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Ya, this I agree fully. Re-sale flat like us seriously spend alot more. If I had a BTO, my same mini budget can actually do quite nice reno on whole house ler. Not to mention re-sale flat itself already cost a lot more. lol But..... haizz..... single leh, didn't manage to get that 2 room BTO.... So bo bian lor....... If continue to wait, by the time I get my 2 rm BTO, think I will be old cock cock liao.

Last but not least, the artwork of us which I drew and painted and is hanging now in our living room. This was a scene when we were in Maldives and we really love the sea, sand and sun (although Mrs might not like to be too tanned) 那些年， 我们一起看的大海。 执子之手， 与子偕老。

Wish you have a smooth Reno and purchasing too bro. Oh you already engaged an ID le huh?

Ya of cos am looking forward to e whole thing but kinda holding my breath at every step cos we never know wat might cock up next.. Things tend to have a twist here n there so it's like a surprise(good n bad) every now n den. Not gonna be in peace til it's all over smoothly 😌

Haha thx so much babe so boosting! Lol.. Tomoro is a very busy day,getting sanitaryware n cooker hood,hob n oven delivered together since carpenter needs to see items n measure for his carpentry..citygas installation,electrical works startup etc..gonna be a long day.. 😁

Sky C r e a t i o n? Sounds familiar leh? They always appear at expo de right?

Agree, it depends on personal preference. Prior owner loved bronze color, they had bronze grilles and gate. I like silver more, I asked for grilles and gate both in silvery colors. Another consideration is me lazy to wipe frequently lah. White color must be hardworking in maintenance......

Yes, of course must change. Even the letterbox's lock also change. i did mine for S$200.

Ya lor. Mine is a 4 room resale at Woodlands. alamak, who got so big living room to place such a big TV. Unless your living room is as big as a cinema hall. I even got an 'unSMART' TV when everyone else's is SMART these days.

glad to have been of help. Some more information if anyone interested : http://www.songcho.com/FAQs/faqlist.aspx Apparently their stainless steel is by electrolysis to finish their stainless steel hence the rust resistance. By the way, in case your ID/contractor can't install for you, Song-cho also provides installation services on a per trip basis $50. [i was told no limits on number of items installed. I didn't take this up though as my contractor was helping.] thank you, thank you.

April is coming soon! Congrats to both Mr and Mrs Lee on your new home! Smooth smooth reno journey everyone!

Check your email. For new forum members and readers who may wish to request for any contacts or additional information in the future, I would like to take the opportunity to point out that these forums have a private message function available.

technology... upgrades features we may not use and charge us more

If you are good with a paintbrush you can get a new color, maybe once a year before CNY?

are those movable windows?? OMG its Cool! can use as a partition!! and actually open for ventilation!!

think got option - just paint over if it gets too 'dirty'.

Congrats! You are going to collect your keys soon.

