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it was a peaceful quiet weekend at my empty new place... until yesterday 1pm.. something happened.. my place became a warzone... monday transport carpentry... tuesday noon up carpentry... think carpentry can complete by today (wednesday)... seriously.. 3 days... i'm in awe of such speed.

Hi Guys, I will be collecting my key on June, have been reading the forum for the past month and saw many bad experiences with the renovation. So my wife and I decide to coordinate the whole renovation on our own. I know this will be a difficult task but also due to the tight budget , we have no choice. Appreciate if you guys can help to recommend any of the following or if you are providing the service or any good lobang Please PM me. 1. Tiler 2. Electrican 3.Plumber 4.Ceiling 5.Blind, window grill 6.Painter I not sure how to upload my floor plan , please send me your email if you require my floor plan for a quote or sms me @ 93366299

Hi, can share the scope? I bought a resale 5 room and will be keeping the floorings.. Thanks..

megaDiscount store has amazing service !

Like your mood pictures! A bit of messiness adds character to the home right?

Some updates again. Someone asked for our floor plan, so here it is. Hubby and I headed to JB yesterday for a day trip to check out some of the recommended lighting shops mentioned by other kind forummers. So we went to Tampo Lighting Centre first to check out downlights. Indeed they have very cheap downlights at RM45-48 (4inch, 12W, 3colour LED square downlights). Their T5 lights which we needed to get for cove lighting also seemed quite cheap at RM15-18 depending on the length. Unfortunately, the initial model of downlights which we wanted to get at Tampoi was out of stock and we were told to come back again over the weekend. So we decided to just get the T5 lights from them first. We then went next door to check out Star World Lighting... they were selling some made-in-malaysia downlights for RM42 which we initially were keen to get. However, upon closer inspection I realised that the quality was really lousy! The downlights had painted exteriors (white colour) and the paint job was horrible. So it was a no-go. We felt bad because we decided not to proceed with the purchase after inspecting some 10 downlights one by one... so decided to buy some squarish ceiling lights for service yard/toilets/bomb shelter from them. Quite cheap at RM58-68 per light so we decided to buy it. We then checked out Yako Lighting Centre but their downlights were so expensive! RM68... and made in china type. So we left and went to check out Best Light Electrical. However, on the way there we got lost and just couldn't seem to locate the shop lot on GPS... in the end we stumbled upon another small light shop Project Electricial at 65 & 67 Jalan Rosmerah 2/2 Taman Johor Jaya, 81100 Johor Bahru This place was such a wonderful discovery for us! The lady boss Ms Leena Chen is a really warm and friendly lady, with absolutely no hard selling. Her downlights (same as the ones sold at Tampoi) were offered the cheapest at RM38 per downlight. Her T5 lights were also selling slightly cheaper... but too bad hubby and I already bought from Tampoi. They have a nice variety of ceiling and pendant lights too and more designs to come... i couldn't make up my mind about which pendant light i liked (for dining area) so didn't commit to a purchase. Ms Leena told me not to rush into it if I have yet to spot 'THE ONE' and will whatsapp me new designs when they arrive. This is the downlight which we bought. Really happy with it - and at such a price, it's too good a deal to pass up on. Initially hubby and I were thinking if the price difference isn't a lot in JB and Singapore, we will just buy in Singapore... but this is easily more than 50% in cost savings... so we decided to just do it! It's made in taiwan... which is similar to many downlights sold in Singapore too. So hubby and I decided to take the leap of faith and buy it. Ms Leena also gave us 1year warranty on all the downlights. We strongly recommend this small shop to people who are considering heading to JB for lights-shopping! If you are keen to buy better brands (but only 1 light colour, not 3 colour option) like Samsung and LG, this shop sells them too. So do check them out in JB for your lighting needs!

Yay!! The Hojichas have moved in!! It's such a tiring and long process from keys collection till today, we are truly grateful for all those who've given pointers to us, and those t-bloggers who have inspired us and shared Mr K's contact with us. At last, we have moved in and stay in a place of our own, this is so exciting!! May all those who are starting out in your renovation progress have a smooth and fun reno! I'll no longer be updating this space here, I'll continue blogging on my own site. More updates here: http://goo.gl/Lh96LV Adios, thank you for reading!

