Rasp

Hi Yuene, I see i see. From your kitchen pic, I guess your house don't have any beam running across. Your previous owner seems to have hacked alot of stuff, e.g. the wall between the kitchen and living. Hee.. can help you save abit of hacking cost and waiting time for permit approval.

Hi Heartya, I think the common range for carpentry is around the range that I post previously. I cant comment whether it is overpriced anot by just that item. Because I noticed that for most quotes, the contractors/ID will quote some items higher, some items lower and some f.o.c. items. So it depends on the rest of the items whether they are quoted lower to absorb this.

Hi Sugardaddy, Welcome!! Nice squarish layout. Hee.. very good for planning. What is the size of your flat? Look very spacious. By the way, the condition of your marble floor look very good on the pics. Very shiny even without the polish yet.

Hi Doremon2009, Er... seems like some sage you have with your renovator. If they are still ok to work with, maybe try to focus on moving forward. Otherwise, you might want to cut the losses and look for another one. You are right, there's alot of info at RT but need alot of digging and reading. Hee.. By the way, I didnt do any homogenous / wooden flooring for living/bedrms, cant help you on it. Hope someone can share their experience with you.

Hi Dannywmp, Welcome!! I noticed that you got your stuff from GR link. Hee.. Me too~ Quite nice to liaise with Benny and wifey. I think we got the same common bathroom basin and tap. Hee.. We also renovated our existing place. Unlike the rest where they pack and move once, we got to pack twice... 1 time going out before reno, 1 time coming back. Heehee.. good thing is... you going to throw alot of stuff. Lessen the load to carry. Have you managed to get a place to stay during reno?

I forgot to mention, I think your ID very detailed. She didnt tile the wall around the windows first and waited for the new window to be installed. Very careful and detailed planning. Because by doing this way, your windows will be 'straight line' with the tiling. There are some contractors that just tiled the whole area as it will cost them if they get the tiler down another trip. For us, my contractor requested for us to arrange our kitchen and toilets' window to be installed once the hacking is done (think 1st week of reno), so that the tiling will not be delayed. Our toilet window 'frame' is flat with the wall tile.

Hi Merryman, Wow... alot of pics at 1 go. Hee.. I like your common toilet wall tiles. Very clean and cheerful. We wanted to go for such combine initially, but didnt see any of such during our tile selections. Very nice. By the way, you mentioned earlier that your original kitchen cabinet design got to change to facing ones due to water pipes. What was the issue with the water pipe? Is it the drainage/ water inlet? Think your reno progressing very well, with the wet works almost done up.. can start the carpentry soon. Hope everything goes smoothly for you and wifey.

Hi JandG, Welcome!! Is your reno completed already? Hope everything goes smooth for you. By the way, how does waterproofing for the cabinet base make the cabinet last longer? Im puzzled. I thought water suppose to flow downward, thats why the whole kitchen floor are waterproof to prevent water seepage to the neighbour below. How does the water proofing protect the cabinet which sit on top of the base? Er.. the 'quick quiz'..... is that for concealed water massager?

Hee.. my hb is doing the 'an chuang' thingy this morning. I wanted to take leave but didnt, cause thought of saving the leaves for my wedding. We aren't on lift landing also, 1 storey down. But the block is currently doing upgrading for the lift, think need another 1 yr to have lift servicing at my level. Ummm.. maybe you want to take a pic of your flat exterior and ask around for ideas. Hee.. I thinking of buying a green plant to put left side of my gate, cause look quite empty at that corner and also can hide the pipe. PS. just realised that my previous gate pic didnt capture the pipe on the left. Heehee.. my photography skill not bad, will automatically omit those ugly stuff. Hehee..

Thanks kopi. Hee.. I think this is one of the more common gate design at RT. The only difference is the plate in the center that we added. Are you changing your gate?

Hi feimei, Nope, my kitchen cabinets doesn't have slow-closing. Can top up abit for it, but hb thinks that slow-closing is 'tougher' to open esp. since we didnt do handles for the cabinets. My carpenter helped us to paste those little plastic 'cushion' at the cabinet doors to cushion the impact slightly. Hee..

Hi MTlot, If you want to plaster that area to remove the bulge area, do indicate to your contractor that the plastering is to remove the bulge. Because for some contractors, their 'understanding' of plastering is just to smooth out the wall and not 'even' out the wall. Some will tell you that the wall cant be 'even' out since the wall original condition is already uneven and to even out, need to put alot of plaster at some spots which is not possible as the plaster will crack. Actually I didnt notice the bulge until blackcar pointed it out.