Hi guys... Ok I decided to post some updates today... Songz n bykaraane thx for ur consolation haha.. For a start, we had planned to settle all the reno works n move in next mth on the 26th April, holding our housewarming party on the 27th, as our monthly rental cycle at our current place is on the 28th,so we could save paying for an extra mth and jus move on before tat.. We even went to ask the priest for an auspicious day/timing to hold the prayers etc and had fixed the housewarming to be on the 27th.. AND THEN, we went down to Casa Italy yesterday to confirm our already purchased during Expo L-shape full cowhide leather sofa set's colour n chaise position(left or right).. We were told at tat time tat bout 4 weeks or so wud be required to indent the sofa upon our colour+chaise direction confirmation n so we thought it's about time n we better make e order soon so we can have it delivered on e 26th April... The salesman den told us tat shipment will not come in til 3rd May or so n he doesn't know if it can be achieved on e 26th.. Tat he will have to check. Tat dampened my spirits a little cos we wanted e whole house complete wit furniture n all in time for e housewarming party.. Though hubby initially suggested tat we shall move out before e 28th so tat we cud spend e rental cost on other costs for e house instead of extending our stay here, he insists he wants to wait n hold out e housewarming til all e furniture n stuffs come in complete so we shall continue staying put at e rental house for an extended week or two depending on wen things comes together. Felt so disappointed with e timeline of the sofa. Have gotten e salesguy to check wit his side to see if anything can be done, gotta wait for them to get back to us. Damper! The next blow was to do wit e flooring in our unit.. As we had initially opted for HDB to lay e flooring for us, we decided to overlay with laminate flooring for a nicer flooring instead of sticking to their cheapo ceramic tiles.. Think fellow owners shud take note tat tis causes an issue at ur main door area.. As the laid tiles is jus enough in thickness to leave jus a tiny allowance of space underneath ur main door, you cannot overlay laminate around the main door area.. The added thickness of laminate is totally impossible to be laid underneath e door.. So ID asked wat we wanna do, do we wanna leave e patch of area wit e existing tiles n start laminating from after e door area, which I felt will be so awful! After thinking much I came up wit e idea of pebble wash flooring.. Meaning they will have to hack away the few tiles at the doorway area and use cement and pebbles to create a different pattern at e doorway area, after which abit further up our laminate flooring will start from.. This was going to cost us an additional of $400 excluding the pebbles which r supposed to cost $18-$20 a bagful which apparently is more den enough for the area with lots of leftovers.. So we went down yesterday to Hafary wit ID to choose the pebbles color n type tat we want laid out n I had tis idea of doing a stripes design in 2 coordinating colors so tat e place doesn't look like a big patch of plain pebblewash, jus had a feeling wud not be as attractive as having say 2 stripes of a color n 1 stripe of another, given our small area.. But e difference wud be buying another bagful of pebbles as extra which was no big deal I thought.. N ID said we cud extend e area of e pebblewash til dining area to kinda create a foyer area look n I was so excited tat we were having something unique done in our small space.. (The 2 different pebbles we chose to do our striped pebblewash flooring.. Kinda limited on choices as we didn't wanna go for e sharp edged ones which had more variety.. These have rounded edge so won't feel prickly on e feet and safer.. E 2nd beigey color was chosen to match close to our laminate flooring color in e living so tat it's not too outstandingly off n e other color was to play wit e stripe design.. If worst case scenario we have to stick to a single color pebble wash flooring, it wud be e 2nd pebbles type..) N DEN, ID msged me after we left saying he checked wit e tiler n was quoted an additional 300-400 for e stripes cos it's more work n material etc etc n tat will bring e total cost of e foyer area to almost 800 jus like tat! Simply not worth right! I was so pissed wit e spoil of plans on my striped foyer area n am now trying to nego wit my ID to get to talk to his tiler on best price to get tat done for me at cheaper price. Haiz... So now I'm waiting for his revert. Simply few hundreds gone like tat on an issue we didn't foresee coming at all.. Wudnt have been a prob if we didn't have tiles laid by HDB but since we do, it's a pain now. So I suggest unless u really want to stick with their tiles, do not opt to have tiles laid by them cos it's gonna cause u extra inconvenience n works later on to do anything else u wanna redo..

