The One With The Gargantuan Task

[schiz0id 0]

The One with the Gargantuan Task - this whole project is indeed a COLOSSAL one. As I will slowly divulge during this whole renovation journey.

Finally got our keys today!

Decided to share this whole experience in this t-blog hoping it will help someone in similar situations or let those of us with similar experiences seek solace in one another

If you prefer to look only at the photos (as I sometimes do), just follow the captions underneath each photo (I will try to post as many photos as I can each day to share the progress of our reno works!) Enjoy your stay here!

[schiz0id 0]

House Hunting

Who knew searching for a place would take us months? My parents never had that much trouble finding a place before, when we settled at our old place 17 years ago. Maybe having 3 grown-up kids now, with differing views does make that much of a difference Or maybe it’s the decision to seek advice from a fengshui master that makes house hunting that teeny weeny bit more tedious than before And just maybe, this time I was adamant we didn’t go through an agent to find our ideal place. All that scouring on propertyguru and classifieds got more dreary as the weeks wore on. Acting on my parents’ behalf with the calling and setting appointments, I had my fair share of nasty agents who refused to deal with direct buyers and agents who tried to push their partners to me when we went for viewing.

Anyhoo, went to view this place in May. Immediately after first viewing, we were very interested and asked the agent for a floor plan so that we can show our fsm to see if this was suitable for us. However, we were told the sellers couldn't decide if they wanted to sell. (Yup, this was an hour after they let dozens of people in to view their place ) Disappointed, we continued hunting for a place to call home. After a month, agent got back to us to say sellers decided to sell and are not opening up another viewing and asked if we would like to make an offer. Without much hassle, managed to settle on a price.

After searching for 3 months, after almost 30 house viewings later and after our fsm had previously rejected 4 other floor plans we had sent him, we finally decided to put down a deposit for a place that could accommodate all of us comfortably (my parents, two brothers and me) Venturing out of our comfort zone in the NE was a difficult one to make, seeing how we wanted to get an EA or something bigger we figured we had to look elsewhere. Finally, settled in the town of Yishun

This is HDB's floor plan for our unit.

Using the HDB plan, tweaked it to reflect what the sellers did to the place.

[Edit: Uploaded a more accurate current floor plan]

Edited October 11, 2011 by schiz0id

[schiz0id 0]

VOILA!

Our new floor plan, as per our fsm.

Lots of changes will be made. And seeing how we have less than 7 weeks in total to finish this whole renovation. I guess now you will understand why I say it's a Gargantuan Task!

And the selection of IDs sure didn't make the whole task easy. Will explain more in my later posts. Choosing an ID is really an ORDEAL.. *pulls hair* I was almost bald at my temples for a few weeks!

Coming back to this. These are the major changes he has made to the existing place. Let me try to do this systematically room to room.

- Balcony will be hacked off and leveled to be part living room, part store room.

- Studio (newly termed Master Bedroom) will be my parents' room and the toilet will be extended. Wall near Study will be hacked to accommodate their wardrobe.

- Study (would have been hacked to be a bigger kitchen if my mum had her way but for FS reasons, it has to be a study or R&R area?

- Kitchen will now have a dry/wet area. Original entrance will be sealed and wall to dining will be hacked for open concept kitchen.

- Wall erected at dry kitchen to block toilet from wet kitchen?

- Bedroom 3 (which is super duper puny, and which I made lots of fuss over with my fsm) will see the wall with BR4 hacked and erected back to original wall position (as per HDB). Wall will be extended out to dining to accommodate my wardrobe.

Many ID/Contractors we went to said it was very tough to meet our 6-7 week's deadline. We have little choice since we have to vacate in exactly 8 weeks from today!

[pebbles 0]

Very entertaining blog..Will surely follow your journey closely

[pebbles 0]

Very entertaining blog..Will surely follow your journey closely

[sleek 2]

wow, really a huge undertaking. welcome to t-blog and i enjoy your narration style

[schiz0id 0]

Thanks pebbles and sleek!

Don't be shy to give comments and suggestions. Have lots to learn from many of you here

[schiz0id 0]

Sleek, love your 23ft walk-in wardrobe!

