's the roof is completed, the windows, doors and glass installed, soffits are in and the builder has started on the weatherboard. Not much done inside other than being ready for JIB. Nothing more can be done inside until the electrician has been in and done his first fix which should be this week.

Couple of major problems have been identified.....

(1) The building franchise company has passed on a Variation Invoice to the tune of $14900 for us to pay for 'extra' earthworks carried out by the earthworks contractor to prepare the site for the build WTF!!!

Fired this back at them as all the earthworks etc is in our contract....we made sure of this to avoid any surprises, so that argument is rumbling along. Contractually and legally the building franchise company haven't got a leg to stand on as our sales person, us and the contract assumes and expects that ALL earthworks have been considered and quoted for in the contract. Because it is a quote, the cost can rise by up to 10% and we have agreed that we will pay for anything unforeseen up to 10% more than what was stated in the contract..so another $1267.00.
$12 067 was the quoted figure that was placed in the contract (flat site, no retaining etc) and the final bill has come back as $27 000.

It is evident there has been a complete breakdown of communication between the earthworks contractor and the building franchise company at the time when they were on site discussing specifics of what earthworks were required and between them they have made a mess of it, but elected to try and get us to pay for their failures.......ha ha think again Batman!!!

(2) We are cladding the house with proper wood weatherboard. This is an additional $22 000 over brick in our contract. When we specified this for the build contract we also asked them to make sure ALL windows and doors were boxed in to make the window and door frames pop out and look really large to mimic a traditional weatherboard Kiwi home, so we wanted the framing to be at least 100mm and up to 150mm wide all the way around. We even explained this to the n'th degree, gave them photo's and took them to a house near where we live so they could see what we wanted in the flesh. Both the sales person and the project manager were all over this and made sure it was in the contract, so for the extra boxing in of these frames we are paying an extra $2400 on top of the upgrade costs for the weatherboard cladding.
The sales person made sure this info was added to the working drawing so the architect and the engineering department knew exactly what we wanted.

Yesterday, after checking the half wall the builder has cladded in weatherboard it appears we haven't got what we are paying for, BUT more importantly there doesn't seem to be the room for them to add the boxing in as we wanted.
To us, either the windows are in the wrong position meaning the framing was wrong, or the framing was not high enough as the exterior wall doesn't appear high enough or the window / door frames are wrong ?
There just isn't enough room over the top and underneath the majority of the windows / doors to allow for the boxing in to make the frames pop out and look large as we wanted.
This is a MAJOR problem and we've no idea how they can rectify it.

They may have to knock it all down and start again !!!