Thanks VincentWangZx! Saw on your tblog, Your place is starting to come together nicely... cool! --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ok, here's the post on our ID-hunting experience. So we spent 5 months in total to look around and meet with different IDs.... the whole experience was really tiring - but fun to a certain extent. Somehow it was quite interesting to be sitting as a customer and have all these ID try to pitch for business to me and hubby. Lol... 1. The first ID we met. Can't remember his name... I think he contacted hubby via a forum (or was it renotalk here itself?) when hubby posted to get quotes from ID. Talked all about how interior design is about 'feel'.... and yadah yadah... 2. Second ID... is currently a ID from a pretty well-known ID firm in renotalk. SXXXXX Design Due to his sensitive situation right now I shall not name him publicly (but feel free to PM me if you would like to know) I quite like him from the start because also of the positive reviews about him here. He was in the midst of branching out on his own and wanted to sign us up with his own newly set up firm instead of under the current ID firm which he is working at. Sigh, big mistake. We found out that his new ID firm is not HDB approved... and felt this whole working on the side while still an actively employed ID at another interior firm too dodgy and complicating for us. Despite meeting him several times, and liking his humble disposition (and reasonable price quotes)... we decided not to take the risk and dropped him recently. He was the first few ID we met, and the last 2 in the running. I felt bad towards him in a way... but it just doesn't feel right so no choice, went with our gut. 3. Third ID - CXXX Interior This ID actually recently jump ship from Weiken.XXX to CXXX Interior, and was recommended to hubby by his friend. He does have an eye for design and came across more like a designer as compared to the rest of the IDs i meet (that is good)... but his pricing was really expensive. Easily $10k more than the ID i chose. I guess choosing an ID from a big company has its price tag.... and we were not keen to pay that price tag, unfortunately. So we had to drop him recently too. 4. Fourth ID - Inspire by Dtrenzo Had a good impression of this ID right from the start, maybe because he was extremely confident and open when talking to us. No hard-selling and able to give advise from a design and practical point of view. Talked alot about having a 2-way relationship with his clients on give and take, and trusting each other. Went to their showflat and were quite happy to see their works, although hubby did point out some areas of improvements on the painting works. 5. RenoXXX Nick - met him upon recommendation by Forummers here... unfortunately felt that we were not on the same wavelength as him and were not comfortable to proceed further, despite his relatively reasonable quote. 6. AbsolXXX Interior - again another up and coming ID firm, with a lot of buzz on facebook and forums. Felt that the ID assigned to us was too junior with little experience... and a little too presumptuous in some of his thoughts and ideas. Hubby dropped them when they made us wait 2 hours for our appointment without being more sensitive or apologetic about having made us waste our precious weekend waiting around 2 hours for them. 7. mX design - again a recommendation by hubby's friend. A female ID this time. She was very detailed and we could tell that she would have been a very meticulous ID whom we can trust. However, her pricing was also on the high side and she didn't follow up as closely despite us mentioning that we were collecting keys soon, which was quite strange. 8. UniXXX Creative - recommended by my sis (although she didn't choose them in the end) for cheap pricing. Hubby contacted the lady ID and was put off by the way she communicated with him, made him felt like he was having a major communication breakdown with her even on simple things like when to meet etc. She gave us an estimated price quote (which was super cheap) but hubby detected that she left out on kitchen carpentry works totally. Felt that it was too much of a hassle to meet her to describe what we wanted... and also by then we had more or less decided to take the plunge and sign up with ID number 4... And apparently, by 1st Apr 2014 this year, all home owners need to sign a declaration before reno works begin that your contractor/ID is HDB registered, otherwise the home owners and the non-HDB registered company will face penalty charges! And on HDB website there is now a link to check if your contractor or ID is indeed HDB registered as well. So... probably best to play safe and sign up with HDB approved IDs and contractors from now on guys!

I hope they will redo the stuff for you. I guess that is the only thing that every home owner hopes to see- a nicely done up house! Its not so much on the compensation! Bless you!

OMG! stacked plywood is sooo cool!

I was going to ask Mr K to do it for me but it cost us few freaking hundred bucks. So we ended up buying from ikea which is way much cheaper.

Hi Septh! Yes am from 590B! I see u managed to fit in a bathtub! Your design layout is big and spacious enough for two. Good planning. Our initial plan was to hack a few walls to make things look bigger but end up no walls will be hacked....will leave one room for the kid so that she can bang the door in my face when she grow up. Another bedroom will be for wife's mum or my mum if they decided to sleep over. Are you in MD facebook page? Will hook up with you over there and maybe a visit to your place with my wife...you saw our MD signage downstairs?...I must say the one who design it should be shot....no no no...should be strip naked and parade around the estate then blanket party....this type of ugly work dare to put up....I am very sad...we should all sign a petition to have it remove...and find out who endorsed the design.. white font...pale purple backplate...and in small caps? gosh...somebody calm me down...Where are the 3D fonts?!?!?! signage not like these meh?

And yes, taken half-day leave in the afternoon to also accept the delivery of a dining table and bench. the 2 dining chairs will be delivered next week (Celini missed them out in the shipment ) Dining table is caesarstone 1.3m white and the table base is solid real wood so is the bench. the white quartz top matches with the flat-circular hanging led light

Thanks Makan for your suggestions. Added another thing to purchase: wall clocks. I'm a sucker for accurate time and being punctual, so looking for good wall clocks e.g. seiko, rhythm, etc. And not those from ikea, or uncovered clocks (collects dust and more cleaning maintenance).