Hi Leon & Jenna, Thank you for posting and recommendation. Do you mind sending me the contact for Calvin and also share your Reno quotation. Appreciate it. My email is tanw0113@gmail.com. Cheers Wen Bin

Hi Hi, Just dropped you a PM. Nice designs and great follow up of your ID. Love that he is committed and makes a point to get his message across.. Would like to re-renovate my kitchen though we've only been living in our current resale unit for 2yrs.. Hope it is not too small a project for Posh Homes to take.. Thus, appreciate your quote and will contact Calvin should it fits my budget. Cheers! Have a great Monday!

Hi Marcel, would you mind to share the contact of your contractor and reno quote. Many thanks!!

TODAY IS KEY COLLECTION DAY! 15.05.14 a day to remember.... Started out early today, and got to HDB hub by 9am (our appointment was 9.10am). Went to get our fire insurance sorted at level 2 before heading for the key collection appointment. Yes, you need to buy the fire insurance first before going for the key collection appointment! After spending about 40mins signing many, many forms and wiping out our CPF OA-account, we were done and keys collected! We then later headed to level 3 SP services to activate our SP services account. Hubby and I then headed to my parent's place and picked up my Dad, and set off to our new place to see it for the first time! Upon opening the door to our unit, we were greeted with a bright and spacious living area. We were pretty glad with the space in the living room area, so that was a nice sight to be greeted with. However, we were quite disappointed with the size of the kitchen and the rooms... really smaller than we imagined! Floor plans really can be quite misleading... haha. Also another disappointment was the piping area and clothes rack in the service yard!! We have absolutely no space to stack our washer and dryer... so sad. ID confirmed it also. Washer and dryer will have to separated... really bummed. So our ID and his site supervisor then came and join us about an hour later at our unit to assist with the checking of defects of the unit. All in all, there were no major defects. No cracks on walls or tiles (we opted for doors and flooring by HDB). Main problems were chips on the doors and walls and some uneven-ness on the walls here and there. Hopefully these are not major defects and HDB will be able to rectify shortly. After hanging around at our place for 3 hours, we then left the place and submitted the defects form to the BSC office a block away. We read other people's tblog and were advised to lock up our unit with a numbered lock and chain... however, the BSC office of our BTO told us they do not accept numbered locks due to 'safety issues'. Don't know why they so troublesome! Duh... wasted our time and money to buy this numbered lock and chain specifically!! So had to hand over a key to our main gate instead. Generally quite pleased with our place! Even the hdb flooring looked pleasing to us... not as bad as people described. Sure, not as nice as homegeneous tiles or parquet or marble flooring if we had the chance to choose it on our own. But for the price we paid, and looking at the workmanship i think it's acceptable and we are happy to live with this. Still unsure if we are going to do Evorich HERF/Krono-o-floors vinyl flooring for our bedrooms... likely yes haha but haven't confirmed. We also headed to Royal Fanco at Jalan Besar to get the Baron WC and basin package... for $390 it's indeed a steal!! Lite Fusion unfortunately doesn't offer package anymore... when we visited they said just because we are a returning interested customer they will sell us the same Baron set for $480. Crossed them out - so Royal Fanco it is! Thanks to guojiawen for her recommendation on her tblog! heehee. ID has also sent over the revised 3D drawings, so i'm going to attempt sharing them on tblog now. 1. Living room area 1 Shoe cabinet will be the partition to prevent our whole house being overly exposed at the main door. Will also have some pockets of empty space in the shoe cabinet as shelfing to put keys/display stuffs etc. Shoe cabinet also then links to a bar counter. Bar counter area will have a loud NYC-times square type of wallpaper at the background to contrast against the black and white theme. Bar counter stools will also not be white... likely will choose a loud colour like yellow or orange etc. The bar counter is meant to be a stark contrast to the mostly white and black colour theme in the living room. Sofa is likely to be black instead of white, and coffeetable is white instead of black. 2. Dining area behind sofa. We will be doing a craft stone brick wall (white) and will be including a tinted mirror in the middle of the wall. Bomb shelter area will also have a feature wall and a tic-tac door to cover the bomb shelter door. 3. Kitchen area Chose a green and light grey color in the kitchen. I really love how green and grey comes so nicely together. Wanted to do Green and white but felt that that was a little too common. Notice we have a breakfast counter in the kitchen for quick meals before going to work/instant noodles before rushing out the house/supper or for someone to just sit around when the other party is doing the cooking etc. I will be decorating the wall tiles with stickers/posters as well for the breakfast counter so that it doesn't look so plain. 4. MBR toilet - the chosen tiles and design after overlaying. Aboslutely love the mosaic wall... thanks to hubby for agreeing to this little splurge! That's all the pics for now! Heading back to our place on Sat and Sun this weekend with our respective families for them to take a look since they are also equally excited about our new home. Maybe take more pics again this weekend...

