Less Is More~ Our 1St New House

[sweetpoison 0]

Happy Blessed 2014 to everyone!

After months of viewing countless flats, my man & I finally found one that we both like. It was not an easy journey for the both of us. A long checklist to go before we decided to send in the OTP. Our first appt was in early Oct, second was in mid Nov, and we really want to have our new place before CNY! Thus, we tried our best to get as many quotations as possible, meeting as many IDs/Contractors as possible, weeks before our first appt (talking about "kiasu"..)

And of course, all the priceless experiences & sharings on Renotalk have helped us ALOT! Thank you all!

Now it's our turn to share our reno journey. Hopefully it will help others and at the same time, get more advises!

Here goes our floor plan -

The reasons why we love this unit:

-Enough rooms for all.

-Large living area for family & friends.

-Lift landing.

-Blah Blah Blah.... the list goes on...

-Best part: The Access Balcony was bought over by the first owner!!

Edited January 3, 2014 by sweetpoison

[sweetpoison 0]

As our new place needs an overhaul & we wanted to move in before CNY, we had a hard time looking for the right person for our renovation. Not forgetting that we also want it done within our budget.

We were bombarded with many referrals from family & friends, as well as IDs from those 'no obligations; get free quotations' online links. After much considerations, we shortlisted 2.

1) Mr A (after reading his many projects here) - He was paitent and nice. He actually revised our quotations many times with no complaints, even replied my emails late at night! Though he does not really gives much ideas like an ID, his pricelist is not any cheaper than one.

2) San from Urban Design - A soft spoken young chap that gave us a very honest & sincere first impression. We actually worried about his experiences in this field, however he told us that he has been in this line for around 3 years. His pricelist is really competitive and most important of all, my man prefers him. So we signed on the dotted line with San.

Edited January 3, 2014 by sweetpoison

[sweetpoison 0]

This is how the place looked like when we got our keys..

The kitchen

[sweetpoison 0]

Living & Dining

[sweetpoison 0]

I am not going to post all the pre reno pics in one go as I planned to show more pics as my t-blog goes along. Meanwhile, I'm gonna share how we want our new place to look like!

I wanted to have a Country-side theme for the place but my man managed to convince me to have no theme and to keep the reno as simple as possible. Reason being.... "See sian already how?? Very hard to change everything.."

And so, yea, we are not going to have any theme.. Keeping the reno basic & simple, so in the future, we can just change the furnishing for new looks as and when we want to. I like the sound of that...

So this is what we planned for the new layout.

BEFORE

AFTER

Main changes:

1) Shift the current main door to the start of the access area. Tile the area and install windows. Hack off the wall of the current entrance.

2) Hack half of the kitchen wall down to open up the space & seal up the current entrance.

3) Change the common toilet entrance so I can have space for laundry.

4) Hack the store for our bedroom wardrobe and seal up the current door.

5) The previous owners have already hacked the study room, so we are keeping it as it is in order to enjoy a bigger living /dining area.

Edited January 4, 2014 by sweetpoison

[ItsOurHome 0]

Hi Sweetpoison,

Congratulations on the purchased of your house... I LOVE the flooring of your living room. Its so hard to find such beautiful stones these days.. Are you going to keep it? With just a polish the whole house will look very posh & swanky.. Just cant stop drooling over it.. Do you know what time of stone it is?

[OceanEleven 203]

Main changes:

1) Shift the current main door to the start of the access area. Tile the area and install windows. Hack off the wall of the current entrance.

Very eager to see the changes on this part. Do you need to apply permit for this?

[HanTu 0]

Congratulations on your new house and hope to see more updates on your reno progress!

[vicx1234 38]

Main changes:

1) Shift the current main door to the start of the access area. Tile the area and install windows. Hack off the wall of the current entrance.

2) Hack half of the kitchen wall down to open up the space & seal up the current entrance.

3) Change the common toilet entrance so I can have space for laundry.

4) Hack the store for our bedroom wardrobe and seal up the current door.

5) The previous owners have already hacked the study room, so we are keeping it as it is in order to enjoy a bigger living /dining area.

Hi sweetpoison, welcome to renotalk. That's a good idea to make use of your previous store room as a wiw, plus it's right outside your toilet.

I am very jealous of your super large living space! Looking forward to see how you will make use of it.

What will be your renovation theme?

[Harriette 42]

Main changes:

1) Shift the current main door to the start of the access area. Tile the area and install windows. Hack off the wall of the current entrance.

Hi there,

Nice place! And very beautiful flooring in the living room. Does HDB allow you to shift your main door to the start of the access area? That will be really nice.

[multi888 1]

Welcome to Rt, can't wait to see the end result.

[sweetpoison 0]

Hi Sweetpoison,

Congratulations on the purchased of your house... I LOVE the flooring of your living room. Its so hard to find such beautiful stones these days.. Are you going to keep it? With just a polish the whole house will look very posh & swanky.. Just cant stop drooling over it.. Do you know what time of stone it is?

Hi ItsOurHome,

I believe the flooring is a gem! I am okay keeping it but my man said nooooooooo...

He prefers clean white look, so we hacked it.

My dad did mentioned that the floor is good to keep, I can't rem what stone he said it was. Just rem that he said even if I can find the similar looking one, the quality of it will not be as good as this. Felt that it's such a pity that we decided to hack it away...

Will show some photos of the floor in my later posts.

[ItsOurHome 0]

Hi ItsOurHome,

I believe the flooring is a gem! I am okay keeping it but my man said nooooooooo...

He prefers clean white look, so we hacked it.

My dad did mentioned that the floor is good to keep, I can't rem what stone he said it was. Just rem that he said even if I can find the similar looking one, the quality of it will not be as good as this. Felt that it's such a pity that we decided to hack it away...

Will show some photos of the floor in my later posts.

It's such a pity that its been hacked away. It's a gem ...l doubt it's easy to find this stone and won't come cheap either.

[sweetpoison 0]

Congratulations on your new house and hope to see more updates on your reno progress!

Thank you Eno!! Will keep posting till the end of my reno!

Hi sweetpoison, welcome to renotalk. That's a good idea to make use of your previous store room as a wiw, plus it's right outside your toilet.

I am very jealous of your super large living space! Looking forward to see how you will make use of it.

What will be your renovation theme?

Hi Vicx1234, having a WIW wasn't in our inital planning actually. It just came to me that since we are getting a King size bed, the room will not have much space left for our wardrobes! So I suggested to my man if we can hack the store down and he said yes! LOL! Now we have a bigger space for the wardrobe, we might as well make it a Walk in!

As for theme wise, like I mentioned in my earlier post, we decided having no theme, so we can just change the furnitures in the future for new looks whenever we want to.

Hi there,

Nice place! And very beautiful flooring in the living room. Does HDB allow you to shift your main door to the start of the access area? That will be really nice.

Hi Harriette! Love your EM especially your glass balcony! How's your reno going?

I dunno if we need to apply permit for shifting the main door. I didn't even think of it till you asked.. I think I have to check it out. Thanks for the reminder!

Welcome to Rt, can't wait to see the end result.

Thanks multi888!!

[sweetpoison 0]

It's such a pity that its been hacked away. It's a gem ...l doubt it's easy to find this stone and won't come cheap either.

I totally agreed. Haiz...