Rasp

Hi, For me, I would paint the whole built up dark grey instead of the two colours to do the strip to match the wall since cant get the exact tile color. The whole built up as a single colour would not show it up too 'outstanding' from the background and personally I think its more classy. Just my opinion.

Hello Hippobb, No problem. Think its a common issue for our layout. We also have a king size bed, but the frame etc are already there during reno (cause we didnt shift them out of the house during the reno). Hope your bedframe can go through. Nope, not me.. its wonder-bee family doing the housewarming on Sat. Hee..

Morning Hippobb, Nice progress with your reno. I like the round corner at the living wall. Hee.. By the way, I noticed that you put up a 'wall' at the living (right-side of the living room pic). You might want to be careful with your furniture purchase because the space from the front entrance through the recess area to the main area might not be sufficient for the mover to shift / turn those big bulky furniture (e.g. sofa, bed) in. Wonder-bee (my direct neighbour) also face this issue during his furniture delivery (though he didnt have that wall). Just for you to take note.

Hi Curryqueen, Those look like pole system to me. I think you can easily find them from those companies doing pole/ wardrobe system, e.g. alumix, ximula, osph, closet design. But personally I don't like the design of that pic cause not very useful to keep stuff and easily collect dust.

Good Morning hippobb, Wow.. so our local singer stayed here last time. Im surprised that you got it at 3xxk. Do you mean your valuation was 330K and they sold you at 300K ? We bought ours at 280K (valuation 270K, cov 10K). Infact, few weeks after we sign the agreement to purchase, HDB had a walk-in-selection and there's a identical unit just next block (facing the field/ running track), going at only 260K. We thought we bought this unit expensive. Hee.. By the way, were you discussing your reno stuff with your contractor at the 'chess corner' yesterday evening? Saw a couple there, wondering if its you. Hee..

Hi Hippobb, We shared the same staircase. Yah, wonderbeezz is staying just opposite my unit (same level), same stretch as yours. I managed to spot your windows grill from downstair last evening. Thanks for your invite, will love to pop in when you're done. Always excited to see new layout with the same floor plan. Wonderbeezz's layout totally different from mine. Hee.. we are here for 3 years already. The amenities are good, but would be great if they had more buses for the 315 bus stop. Hee.. now looking forward to the lift completion and NEX opening in Nov. By the way, just curious, how much did you bought your flat at?

Yah, I also noticed this. You might want to try opening the fridge to try out. The fridge usually need some gap at the sides to 'fully open the door', especially if your fridge had 'flap-up' or drawer within. I think we left around 2.5 inches gap between the wall and the door.

Good Morning hippobb, Wow.. so coincidence. The neighbour directly opposite us also in this forum. They also just renovated their place. Which stretch are you at? Along the main lift stretch too? ------ I just went to browse your pics. I think you're same staircase as us cause you got no 'door' at the balcony. Hee..

I think we're staying quite close to each other. My block is also doing the lift upgrading now. We finished our reno last year. Hee.. my t-blog is down there somewhere.

Hi Hippobb, Just saw your t-blog, I think we got the same floorplan. Hee.. Looking at your layout, I guess the mbr will be crampy after building the wiw. By the way, we also went through the same thing about the upstair leakage. I wonder if we had the same MP, ours Mrs Lim.

Actually the grind isn't 'eating' alot into the tiles. If you're worried, maybe ask your contractor to grind a sample to show you first. I think its neater this way cause the pvc strip is actually 'round' corner and it kinda 'pop' out at the right angle. Have your contractor show you the pvc for the floor? If Im not wrong, those pvc strip have limited colour. It will be quite ugly (in my opinion) if the pvc colour isn't close to your floor tiles. Kind of like 'highlighting' that strip on the floor. By the way, your bedroom floor tiles look like my old kitchen floor tiles. Hee..

Wow.. my blog so hidden, you still can find them out. 1st pic, they use pvc trim. 2nd & 3rd pic, they grind it smooth. If for wall, usually they use pvc for the edge. For floor ones are usually grind. I think it will look weird if they use pvc for the floor ones and might be slippery.

Hi sgnick, For our washing machine base and based for toilet pipes, we did round corners (meaning the tiler will use the tiles to create the round corner). Personally I think its neater than to use those pvc tile trims, cause the colour of those pvc tile cant match the tiles exactly.

Hi Angteko, Great progress with your reno! Hee.. Just noticed that the hanging bar for your wardrobe is pretty long. How long is that bar? Is there any support in the centre area? Im thinking that the clothes weight might cause the bar to go 'down' at the middle portion. You might want to get the carpenter to do additional support if there isn't any.

Oh and just to share about the lift upgrading, its voted by the residents, not decided by the hdb. I remember previously when the lift upgrading plan was brought up by hdb, there's alot of meeting with the residents to discuss the most ideal plan to do the lift for those unit not along the stretch of the existing lift (due to the unique structure of the block). Finally they came up with this solution, ie to open the new entrance @ the balcony as if the lift is done @ the stairs flight, the resident still need to climb to reach the lift (like what you mentioned earlier). After they finalise on this plan, then the voting is conducted. During the voting, there's alot of hdb staff around to explain the lift construction and plans to the residents. We did get to vote that time. Hee.. I suppose for those who didnt get to vote, most probably the voting phase had been over already when you purchase the flat.

