house - 2

Well, my plan of blogging every month about the progress on the house build was a bit of a fail.

Before

Our house is now almost finished and our site has been transformed to look more like a house in need of decorating, rather than a construction site. It seems when people say that building is a time-consuming project, they are right!

Our build has come a long way since it kicked off last year.

The foundations went in without a hitch. Well, without any major hitches anyway. It turns out we needed more specific design engineered foundations than first anticipated but otherwise, it went much as expected.

We were pleasantly surprised to find the house looked relatively large despite having no walls or roof. But then I guess, by comparison to the house we're currently living in, it is twice the size.

We visited the site a few days later to see if the timber framing had arrived on time, just to discover the framing was already up. Man, what a transformation!

The framing really... well, framed the house. The rooms were defined by the walls now so you had a sense of what the space would be like once it was built. We had forgotten about 2 windows in the house plan, so it was exciting to see those in place.

A few days later the roof was mostly finished. The house was starting to take shape. And it was going up fast!

Before we knew it the windows and doors were in. Well, all of the doors, except the garage door. Muttermumblegrumble damn Specific Engineer Design Wind Zone muttermumblegrumble.

Over 1000 metres of cable

We expected the bricks to take 2 weeks to go up, but they took a record 3 days! The house was water tight... except for the garage door.

Geeks hard at work

During first fix, Andrew started spending most of his spare time at the house running miles and miles of network cable and speaker cable and who knows what else (with some much appreciated help, of course), to ensure the house reached Ultimate Geek standard.

The insulation went in (including, thanks to some friends of ours, some silencer batts in some strategic places) and then we needed to take a short pause. The house build had happened so fast that the timber framing hadn't had time to dry out after getting wet before the roof went on. A couple of weeks and some sunny days later, we were back into it.

The gib, skirtings, scotias, and internal doors were installed and, finally, the much awaited garage door, thanks to Jennian Homes.

The plasterer is now finishing off, the painter is starting this week, and second fix will begin next week. We're mostly on schedule with only 2 weeks overdue, which is pretty good for a house build. And would you believe, we'll be moving into the house in 5 weeks time! Let the packing begin.

A few observations so far:

It's surprising how few names are required within each field:


• Glenn and Glen, our excavators
• Nick and Nicola, the surveyors
• Brian and Ryan, the engineers
• Mark and Mark at Jennian Homes
• Shane and Shane, two of our electricians

It's surprising how many snap decisions are required:


• To centre the bath spout or to not centre the bath spout
• To install tiles above the bath or to install a splashback
• To install the sump 100mm above ground level or to install the sump flush with the ground
• To install a tap on the outside of a fence or to install it on the inside of the fence

A few tricks of the trade:


• Tradespeople don't schedule meetings, 'how about now' works for them
• Things deemed 'not needed until later', will be needed today
• The shorter your emails, the sooner you'll get a reply
• Variations and additional extras are a way of life

Would we do it again? Definitely yes!

When we build again, we would definitely use Keith Bullocks Contracting to excavate the site. They are The Best excavators. They turn digging into an art-form making the digger look like it's performing in a ballet. They are professional, reliable and are straight-up-and-down good guys. They know their business, they understand local Council and they work hard to ensure the job gets done to an exceptionally high standard.

We would also definitely build with Jennian Homes again. They really do make building an enjoyable and relatively stress-free experience. They know what they are doing. They've been in this business for a long time, and it shows. When problems arise, as is expected on any big project, Jennian takes the problems in their stride and finds a solution that works for all parties involved. They listen to the client and they work with the client every step of the way. The contractors they engage are hard-working and reliable, often working long hours and sometimes on weekends.

Although I'm not sure if I'd want to build with this local council again...

It takes many people to get a project like building a house off the ground. We've been in contact daily with our surveyor, resource consent planner, engineer, designer, and more recently mortgage broker and valuer. After having had a frustrating few weeks, we are now, finally, making progress.

We now have a earthworks plan that will create the optimum space on the site. The site will be excavated so that the house will have a North North West outlook, which in Wellington, is the best angle for optimum sunlight. The best part about the earthworks plan is that we can now build using a concrete slab, which is much cheaper than having to build on piles or any other engineered foundations. So we have now finalised our resource consent for the earthworks, which is ready to be lodged with the Council on Monday.

We've heard back from a number of suppliers this week who have firmed up their quotes for us. The best one being from our digger driver, who has been very generous with his pricing. So now that we know how much money we have left in the kitty and the site dimensions, we've been having fun deciding which house plan we'd like to build.

The Hillstone

This week's big milestone: Paying the deposit and proceeding to working drawings.

So exciting, so surreal. After all this time we're actually building our house. Yippee!!!

Since my last blog, we've learnt that building a house quickly turns from fun into frustration.

