My First Renovation Experience

[eveste 1]

Is it a condor or HDB? How many rooms was it and what is the reno damage???

Pretty curious. Amazing piece of work I see there.

[elin1029 23]

Thanks Makanology and Asking4Help.

The reason for this blog is not to bash Mr K though. He's a nice person and it's no fault of his that he's so busy. I wanted to share what I went through so that others who are thinking to engage his services can make an informed decision. He is now quite different from the Mr K that was highly raved about previously. For example, he doesn't bring customers to tile shops to select tiles, at least not in my case. His electrical lumpsum doesn't include unlimited power points anymore.

So anyway, he seemed really busy and didn't seem interested to take up my project. Maybe I should have taken the hint and gone to someone else. But because I didn't follow up with the others, and key collection date was approaching, I was a bit stuck. When renovation was going to start, he told me his assistant would be managing my project because he had more than 10 projects. I was like, huh? but I paid a higher price for your services and you're handing the project to someone else??? Then I might as well go to another contractor? But he reassured that he would still oversee the project (after note: he didn't really) and the workers would still be the same people (after note: not true).

He told me to go to tile shops to select tiles and then tell him the code. As a newbie in renovation, I would really appreciate some help there as there were so many different tiles in the shops. Ok, he's a contractor, not an ID, so fine, I shouldn't expect such service from him. That's why credit of the design of the house doesn't go to him. He never helped with any part of the design at all.

So renovation started and the progress was excruciatingly slow. They blamed it on the working hours restriction but I thought it was an excuse because when I visited the unit sometimes at 9am, 10am, 11am, no one was there to work. I guessed with so many projects running in parallel, they sent the workers to each unit for a few hours each day so that they could inform the customers that the workers were there and work was in progress.

So the "fast" of "fast and good" was not valid anymore, what about "good"? I was a bit worried if "good" might be affected too. With so many projects, the workers might be pressured to produce work, so would the quality of work still be good? And with so many projects, they might have to outsource some work to other teams of workers (not their regular ones who had produced excellent workmanship as reviewed by forumers before).

In my case, the electrical works were passed to another team of electricians. This team was quite expensive and I had to top up quite a significant sum of money to use them. When carpentry was installed, I didn't think the workmanship was excellent like what his past customers raved about. I confirmed with his assistant that it was a different team of carpenters.

So contractor also not him, workers also not the regular ones, then I might as well engage another contractor at lower cost?

[elin1029 23]

So my project was managed by his assistant, a lady. I am now glad it was her and not Mr K. She was very detailed and careful about the renovation works. She offered great design tips and practical solutions. Credit should go to her for helping to fine-tune my design. If I had known her earlier, going to her direct would have been an option, at a lower cost too!

Here's the design I drew in October before renovation started in November, not drawn to scale of course. I'm pleased the house turned out looking quite like what I had designed except for the carpentry details.

[claypot 46]

Nice drawings. I wish I can draw like that.

[hweeli 0]

This is another nick signed on the iPad that I kept using accidentally. In order not to confuse, I'll stick to the other one.

Edited February 1, 2014 by hweeli

[Harriette 42]

Hi Elin1029,

Your home is very nice. Your lights are very nice too. Could you share where you bought them and the costs? Thanks.

[elin1029 23]

Is it a condor or HDB? How many rooms was it and what is the reno damage???

Pretty curious. Amazing piece of work I see there.

Thanks. It's a condo unit with three rooms. Reno cost under 70k not including furnishing and appliances.

[elin1029 23]

Hi Elin1029,

Your home is very nice. Your lights are very nice too. Could you share where you bought them and the costs? Thanks.

Thanks. The pendant lights are from taobao, let me know which one you are interested in and I'll share the links.

[blackpeace 1]

wow 70k not including furnishing and appliances? That seems rather high.

[skins 2]

Whats the tiles used in your bathroom with the bathtub. Looks great!

[rumahku 0]

Love the bathroom!

Btw, can we see the laundry area....seems like the service yard area is for the dogs to chillax? Thnx

[elin1029 23]

wow 70k not including furnishing and appliances? That seems rather high.

Yes, quite high considering carpentry work was kept to a minimum - no walk-in-wardrobe, in fact no carpentry at all in the rooms. I saw other renovation by the same contractor at a lower cost with lots of carpentry works, and I asked my contractor assistant if they marked up the cost just because it was a condo unit. She said yes, because of the concealed pipes and wirings in condo units, they might encounter surprises during renovation. (but trust me, when they encounter surprises, they would charge additional to fix it). Also, condo ceiling is not standard HDB height, so carpentry work is more expensive because they need to customize (??? - doesn't make sense to me, isn't carpentry work to be customized to start with)

[elin1029 23]

Whats the tiles used in your bathroom with the bathtub. Looks great!

Thanks. These are the classic subway tiles.

[elin1029 23]

As requested. The dogs area comprises the service yard, the bomb shelter and the yard toilet. They are confined to this area when no one is home, otherwise they get free roam of the house.

This is the bomb shelter converted to dogs room. There's a taobao light for them too.

The yard toilet is where they *should* pee in, where they get washed after dog runs, and houses the pails and mops. Two sets of pails and mops - one for cleaning up the pee because the little old one is on heart medication and pees a lot due to medication and she pees everywhere because she's blind.

The yard toilet door is removed and the toilet bowl removed too.

[HanTu 0]

Thanks for the honest comments abt Mr K. I knew he was extremely famous to the point where his service/quality might be impacted.