Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Fixing Stage


Time to update our blog again.  The fixing stage has quickly passed.  We now have architraves, wall skirtings, internal doors including pantry doors andWC doors, wet proofed bath and shower areas.  The SS also had the site cleaned up from excess materials and rubbish from the previous building stages.  Good thing my husband caught the cleaners in time to ask them not to take away the good bricks left over which are nicely stacked in front of the house.  We have also contacted New Home Inspection to enquire about getting our house inspected upon completion.  We have also advised CH that we intend to hire our private inspector during PCI, the CLE said that this is ok and would just need to be arranged with our SS.  When we discussed the matter with our SS, he kind of talked us out of it because it will be an extra cost that we will incur and usually the things that the inspector will find are minor issues (sounds like he is very confident with the quality of houses that CH builds) and that CH's Quality Assurance Inspectors are independent and are very good at finding defects themselves.  He also mentioned that K* from NHI knows him well and that they live in the same neighbourhood.  Makes us think now if it is wiser to get someone else than K*. 

We received our fix stage invoice last Thursday 14th April.  Then come Monday 18th we got an e-mail from our CLE following up our payment.  Her exact words were " just a following up to let you know that Fix payment is not yet received – you may wish to follow up with your bank".  This set me off, we have never missed a payment within the 14 days grace period with our past invoices, in fact  it was usually within a week from invoice that we instruct our bank to release payment.  How could she send this e-mail on the 4th day from invoice date!  We also requested copy of the Quality Assurance inspection report for the Fixing stage as the Procedure of Construction states that "An Independent QA inspection takes place at the completion of this stage".  To this request, the CLE said that they do not have a Fix stage "report" as such and they do not normally give QA report copies to clients.  However, she said that there will be one report she can give us at Completion/Final stage which is also required before the issuance of a Certificate of Occupancy.  Not really happy at this stage, the only consolation we have is that the house build seems to be progressing well and at this rate, it might be completed within the next few weeks. At the time of writing this blog, we still are waiting for our SS to return our calls so we can inspect our house at fix stage. I hope he didn't go on early Easter holiday. Maybe tomorrow he'll have the time to ring us back.


WEEK 12 & 13 PHOTOS

Balcony ceiling plastered





Skirting boards (dining area)


Cinema Doors

Pantry Doors


Powder Room's Mirror Base



Bedroom Door

WC Doors

Ensuite's Toilet Door

Master's Bedroom Door


Cinema Room



Sunday, April 03, 2011

Lock-Up Complete



Two weeks have now passed since my last blog and within those two weeks, so much has been done with our house.  Bricks and plastering have all been completed.  We also now have our cornices, stairs and cabinets in the kitchen, laundry, bathroom and ensuite.  And yes, on Saturday, we found the renderers putting the first coat onto our front facade. Final rendering with our chosen colours  will be done after a few weeks.  Received our lock-up invoice last Thursday, we have now officially progressed 63% in our build.

WEEK 10 & 11 PHOTOS


Ceiling Plaster




Bricking almost complete here


Garage plastered




Internal Doors delivered



Formal lounge plastered


Bath installed 

Ensuite plastered

Feature niche in the master's bedroom


Balcony bricked








Laundry cabinet

Powder Room floating vanity cabinet

Island bench cabinet

Kitchen cabinetry

Cinema Room plastered

Family room plastered



Stairs w/ silver balustrades

Ensuite vanity cabinet

Bathroom 

View from upstairs

Cornices and plaster on our first floor

Initial rendering of facade

Initial rendering


Initial rendering front porch