Hi Goodman123, Welcome!! Congrats on the start of your reno!! Any pre-reno pics to share?

Hi momo13, I am not sure about the face plate and prices cause my hb was doing liaising with the electrician. I just noticed that you are putting 2 pts at utility room. Are you having more than 1 pc at the utility room? Actually you only need to have 1 pt at the utility room, just need to get a 'switch' where you can plug your pcs into it for the connection. This is the brief understanding that I got when my electrician is explaining to hb (because hb also want 2 pt at a particular room). You might want to check with your electrician.

Hi, During my reno search, most of the renovator (contractors) quote around $180 to $250 pft for wardrobe. And the laminate finish is only for the exterior with white pvc for the interiors. There's another kind of brown pvc kind of interior finish but slightly more expensive. The difference between Ikea one is, the wood used for carpentry on the wardrobe. Most of the contractors quoted for solid plywood as the material for wood. For Ikea, my previous understanding is they used compressed wood. My old ikea coffee table was made of compressed wood and circles of molds grew out from underneath it within months of using. We didnt notice it as we didnt really look under the table. But the molds will dropped off to the ground as powder stuff. Its only when we noticed the floor always having white powdery stuff that we went around to check. The moment we look under the table, both of us got a shock! Many many circle of molds under the table. Very scary, since then I don't dare to buy ikea wood stuff.

For us, hb also called Gain City to dismantle our old aircon. We traded in our old aircons. There's no additional charge. Our sale person from Gain City told us that there is only additional charge if we want them to come 2 visits, 1 for installing the compressor first and the other one to run the trunking.

Hi Pinklady, If I am not wrong, Doremon bought her house from HDB direct. Her seller = HDB. Hence, she's waiting for HDB to retify those defects.

Hihi red_devil, Hee.. we originally thinking of moving back last friday. But hb got some last min work commitments, hence it didnt come true. The next available fs date for us is tomorrow. Hee.. hb probably want to go for it. Wow.. dragon background.. such a powerful design. Hee.. we didnt expect the uncle to paste the number for us. I thought silver will go better with my gate lever knob. Hee.. what do you intend to do for your number?

Thanks worldangel. Only our wall tiles are white. Hee.. glad that it turned out ok.

I think the flat design look pretty good. Something different from the usual console type. Think its pretty cool to have your gadgets hidden in the feature wall. My initial design for console was something flat and suspended, didn't managed to do it cause it will look bulky from the angle we stepped into the house. Since you seldom cook, should be ok ba. Otherwise, if really not enough, can buy those granite top moveable one (with wheels) to put infront of your fridge/ passageway. Hee..

Hee.. We also got our sofa at the same place. I sort-of froze for a minute when I saw your sofa. Very very similar to the one that we bought. hee.. we are still crossing our fingers for our sofa at the moment cause we only read about their 'stories' after we return from our purchase. Hopefully everything will be good.

Hi red_devil, Wow.. seems like your carpentry are almost finishing. Hee.. can move in soon. By the way, do your wardrobe door have the 'mao mao' stripe at both side of the doors? I noticed that for the first pic, the center one doesn't seem to have. I also like the storage space at your study. But I noticed that the 'drop-down' from the ceiling seems to be abit low with the false ceiling etc. Er.. the drop-down may affect the putting of stuff at the top shelving in the storage. But for yours, seems ok, as you didn't put the top shelf very high also. Will you be adding doors to it? Hee.. I am quite particular/sensitive about this 'drop-down' thingy because my previous pole system was built behind a beam. The beam is very much in the way when we want to put/take stuff from the top. Hence, this time round, hb specifically ask that the top portion to be minimize as much as possible.

Good Morning Forkie, We didnt really face any issue with the calling part, probably cause we didnt ask for boxes. My mum was also impressed with their speed and carefulness with stuff. Luckily everything turn out ok for you in the end.

Hi discoburg, Congrats on the starting of your reno. Your house look huge from those pre-reno pics. Very spacious living, dining, and the kitchen even have a service yard at the back. Looking forward to the transformation of your flat.

Hi Goobii, Welcome! Your floorplan look quite familar cause one of the showflat that an ID brought us previously was at dover with the same utility room at the corner of the kitchen with the 'slanting' entrance. The couple combined the toilet into one and opened another entrance at bedroom 2. Meaning the toilet is accessable from both the bedroom and kitchen (2 doors). Hee.. quite interesting concept.