Hi, I'm not sure how the workmanship & quality of products.

hi tinydot, actually i only ordered the drawers, because it is the runner tracks that provide soft closing and i need the weight (30kg, 50kg, 65kg). the hinges i'm using my contractor's ones which i'm pretty sure are not blum. hinges are not too expensive though, like $4-5? but some drawers especially in larder units need a hinge with wider angle else the drawers cannot take out fully. i think anyone can install them. that's right, Blum did not help me with the design phase. to be fair, during my 3 visits there, i also did not ask them for much help as i have a rough idea of what i need to keep where, judging from my experience in my current house. the catalog doesn't show combos, it's literally individual drawers. customization is subjective, as the height of the drawers are fixed. not sure if my quote will help you much as my kitchen for 5A is quite big, it's 55ft of cabinetry. my blum drawers alone was about $1.5k. my contractors will then fabricate the drawer fronts to attach to the blum drawers or doors for the larder unit. separately i am asking my contractor if his initial quotation of $5k plus will reduce given that he's only providing the carcass, all internal systems are blum. hope this helps.

I saw on the website that this is called the TT239 CARLOS DINING TABLE. The dining table comes in either ash or walnut colour... costs $1100 for 1.6 metres, will there also is a 2 metre version at $1340. Dimensions are: W160 X D90 X H75cm or W200 X D90 X H75cm BTW, i love it too. the legs are so pretty.

Hi vicx, sorry our posts crossed. Congrats & enjoy ur reno journey too! See that u've engaged 3D Innovations (I also did mine by 3D 1.5 yrs ago). Have read that Jimmy is a good ID! U are under gd hands!

Wow... I like ur house reno

Master bedroom is kept simple with customized bed frame and headboard and wardrobe in the same laminate. Adding 'groove' line to make the same colored furniture look less boring. Thanks to father-in-law suggestion on adding the 'groove' lines. IMG_1560 by mrswongjas, on Flickr IMG_1565 by mrswongjas, on Flickr

The technician came to repair as per appointment. He replaced two power regulator board and after that it worked. The repair was free as covered by warranty and the repair itself comes with 3 months warranty. So far the service experience with the technician has been pleasant. Will see how long this will last.

I had one contractor to recommend too. He is reliable and trustable. Recommended by my sister. My sis and her frens all engaged him to do their home renovation, and commented his workmanship is good. Price is reasonable and affordable. He is easy to talk to, and always try his best to meet our requirement. He also do us a very big favor by recommending us where to get cheap lights and other necessities. Of coz,we,ourselves also do some homework in comparing the price that was given to us. Save all the hassle. Even for air-conditioning installation, he help us to liaise with the installer, as both of us were very busy at work. No time to be there for the installation. Most importantly, he is always contactable. Of coz, he(contractor) is unlike those IDs with great designing skill. So if you engage him, u must have a design concept of what you really want, so that he can help u up with that. However, he do help us up in advising us with some ideas that can fit into our design. hmmm....One word which i can describe him is genuine. =) For me, i think that even if a quotation is very cheap, that doesn't mean that you have a good deal. Because it is based on the material they use and also the quality of work they provide. Pm me if you guys wants his contact number. p/s: He is "more" Chinese speaking.

After reading the recommendations in this forum, we also called up Jimmy from 3D and was impressed with him at our first meeting. He really knows his stuff and understands the whole renovation process, including the transport of materials, when to carry out works, etc. This is very important to us as we are renovating the second floor of a shophouse as a residential area, and would have to take tenants around the area into consideration. Jimmy was patient and explained what could be done with our limited budget, and we are very happy that he tried to maximize our budget. Well, this is just for a first meeting, will update after we meet him again. Hope all our renovations go well!

Can try talk to Jimmy Tan of 3D. Now in the midst of renovation.So far he is very responsive, even past midnight he will answer my query. Haha. Can read up my blog on him, my handsome ID.

To add on Yhliang's post, Jimmy is in the mist of preparing our 3D drawing... Keke Looking forward to seeing it.

Bro.. When your renovation start? Already ask for quotation from Jimmy..... I wanna know their workmanship....thank you...

here to share my views on all the quotes i got from different company for if i have more to spend, i don mind getting 1) a& d louis 2) ho bee partrick 3) huge stone jason sim 4) designer guy 5) livin concept johnny 6) dennis from active 7) wika/mod 8) alan from initial price friendly 1) deen from lego 2) edmund from 3d innovation 3) jim ng from * 4) bernard from ideal 5) jason lee from homemaker 6) mr seah from seah soon li 7) mr see from prestige 8) frankie in the end i select 3d innovation just for the rest looking from who to do their flat to see which gruop they like to visit price different can be 3 to 6k from top list and bottom :>