Hi Rasfene, Good Morning! So excited to see your blog. Your layout is similar to mine, except that my kitchen doesn't have that window in the middle. If Im not wrong, your layout is same as reiki. You might want to take a look at his reno blog, cause he did a wonderful transformation. Hee.. My block is also undergoing lift upgrading. My unit is at the existing lifts lobby stretch so no need to open another entrance @ the balcony, but my neighbours at the other stretch also had to open entrance like yours. Hee.. looking at your final reno layout, its very close to ours as we also 'open' up the kitchen entrance @ that wall, alter the toilet entrance, hacked the store to combine with the room, built another room @ the dining area. But we didnt combine the 2 rooms into a huge mbr, we kept a small room instead, so we got 4 bedrooms. Hee.. We didnt do anything to our balcony as we like to have the balcony. Are you leveling up your balcony to merge with the living rm? Saw the curved lines @ the balcony and kitchen area on your layout plan, are you doing something interesting at those areas? Looking forward to your transformation!

Hee.. then i answer for the singtel portion bah.. For us, the modem is in our mbr and the mio is at the living tv console. 2 option available, either you can ask singtel to run the wire from the modem to the mio (foc, but think that's a limit to the length of the wire), or get a cordless home connect (either rent from singtel or buy from outside). We rented the cordless home connect @ think 5bucks per month to save the hassle of running the wires. I think most people will put the modem next to the mio in the living, if you do so, then there's no need to run wiring or get the home connect as the mio can connect directly to the modem. Hope this helps.

Good Morning Tigertgr, No problem. Good to know that you enjoyed reading my blog and it has somehow helped you. Hee.. you kinda motivated me to sort out my post-reno pics. Ok, shall start sorting them.

Hi Angteko, For us, we switches from starhub to singtel. We found that our internet connection with starhub was very slow and unstable. We rang up starhub several times to check and they even sent their technician down but still nothing improves. My hb terminated the service once the contract was up. According to hb, its likely due to the starhub shared bandwidth. Because we always faced slow connection etc during 'peak' hours like after work hours and during the weekends. And it can get pretty frustrating as those 'peak' hours are also the only hours that we wanted to use it. After we changed to singnet, our connection is much stable and faster compared to the previous provider. Guess there's more starhubber in our estate, so we're glad to have switch over. For the tv content wise, I think starhub tv got more variety. For us, we didnt subscript for mio-tv content, but it comes with free 15movies monthly. So we just watched those free movies monthly.

Hi coldflamez, Welcome!! I noticed from your revised layout that you are going to have a big mbr. I like big rooms. Hee.. But there's also 2 doors drawn on the layout. Are you going to seal up 1 of the door to the new big mbr? For me, I would seal up 1 of the doors and alter the door position of the other room to maximize the room space.

Hi KSJL, If you want to DIY, I think you can get those cement/ grout powder from your contractor. Shouldn't be a problem. I think the tiler / painter will be able to teach you how to mix them to apply. For us, our contractor left us some incase we want to DIY in future. For your grouting, Im not sure if its the HDB whose grouting wasn't done properly in the 1st place or is it the acid wash issue. We redo our flooring and the grouting stay intact after the acid wash. After the acidwash and when the carpentry are 80-90%, our tiler came by to check if anyone 'dirt' the grout during their works and to rectify those affected grouting (ie. for those suppose to be white grouts, there are some black spot on the line, so he fill them back with the white powder mixture). There are some blogs which I read before, most tilers will return to 'refill' the grouts after acid wash when its around handover. We visited one of the forumer's place when she was doing Handover that day and the tiler was around to check her living room tiles grouts and filling those affected grouts.

Hi Tigertgr, Welcome!! Congrats on starting your reno. Didnt know that you got Impress21 to do up your reno. Hee.. Was surprised to see my nick mentioned, no worries. Im also thankful to Xiaobinbin, Wakzool and Oogachaga for sharing their experience with me. You might want to check out their blog too. Hope everything will go smooth for you too. I'll pop in here to check your updates regularly.

Hi Graceakaclouds, Er.. happened to read that impress21 was one of your shortlisted choice. Just to share, our reno was done up by Henry from Impress21. Overall experience was good and Henry was also very responsive during the reno. Hb was the one liaising with Henry and we can reach him easily via sms, email or mobile. He's also very flexible and easy to talk/discuss with when we faced some issue/ changes on the reno. Even after our reno, he remains very responsible and responsive. We are glad to have selected him.

Hi Angteko, I think your ID had the same concerns because he'll be the affected one should the electrical face issue at a later stage as he will need to do those 'cover-up' / rectifications if need to dig up later. Hee.. any way, just make sure everything is in order once the electrical works are done and I suppose you won't be doing pub testing for your unit, right? By the way, your choice of tiles are quite unique. Hee.. seldom see black kitchen wall tiles, red bathroom tiles and grey living floor tiles. Look forward to your end-results.

Hi wcseow, I would prefer tiles over laminates/parquet anytime. Just to share, my neighbour at my parents' place also went for laminates/parquet (cant remember, but are those wood planks kind) previously. When I went over to 'play' at her house last time, her bedroom's flooring was like 'full of holes' at those joints/between the 'plank'. I saw ants and those small cockroaches crawling into those holes. Very scary. And there's no way to clean the area under the laminates/parquet or 'catch' those insects crawling beneath it. I cant imagine sleeping above 'them' daily. I think cleaning and maintenance wise, tiles are easier. My mum like to use hot water to mop her tiled floor bi-weekly. Don't think can do that on laminate/parquet as they usually need to use some specific cleaner for cleaning. And I think tiles are more scratches resistant than laminate/parquet. For Hb & I, we never consider parquet/laminates before so didnt really do much research on it. Maybe those with laminate/parquet can provide a totally different view.