dizyweds

Our Experience with Interior Designers Not sure if we are able to pinpoint the IDs by name.. So we are just gonna abbreviate their company names.. If there are those who are interested in finding out who exactly they are, can always PM us.. However, we must also clarify that having one experience with one interior designer in a particular company does not mean that you will get the same experience as us.. So please take our post with a pinch of salt, just for your information purpose.. I.H. Well, nothing much to say about them because after dropping by and having a one hour chat with one of their designers, we did not hear any news from them thereafter. Some might ask why we did not call to check/follow up.. We feel that if even in the beginning phase (when we haven't even signed on the dotted line), they do not have the initiative to follow up with us (even when they said they would), it probably means that if we were to engage him, we would have a hard time contacting him during our renovation.. R.R. A big company, but the ID we talked to belongs to Category 3 (refer to previous post). She seemed pretty inexperience and the quotation she gave us was horrendously expensive.. What made us turned off was the fact that in that horrendously expensive quotation was a TV feature wall for our MBR and the material used was gypsum board.. We asked her what that was and she said, "Oh, it's quite a flimsy material, not very good quality, that's why we are using it in the MBR, the living room will be using something of better quality." ??? So... if the quality was not good, why are you using it for our reno? And why is the quotation so high?? In the quotation, she also quoted for clearing of debris.. When we asked, why do we need to pay $500 for this? She says it's to clear the wood left over from the carpentry works done.. ??? There is completely NO hacking in our requirements.. None of the other IDs quoted us this.. So she was trying to rip us off? Do take note for those with no hacking works that this clearing of debris charge is completely NOT NECESSARY AT ALL.. A.D. We had a pretty good impression of this company.. This company belongs to Category 1.. Their past works look good and before you sign, they are willing to show you one 3D drawing of their proposed layout.. Pretty good ideas coming from the ID we spoke to.. We were very eager to find our after our first meeting, what he had in store for our home.. On the second meeting, he showed us the quotation which came up to be a little over budget but was still the lowest then. With the price and the ID belonging to Category 1, we were just one step away from signing with this ID... But then, came the third meeting... We had an idea and we were pretty set on doing it our way as we felt that his plan wasn't to our liking.. However, he wasn't very receptive to our ideas and tried to insist on his own.. This got us a little worried that if we do sign with him, along the way, when we felt we wanted certain things our way, he would not do it for us.. Ultimately, he gave in when we insisted (again and again).. But that came with a price increase and from a little over budget, it became more than a little over budget.. He also sarcastically said that that was the price for wanting our idea.. Ok, so this ID was then ON HOLD... B.D We spoke to a very friendly ID who gave us very practical ideas.. We had a good chat on the first meeting, but the problem came on our second meeting. The quotation was much lower than we had expected and we were pretty happy to see a smaller number after so many high numbers.. But words like, "I'll show you the color chart then you can choose what colour you want to match." and " Ok, so you want this here and want this here." finally showed us that he belonged to Category 2.. It wasn't a bad thing, just that we were really looking for someone to design our home and do all the necessary colour, design coordination without us having to worry about our lack of design sense.. Otherwise, there is no point in getting a "ID".. He was a very practical guy whom constantly advised us that we will someday be daddy and mummy and we need to plan for that.. So, our ideas were slowly thrown out of the quotation as they were "not practical for kids".. At the same time, the quotation numbers were getting smaller and smaller which we should be happy about but looking at our "dream home" design becoming a "no-design" home got our spirits lower as well.. We would definitely recommend him if your reno requires no design and it's just carpentry work.. Then again, contractors might be cheaper.. S.D Similar to I.H, nothing much to talk about as after the first phone call, he promise to contact us again with his proposed design a week later.. But we never heard from him again... Debbie Decor Interior Well, as you can see, we spelt out the name of this Interior Designer, which also means that we have engaged them.. Johnson was recommended to us by our good friend who engaged him about 1.5 years ago to renovate her new place in Punggol.. Our first meeting went very well.. He was a good listener who hears what we want.. He then digests them and advises us on whether it was feasible or if there was a better way in doing it.. He gave us a proposed idea for our kitchen which none of the other IDs had thought of.. We particularly liked it as it was practical and does not compromise on the design.. In fact, we feel that it gave our kitchen a much sleeker look.. He was also able to draw 3D drawings on blank paper of his proposed layout and that gave us a better visualization of what he meant.. Again, none of the other IDs we met did that.. On our second meeting, his quotation blew us away.. Not very, very cheap but lesser for more compared to the others.. We were initially worried about the quality as it could have been compromised due to the lower pricing but were soon assured by him after asking tons of questions.. We then visited our dear friend's home to have a look at the workmanship and was pleasantly happy with the condition of them even after 1.5 years.. In addition, we felt comfortable communicating with him and therefore decided to engage him.. So the excitement officially begins...

