Firstly, apologies this is a long post. I guess this blog is cathartic for all the frustration and tedium, so I do ramble on a bit.
Hmm, how do you approach tender? With trepidation, angst, confusion, fear, worry, joy, relief? Many emotions ran through me on the way to the tender appointment. Although we have built two houses previously, we have never been through the "tender" system.
We got there pretty much on time and then had to wait about 1/2 an hour -45 minutes because the morning appointment was still going. Our appointment was for 1pm. Nothing you can do, but it seems like forever, waiting, waiting Note to self: make all further appointments first thing in the morning!
It will come as no surprise to many of you reading this, that the first thing to blow us away was the amount of the site costs. Hmm, 12K sounds OK (our sales quote had 20K) then the slab upgrade and the services upgrade and holy cow, the retaining walls. All up just over $27.5K. Bend over sunshine! After the shock of that, our presenter "D" started to go through each item we had requested. Good news was that most of them were under what I had budgeted them to be! I had a few swings and roundabouts but mostly pretty positive UNTIL I got out the laptop (yeah I know, I prefer to think of myself as a detail person ;-) The first item extended the front of the house. Not there on the list? Hmmm, flick through the file, there is the layout on the block from the sales appointment with red pen scribbling this out and NO written on it.
Excuse Me???? If you have read previous posts, you will know that PD took quite a while to contact me, supposedly because this specific request had to be approved before they would accept and prepare a tender WTF? We did not go ballistic, we told "D" what had happened previously and what we had been told. This was hardly his fault but we were polite and firm and informed him that this was a deal breaker; minimum was we add AT LEAST 1m into the study and some into the bedrooms, or he was wasting our time, have a pleasant life and we will leave now thanks.
To his credit, "D" took off to see what the situation was. After about 10 minutes he came back and asked us for some time to work through with drafting, estimating and all the areas to try to come up with a solution for us. We took off for an hour and then came back.
Good news and bad news, firstly he explained that they are volume builders not custom builders, once we ask for too many changes or change the basic structure etc then we are falling into that category, fair enough. No harm, no foul, po'd that we'd wasted over a month but whatever.
So, he then came out with the compromise. The could extend the study ONLY by a metre explaining that this was because of roof pitches, tresses and angles, but they could in turn put 1m into the body of the house and we could then move the walls in bed 2 and 3 down to get 500mm in each. Also means an extra 1m in the pantry (yipee!) and in the lounge room. We think that this was a really good compromise. PD are a volume builder and we recognised that and would have walked away, but they came to the party to do the best they could do within their systems for us, which was great. Bad news was that "S" has had to sacrifice extra space in the garage that could not be accommodated due to the roof trusses/pitches/technical thingys.
On a further note, because of these couple of issues it was well after 6 when we left and we missed things. I emailed "N" our CSC the next morning about some but pored over the plans today and realised that I think PD have missed some things (swapping alum windows for timber in the alfresco) that I had asked for by email on the 15th. Emailed again today to ask if that was the case.... we are waiting to hear back.
I really think it is very difficult to try to do everything in 3-4 hours especially when in shock! I also realise that if you don't have a cut off people will change their minds 4 times a day. I have changed my kitchen colours at least three times this week alone...still not sure....
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
13 comments:
Aren't site costs a bummer!! What sort of slope do you have on your block? Do you need a H class slab? I found tender quite nerve wracking - trying to take in all the costs and at the same time, trying to make sure that they had in all of the "structural " changes that we had requested. I found out a couple of days after tender that they had put a 720mm door on our WIR when we had asked for it to be a 820mm door - when I rang to point out their error and get it changed, they said we couldn't!! AARRGGHH!! Still fuming about that one, hope you have more luck with your windows!!