Will KIV that when I get my own place in a few years' time *fingers crossed* Haha!

[schiz0id 0]

ID/Contractor Selection (Part 1)

We were going back and forth on this. First we couldn’t decide on which to choose (that seems to be the age old question here) - ID or contractor?

My brother and I started out being very adamant about getting a Contractor. For us, since much of the colors and orientation of our furniture is more or less fixed, we thought it might be a waste to go with an ID. So we went to a Contractor (comes highly recommended from the threads here), and armed with our floor plan, wanted to get a rough idea of how much it will cost and the timeframe we should be looking at. After telling the lady what we wanted, we asked her how much it will cost and how long it will take to complete the whole house. She said she couldn’t quote us yet cos she needed to check with someone else. The timeframe she gave - earliest will be 6 weeks. Said she will get back to me the following week. Her call never came.

While we were waiting for this contractor to call back, mum had sent in our floor plan to i-compare to see who would reply us. The next day, she had a flurry of calls and SMSes. She made appointment with the first 4 firms, while the rest had to be put on hold cos our schedules were conflicting.

Who knew talking about the same thing over and over could be so tiring? After our 3rd meeting with the IDs, we realised we couldn’t hit our initial target of meeting 10 firms. So we stopped at 3. Not sure if it was the wisest move, but that’s bygones so let’s look ahead.

Long story short, we met up with 3 IDs and this was how it all went down. (For the sake of anonymity, we shall call them A,B and C)

A - an ID at IMM. No chemistry. No communication. Simply put, No Good.

B - an ID in the NE. My parents loved him. Showed us his showroom. Impressive. Looks like a decent goody-two-shoes ID.

C - an ID in the East. Very polite. Tried to help us save money and time but we needed to change EVERYTHING. Had to tell him a few times, “we need to change everything”.

From first impressions, B seems to be leading the pack. Not much of a pack since only him and C.

[gnipihz 1]

If you need to change everything, (i guess includes hacking and tiling), then 6 - 7 weeks for such a big place will be a challenge!!! Your plan shows hack walls, relocate bedroom doors, relocate bathroom doors...

Better state it very clearly to your contractor about the timing. Maybe can even put a delay penalty. hahaha. Joking.

Anyway, hoping to see your design! The place is big and spacious! The idea of hacking the wall for wardrobe in bedroom 3 is very good!

[schiz0id 0]

Thanks gnipihz! I need that space cos i'm lugging a Queen size bed over

Actually, there is really a delay penalty clearly stated on the contract! Thanks to the insistence of my dad. But we have stressed this at every single meeting with our ID that we are more concerned about handover date cos we die die also need to move in before first week of December.

Will try to post the designs up soon!

[Kobelala 8]

U have a very very huge floor area

Blk 600 plus I guess, always wonder how those huge jumbo flats looks like when I see the long row of windows, will be "stalking" your tblog closely

[schiz0id 0]

Hey Kobelala, thanks! Huge but not the biggest. Ours is 163sqm. I think woodlands have got 180sqm houses!

And yeah, you're right. It is Blk 600+. Will post more photos soon!

[pebbles 0]

Can't wait to see your before & after pics..

[schiz0id 0]

PHOTOS BEFORE RENOVATION (Part 1)

One of the reasons why we liked this place after the first viewing. Our immediate neighbour is at the right turn after this long corridor infront of the main door. So just imagine an L, with us on one end of the L, two other neighbours on the other side of the L.

The new living room and study area. The opening you see on the right is the current entrance to the kitchen. That will be sealed up and the adjacent wall (out of view) will be hacked for the open concept kitchen.

Current kitchen. This area will be our new dry kitchen. Where the sink now sits will be hacked away to accommodate more walking space.

One of the few units in this whole block that still has an open balcony. Many homeowners in this block have extended their living room out to the balcony. And we are going to do likewise to extend our living and create a new storeroom here. Previous owner hacked off original store room in the kitchen so there is no storeroom in the house currently.

Edited October 30, 2011 by schiz0id