Interior Designers (Or Not) After meeting with a number of Interior Designers, both of us have categorized them into 3 main categories.. Category 1) The real ID, ID - Designer who designs your home, propose materials, color schemes, etc and also advise you on your furniture/fixing choices.. Quotation is not very cheap, but shouldn't be crazily high as well.. Category 2) ID-Contractor - These type of ID will follow everything u want to the T... Basically u tell them all your criteria and they will draw them on your floor plan for you (I'm sure a lot of free websites offer these kind of DIY function).. Colour schemes will also be chosen by you.. Therefore, if you meet with these IDs, their quotation should be cheaper than those in Category 1.. Category 3) ID-Salesman - Basically, these are the ones who only roughly tell u your space planning, know a bit but not much... Ultimate goal is to psycho u to sign up a package with them.. If you say you wanna change any layout they will tell u,"OK, I'll go and plan, redraw then we will meet again". They will then submit the changes to their company's 'real' designer to do the stuff... Having said that, based on our experience, this category of IDs charged us horrendously high..

Hi All, Welcome to our T-Blog... We are currently awaiting the arrival of our keys to our first home in Coral Spring and like all eager soon-to-be home owners, we've started to meet with Interior Designers, bugged friends who have contacts for good deals (furniture, lights, anything to do with setting up a new home) and also visited any furniture malls / shops we can think of, even though we have no idea what was going to be suitable.. We hope that by penning down our renovation footprints in this T-blog, it will help us to keep track of what we've done, our thoughts on certain shops, furniture styles etc, so we won't lose them as we continue to recce other options. At the same time, we hope our research, ideas or thoughts can be shared with everyone.. Please feel free to comment on any of our posts.. We definitely appreciate your feedback.. =) 请多多指教... First up, our premium flat 4-room floor plan... Floor Plan by dizy.weds, on Flickr

ya.. probably really not fated... every other ID we met called us promptly to followup except for them...

we didn't have the best of impression with Ideal House.. we walk-in and spoke to 1 of their staff, handed them our floor plan and requirements.. he was supposed to get back to us within a week on the layout and quotation but it is now the 3rd week and we have not hear from him at all... In our perspective, if the ID is not the least responsive even before clinching the deal, imagine what can happen when renovation kicks off and u are looking for him? anyway, this is just to share our experience with them and by no means condemning them as i believe everyone will have their very own experience/impressions...

actually if u are not sure, u can just ask ur agt to talk to buyer's agt (or directly with the buyer if u're not dealing with agt) whether they are ok with u bringing these stuff with u... simply becos the buyer may already have plans to remove and discard them during renovation!! =)

Thank you so much, paulskl.. I was fiddling around various banks' online calculators and was really puzzled becos for some, the EIR is much higher than of another bank and yet the monthly repayment is lesser...

HI paulskl, thanks for your explanation... so, the EIR is for apple to apple comparison between banks only?? are we able to calculate our monthly installments based on EIR or do we have to use only the flat rate???

Hi, can someone explain to me about Effective Interest Rate?? When we check out on reno loans by the bank, what interest rate do we wanna look at? and how do we calculate the total interest we are paying as well as the monthly instalments...

Anyone heard of Bryan from Ideal House?