Hi K&T,
we have the standard M class slab. Our land goes from 10.3 in one corner to 9.01 in the diagonal opposite corner. They are going to cut and fill at 9.7. I am going to be royally p*ssed if they do not change the windows. I specifically said in the email on the 15th that I thought there were other windows looking onto the alfresco and I wanted all windows looking into the alfresco to be timber. If I had not been in so much shock by the big NO in red, I probably would have gone through the rest of my list and found it. Guess I will have to wait and find out. Marcuso had a similar experience to yourselves. He changed a window size, it was written incorrectly but read to him correctly and even though it was their mistake, PD would not change it.
Hope that your door does not look too out of place once you see it in the house.
So is that a fall of just over 1m?? Where do they say all the big $$$$ come from if you you only require a m class slab?
Hi again, about 1.3, costs are - Slab cost - cut and fill etc 12K; the retaining walls 12.5K; slab and service upgrade because part of it needs to be pinned (where they are filling) 3K, AND it could be more once they "test" drill for our garage foundations which may have to be strengthened because our neighbours have a retaining wall on our garage side. "Allow another 2K" was the suggestion. They are sooo lucky I love this house LOL!
That's it, isn't it? If you love the house, then you ( within reason ) pay! Our costs came back at 15k plus 4.5k in extras because we extended the garage by an extra 1.5m!! I can't quite understand why extending the garage width by such a small amount equates to an extra 4.5k, but I'm certainly no expert so I can't question it with them. I don't even know why I need an extra retaining wall on the low side of the block..the one thing I do know is that I hate how these costs eat into the overall budget!
Hope your overall costs come back as acceptable for you.
Ouch for your site cost...
Hmm... why is your retaining wall and cut & fill so expensive? >.<
Hi Lex,
The retaining wall goes for about 32 metres and they have to take away a fair amount of dirt. I have no idea if this is expensive or not, as K&T says "if you love the house ( then within reason) you'll pay. PD are a volume builder, we had a very similar house priced with a custom builder and the difference was $60K, we only had slightly cheaper site costs quoted with them. PD had a much better finish than the custom builder and were cheaper.
Oh,site costs are always a shock.
I dont know whether you have heard back from ur CSC about the timber windows or not.
However, this is not a structural change and should be done on your contract appointment, just keep a track of all the changes that you make and contract appointment is the perfect oppurtunity to pick up if those things are not added and they will create a "Post Contract Variation" to accomodate those changes.
I even got a structural change approved after the tender appointment, so i dont see that as a problem. They really fuss about making any changes after the contract, so make the most of the time and make changes until the contract appointment.
All the best
Hi BelleBeau,
Just a query for you.. are you dealing with Pd North office or east? Did you get your colourbond gutter upgrades as part of a promo or something?? When I was quoted almost $6k ( shock horror!! ) I let it be known that others out there were getting it done for much,much less! Their response - impossible - price stands! They are really making me mad!
K&T,
I am dealing with Prestige East. No, not a promo. The figure they are quoting you sounds like they are talking about the whole roof including the gutters, fascia and downpipes.
I was quoted between 5-7K for the whole roof, which we decided we did not want anyway because PD would not do the new colourbond colour LOFT and that was the colour we wanted. I'd make sure that they are ONLY talking about fasica, gutters and downpipes NOT the whole roof. This is was something I had to make clear to my CSC.
I have to say my CSC is an absolute dream to deal with. Thank God because this is driving me nuts!!!
Cheers
Hi BB,
Thanks for that. I am pretty sure though that CSC realises that I meant just the gutters/fascias etc and not the whole roof - at least I thought it would be fairly obvious when i wrote " colourbond gutters ILO zincalume gutters". I think she hates us!!
Hi bb
We're also dealing with Prestige East.....not the same CSC, though (you ain't missing ot on anything there!!!!)
Just read thru your story thus far - I've had someone else's details emailed to me not ince, but twice - one of them was the cost of someone else's tile upgrade, with name & address - I would be absolutely FURIOUS if they emailed my stuff to someone else, esp considering the fact that I only picked ONE standard tile, for the pantry s/back!
If I didn't absolutely LOVE this house, I would have just about walked away after we started, we've had so many problems. Hopefully that WON'T be your experience! Good luck! :-)
Post a Comment