Monday 25 November 2013

Final Bank Approval Received

On Thursday we were also advised that our loan have been fully approved. We have signed all the paperwork and are now just waiting for the bank to issue the Authority to Commence Construction Letter so we can forward it on to rawson. We are almost there!!

We Have A Pool

On thursday our pool started to get installed, and it was completed on friday. We got a Billabong plunge pool, as we dont have alot of room, but its going to be perfect for us. Cant wait until summer 14/15 to have a dip.

Block before the pool is installed


Markings of where pool will be placed


All the fill that was removed


The shell




Before it has been backfilled and water put in


All done - until the house is finished


Monday 18 November 2013

Construction Certificate Issued

Our paperwork for our construction certficate was sent to certifiers on 11/11/13 and to our suprise we we advised today that it has been issued and it is dated 13/11/13. We are now just waiting for our bank approval to come through, once that happens the 20 working day count down till construction starts is on!!

We are still waiting for a few colour prices to come through - its been over a month since our appointment - hopefully they are sorted this week so they is no delays in getting our final plans and orders in.

Friday 1 November 2013

Council Approval Received

So today marks day 130 of our admin period..... and today we received DA approval. I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. We are now hopeing to have contract and construction certificate paperwork completed by the end of next week and then patiently wait for final bank approval and site start.

Monday 28 October 2013

Small Win

After giving our independant bush fire consultant the go ahead on friday, we werent expecting to receive the report until the end of this week. We were quite suprised when we received the completed report this morning, and to make it even better - the bal was 12.5!! I have now forwarded the report direct to the council officer looking after our file, fingers crossed now that we might have DA approval by the end of the week.

Friday 25 October 2013

Bushfire Assessment Battle

Our admin dramas have continued this week. All of our DA documents were uploaded to the council tracking site, where I was able to look at our bushfire assessment that Rawson had submitted, and was disappointed to see that they had assessed us as Bal 29. We have been told all along since before going to tender that the bal assessment would be reviewed as the initial assessment was done before any houses had been built. The whole stage has now been developed, apart from our site, and all of our neighbours have been assessed as bal 12.5. Bal 12.5 is a huge saving in $$, so after a few angry emails and phone calls, Rawson have agreed for us to get an independant bush fire assessment report completed, and they will credit the cost of the report back to us. We have decided to use Newcastle Bushfire Consulting, as they completed our neighbours assessment and have said they support a bal 12.5. The council are going to proceed with assessing our DA but are going to hold off on final approval until the new report is submitted, which should only take 5-7 days. Another delay - but well worth the wait.

Friday 18 October 2013

Finally In Council

So today marks day 118 of the admin phase, and we are finally in council! Our pool plans were submitted yesterday, and the house was submitted today. Praying now that we have a speedy and delay free approval process.


Tuesday 15 October 2013

Impatiently Waiting

So today we are at day 115 of the 120 day admin period, and we are still waiting for our plans to be lodged to council. Water board stamped them on 4th October, they were then submitted to Mine Subsidance, and we were advised they were stamped and sent back to Rawson on 10th October. Rawson still have not received them in the mail, and they cant be tracked as they were sent by REGULAR mail!

I have been assured that they will turn up, and that its not unusal to take more than 3 business days to arrive! Hhmm in what century. Newcastle to Sydney mail should be 2 business days max.

Anyway, after quite a few angry emails, I have been told as soon as they turn up, our paperwork will be sent by EXPRESS POST to council.

Fingers crossed they turn up tomorrow, otherwise I will be committed to the loony bin - this admin is slowly, but surely driving me friggen crazy.

Wednesday 25 September 2013

Selections Appointments

Finally received an email last night asking us to contact Raw interiors to make our colour selection appointment. I rang them first thing this morning and made our booking for the first available saturday which is 19th October. Our appointment is at 1pm which allows us plenty of time to attend Accent carpets for a 10am appointment to have a look through there timber floor selections and get some prices.

Now that we have those 2 appointments booked in, I was on a mission to arrange the Tile & Electrical appointments on the monday straight after colours, whilst everything was fresh in our heads, and because if things go according to plan, and we have no more setbacks, we should have our DA approval the same week.

So after some helpful information and contact numbers from  homeone forum members, all our appointments are booked. Our tile appointment is at 7:30 monday 21st October at Beresfield, and our electrical is at 11am at Swansea.

Who would have thought that making a few appointments would make a person happy.... it finally feels like we are getting somewhere!!

Now to try and wait patiently for our engineer plans to be complete so we can get into council....only 8 more sleeps max hopefully.

Tuesday 24 September 2013

Another Set Back

Contacted our CSO last wednesday to find out if they were on track to lodge our plans at council on Thursday, and we told that Hunter Water would not endorse our plans as the footprint of our house is to close to the sewer. Our water tank is only a meter from the sewer, but we are unable to move the tank anywhere else without it ruining the look of our future backyard/entertaining area.

To ensure that Hunter Water will endorse our plans, we now have to wait for 2 weeks for more engineer plans to be drawn up to show that there will be piering in the area, and that the sewer will not be effected by the water tank.

Although it is only a minor setback as such, it feels as though we are taking more steps backwards than forwards at the moment.

We are also still patiently waiting, for 2 weeks now, to be contacted to make our selections appointments. Im really disappointed in the lack of contact regarding these appointments. We just want to go and make all our selections so it feels like we are actually building a house not just dreaming about it.

Tuesday 10 September 2013

Slowly Moving Forward

We are now 78 days into the pre-build phase, and and it is really dragging. Everyone said the admin phase is hard, but I severly under estimated how hard and frustrating it would be. I find myself daily stalking other blogs pre-build timelines to see where they were at this stage, and its very disheartening to see that we are miles behind, and the chance of us having a slab by xmas is getting slimmer each day.

Yesterday we received our DA plans to check, and unfortunatley found an error. Only minor, in that it is just wording, but if its not fixed before it goes to council, it will result in our plans getting knocked back. Fingers crossed it can be rectified in the next day or so, so we can get the plans to council, and FINALLY book our colour selection, electrical, and tile appointments.

Tuesday 9 July 2013

The Stroud 30 - with some additions

After going over all the single storey home designs, we both really liked "The Brookfield". We decided to take a trip to the display centre at Waterford County to see if we could get some more information and have a sticky beak at the other houses on display. We went through the 3 homes on display and imediately fell in love with "The Stroud 30". We loved the layout and the overall look of the house was just what we were after.




Our plans will be a bit different to this as the porch  comes out and runs across the front of the bedroom. We are also adding another garage, and doubling the size of the alfresco area.

We are also going to render the front of the house - have done a little mock up just to give a rough idea of the look we are after.


The Hunt For A Builder Begins

After selling our house we started looking online at builders and going through all the house designs they had. We knew we only wanted to build a single story home, and had actually picked out a house we like with another volume builder, when we came across Rawson Homes.

We poured over there designs, and there inclusions, and decided that they were who we were going to build with. We visited there display homes at Chisholm and the sales staff there were so lovely and helpful. They answered all our questions, and emails quickly (even on there days off), so we decided to build with them.

Our Land

 After 6 years of renovating our home and working towards big extensions to make it our "dream" home, we found out that to make it a reality, it was going to cost us alot more $$ than what the house would be worth at the end. So we quickly decided to tidy the house up and sell, and build our "dream" home instead.

We had our fingers crossed that our house would sell quickly, but in reality thought it would take a few months, so we were quite suprised when it sold after only 3 days on the market!!

The search then began to find a nice flat block of land. After a few weeks of searching, and researching different blocks, we ended up purchasing some land at Northlakes Estate in Cameron Park NSW.