After getting confirmation from the Design and Build company, 3 times, that the indicative pricing for the house fits our budget, we handed the plans to our valuer to check that, after the house has been built, it would provide us with 75% equity. Luckily for us it came back as providing 74.5% equity. Phew! The bank is happy so we are happy.

Then the Design and Build company we were using (note the use of past tense), gave us 2 prices for the same plan which greatly varied from the original price, despite no changes to the plan. When queried, they told us they made a mistake with the first pricing. Although that doesn't explain the $8,000 variance between the second and third pricing, which they had no explanation for. Despite the house now being $18,000 over our budget, they suggested we pay to get working drawings anyway. But really, what would be the point in that?!?

So after going round and round in circles and banging our heads against a brick wall a few times, we've jumped ship. We're now using Jennian Homes, who have been wonderful and marvelous in every way... so far, and better still hasn't varied their quotes in the slightest.

So now we have some plans we like, we need to sort out the building platform. Some months ago, we lodged a resource consent application to take earth from the bank on our site and use it to fill a hole on a different site nearby. After waiting 6 months for Maori to consult on whether or not that hole should be filled, the Council in their great wisdom decided to reject the resource consent application. They have asked us to instead submit two resource consents: One for our site; one for the other site. Muttermumblegrumble red tape muttermumble sigh.

In the meantime, we received our Engineer's report. Being solid rock, the bank is currently graded at a 15 degree angle. When we bought the site, we spoke to the engineer who originally determined the grading of the rock at 15 degrees. He said that we could take the bank back at the same gradient. Since then someone has put some loose soil at the top of the bank and over our boundary on to our land. At the time we discovered it, we didn't think it would matter much.

Turns out it does matter. It means that instead of a 15 degree angle, we need to a gradient of 30 degrees. The upshot is, we aren't allowed to remove as much dirt as we were able to, plus we cannot build within 2m of the toe of the bank, making the building platform smaller than expected. Consequence: the chosen house design doesn't fit the site anymore. Argh!

Back to the drawing board. So after chasing our tails some more and shaving a few yaks on the way, the man with a hole to fill has taken charge. Being a developer and a surveyor, he's working with the engineer to devise an earthworks plan which will allow us to have the optimum amount of space on our building platform.

Once we have their topography map of what the site will look like after the earthworks have been completed, we can then choose a house plan to suit the site. We then need to amend the resource consent to have the footprint of this house on the land, which we'd better do quick smart because the amended resource consent application is due back at the Council by the end of this week.

Where does that leave us? Pretty much in exactly the same position we were in a month ago. No resource consent. No plans. No working drawings. We even need to get the valuer to value the new plans. Sigh, two steps forward, one step back.

So Andrew and I have decided to finally build on the section we've owned since 2004.

We don't tend to take decisions lightly. So in coming to this decision, over the years we've spoken to: 2 Architects, 3 Designers, 1 Draughtsman and 4 Design and Build Companies. Not to mention the hours of online research, visits to suppliers, reviewing pamphlets and checking out showhomes etc. I've also had hours upon hours of fun coming up with 30-odd designs using Inkscape - The BEST free and open source vector drawing software available.

Having just spent 18 months project managing a major international 7 day conference, linux.conf.au 2010, we decided we would not project manage the house build. So, we've decided to go with a design and build company. We took their design and tweaked it (using Inkscape) to better suit our section, and came up with this:

Now we have the design, it's time to work out how we're going to pay for it. Thanks to our mortgage broker, we're now pre-approved to value x. The Design and Build company has estimated the pricing as x minus $5,000. The only way to get the actual price is to draw up the working drawings, which of course costs money. So here's hoping the Design and Build company is accurate in their indicative pricing!

So to help the build fit the budget, we've started looking into supplying some of the materials ourselves and getting in our own tradesmen...I find myself wondering, if something looks like project managing the build and smells like project managing the build, is it not project managing the build? Sigh. We may be in for a long 3 months (apparently the build will take only 3 months, but I will not hold my breath).

A while back, we were lucky enough to be introduced to a man who owns a subdivision down the road from us, who happens to have a hole that he needs to fill. Conveniently, our section is made up of the kind of rock that fills holes in subdivisions. So naturally, we struck a deal and lodged an application for resource consent to complete some earthworks on the site. The Council should be granting the application any day now. So we've had to move fast on the build process so that we'll know what earthworks to do as soon as the application is granted.

So to help us with the build so far, we have:

• A design and build company, who has provided the... initial design we based our custom design on, and who will provide... some of the materials and... some of the tradesmen
• A Mortgage Broker, who has sorted out the funding;
• An Engineer, who is ready to go out on the site to check the stability of the build platform and to advise us of the gradients of the land for the earthworks;
• A Valuer, who is valuing the plans.

Next on the list, a surveyor, who will tell us the topography of the land.