Is my electrical quote reasonable. I think that its too pricy. What do you think about it guys? what is the market rate? Many thanks. 1. New light point -$35 2. Reposition lighting point concealed - $65 3. Installation of telephone point - $65 4. Shifting of double power socket - $65 5. Installation/ relocation of SCV point - $180 6. Installation of cat 5 point - $180 7. Installation of hod point - $150

In preparation for key collection on 15th May, hubby and I met up with our ID today to go through and correct our 3D drawings properly. Hopefully the next time we receive the 3D drawings, it will be as close as possible to what we want. Will be sharing the 3D drawings once we are happy with it... so cross fingers ok! haha. Our living area is the key highlight for us...and is also the one area which we keep going back and forth with our ID on the 3D drawing because most of our money for the reno really is spent in the living area. We're adopting a modern theme (meaning not scandi/industrial kind which I understand is the rage right now) because it looks like hubby and I seem to prefer features that are more "modern" in nature. However, we are doing a craft stone brick wall in the living area - so it'll be interesting to see how our black and white modern living area is going to fuse in with the brick wall concept. Most of the pics and ideas I read on renotalk as well as online are usually industrial/scandi/country/retro theme when people adopt the brick wall idea. Have seen some on Home & Decor where brick wall got infused into a modern concept... hopefully we will achieve a unique living area we can call our own. Can't wait for the 3D drawings now!!

Yippeee yayy!! Finally gotten an update on our key collection date! And that's on the morning of 15th May!! Woohooo~~

Can any kind soul advise what is the adhesive material used to overlay toilet floor tiles?

During the long wait, I've been playing around with floorplanner.com to plan our desired layout for the flat. As the master bedroom was really small, one of wifey's "must-have" is a wardrobe length of at least 3m. On the other hand, my "must-have" is a long study table. Therefore, we have to sacrifice one of the bedroom which is fine with us as it is only the two of us who will be living in the flat till we have kids in future. In total, we've revised the layout 18 times. I will share some of the them here:

[back to Table of Contents] Laying white marble, especially those with veins, is very challenging. A lot of contractors are reluctant to use white marble. For the toilet walls, we chose white Volakas marble. My wife specially asked for those with a bit of pattern, light veins which flowed diagonally from top right to bottom left. We paid $1 more per piece for "dry lay". This is a process whereby the marble supplier would lay out all the marble at his warehouse as per our installation plan, and we could arrange all the pieces such that the pieces all match, with veins flowing smoothly. We could reject pieces that were chipped or out of place or colour. The pieces would be individually labelled A1 to A6 for bottom row, B1 to B6 for 2nd row and so on. When delivered to site, the installer will lay the pieces according to their pre-selected location. In theory, it is perfect. In practice, it was a fiasco. I still don't know if it is worth it. Those of you who are considering dry lay should take note of our mistakes. As can be seen from the dry lay, the marble pieces looked perfect at the warehouse.

Oh... That's a good idea. Thank you for advising this. Yes. I'd better tell my contractor they only hv 7-weeks to complete and hv 1-week buffer just in case, Really pray hard the Reno will go smooth smooth. Don't want anymore delays. My pocket can't afford to burn more hole liaoz.

This is the first one on Kaori.....I didn't miss

Yes......its your list and you can choose not to supply the list or answer anything. I respect your reserved rights which is why the PM on list i didn't post it up for clarification......its something rightfully personal. My doubt was how come you're always defending for Mr Chang and how you actually classify Master Chang when i read much of his feedback buried inside these thread. Like when i first joined.......i see many others creating account to post request for your list. Naturally i became one of those since i'm seeking one too. But when you mentioned you stood neutral.......yet you can be replying and bashing negative feedback poster. Reading up your negative list......i was curious how those FSM were admitted into your list. I nv asked for justification or proof for those banished into your bad list.........is my way of respecting your list in a way. Also like you said you're answerable to no one. End of day i'm still fascinated your willingness to reply all the negative feedback. I leave it for all others to read.