Mission (Almost) Impossible - 25K 4Rm Bto Renovation

[souler87 0]

Hi Jez,

Mind PM me your contractor contacts? Thanks in advance.

[aurora 1]

Hi,

Your blog is very interesting, can you share the taobao link on where you bought the led motion sensor light for your kitchen? Which forwarder did you use?

Thanks!

[doraemon0410 0]

Hi Jez, am totally inspired by the work done for your house! Can you send me the numbers for contractors J and E please? Thanks!

[lktw 0]

Hi Jez2014, decided to open an account after read your post. A nice house indeed! Can share your contractor's details please? TIA

[styybt79 0]

Hi,

it's really a great T blog and thanks for sharing.

Do you mind if you can share the contact of your contractor with me as I m looking for a contractor to Reno my new bio flat.

Thank you

[peachpokka 0]

Hi Jez, thanks so much for your sharing. Much appreciated!

[Maloz69 0]

Hi Jez,

Could you please share the contact of the contractor ?

Thank you !

[Choy Kuan Foo 0]

Thanks for sharing Jez!

[oreo 0]

Hi

Your house looks great, and would greatly appreciate if you could share your Contractors contact please.

Thanks

[lahahe 0]

Hello Jez2014! can you provide me with a detailed quotation/price and the contact of your contractor? many thanks!!

[iluvspree 0]

Hi Jez2014,

Appreciate your time to reply and valuable tips/info shared.

Cheers!

[tangle 0]

Hi Jez2014,

The carpentry looks absolutely awesome.

May i ask for the contact of the contractor?

Thank you.

[Relacker 1]

Do note that for fabrif if you buy from Taobao , make sure you wash all covers . The dust , bacteria accumulated from warehouse or forwarder warehouse will cause skin to itch. Do consider a high end vacuum cleaner too like Delfin or rainbow, you will be surprise how much dirt and bugs, germs it can suck up from a seemingly clean sofa or bed.

Renotalk. After this, I no talk

I now have a real home to clean, and a baby to wean. So I'm going to have to make this quick, and use this post to discuss four things:

1. Reveal our final renovation budget, and some tips

2. Talk about our movers - they are a team of ex-drug addicts and/or ex-convicts who have turned over a new leaf.

3. Tips for moving house

4. That Taobao Sofa

1. Our final renovation budget

The final cost of renovations came to an auspicious $28,888.

Our initial budget was $25k, and we could have stayed on budget had we:

a. NOT installed the glass door for the kitchen (about $800-900)

b. NOT installed the folding table for our MBR (about $500)

c. NOT built the full height cabinets in baby's room (about $1.5k)

Most of the above was added as an afterthought.

We compared about 7 quotations from different companies, and I remember contractor JE's prices - for some items, they are actually mid range (means, not cheap), but they seem to be quite cheap for carpentry.

ALWAYS REMEMBER TO BARGAIN! Our final renovation costs was $31++k, but we bargained this down to $28,888. Even our initial quotation from JE was about $27k, but we bargained that down to $24,888. Throughout the WHOLE negotiation, we were very clear that our budget was $25k. You need to let them know.

PLEASE BUDGET FOR APPLIANCES. Our household appliances, air con, TVs, Eubiq system and random crap (like cleaning towels, mops, decor items, storage boxes etc) easily cost us $15k in total!

2. Our Movers (really moved us!)

They're called the Gethsemane Ministry. You can read more about them here.

There is a similar moving team called the Helping Hand, you can read about them here.

Both are Christian/Church affiliated organizations, and although we are both NOT Christian, we feel that they are worthwhile causes. The moving fee also seems reasonable. Gethsemane Ministry charges $300 per 15 foot truck, and Helping Hands charges $400 per 15 foot truck.

Service: Gethsemane Movers

Gethsemane Ministry is wonderful to work with!

They are so polite its almost funny!

All these big burly men with ang kong (dialect: tattoos), then speak like elves and tiptoe gently in your house dancing like pixies...

Two to three weeks before moving, we called them to make a "survey/appointment". They will come to your EXISTING place, to see how much furniture and/or stuff you have to move. Based on what we showed them, the estimated one 15 foot truck would be enough. We were given an afternoon slot, 2pm.

They provide exactly 30 boxes, and additional boxes (if required) may be purchased at $2 each. The boxes are of a good size, but a little on the short side. Some of our taller items had to be packed in our own boxes (we have alot of boxes from our Taobao adventures).

The only minus point of the whole experience was that they were held up by their morning appointment. Apparently the morning home owner had a couple of furniture to dismantle and reassemble, which held them up. Bo pian. Wait lor. They arrived close to 4.30pm.

The team was 8 men strong, or 8 strong men, both sentence structures work . Armed with their trolleys, they shrink wrapped our bed and everything was moved from our existing flat (parent's place lah) to our new BTO in about an hour. Much WOW! They were also very careful with our fragile boxes - something I liked. They made sure the fragile boxes were the last to be loaded, and also the last to be unloaded. Not that there's any advantage to being last - but at least they were aware which were fragile!

The final cost was indeed $300, no hidden charges. As a token of goodwill, we gave each of the movers a nice red packet... drink. HAHA. Kidding. Got both packet drink and red packet lar.

3. Tips for Moving House

We thought we would also share some simple tips when moving house. Not saying that we are very smart, we just happened to read them!

1. Newspapers. Few months before moving, you can start to store newspapers. Yes. No more selling to the karang guni for twenty cents. In fact, if he comes to your house, you ask him to sell you big stack for twenty cents. See he happy or not LOL. Newspapers are a very cheap way to stuff boxes so the contents won't shake around, and for regular items, can absorb some shock. (Bubble wrap is still MUCH better for very fragile items - I won't recommend newspapers for fragile things.)

2. Label. Every box you pack should be labelled with its contents - so you know which to unpack first. For example, on moving day, you dua lau sai (hokkien: big diarrhea), you better know quickly which box contains your toilet paper. You should also label the ROOM it goes to. That way, you can get the movers to put the boxes in the correct rooms for you, rather than everything dump into the living room and "later then sort".

3. Red color paper or tape. Use red papers or tape to tape up the boxes with fragile items so that the movers know at one glance which to be more careful with. It also helps YOU to watch what they are doing with those boxes, and quickly "oei" them, if they are too rough with those.

4. Penknife! You will definitely have a hand carry bag - I mean, some super valuable things like gold bars, or ultra sensitive company or state secrets in your laptops. Bring a penknife or scissors ALONG in that HAND CARRY bag. You don't want to pack all your penknives and scissors away nicely, then move liao... how to open the boxes? -cricket chirps-

4. That Taobao Sofa

Here are photos of that Taobao Sofa. For $300 including shipping, its reasonable.

We got fabric, which has washable covers, and the sofa came assembled. You just have to "click" things together. You can see the hook for yourself, later.

The material is sufficiently comfortable. Feels like fabric, loh.

It's quite a good size, and comes with a pull down cup holder. We were a little disappointed that the holder didn't come with circular rings, for cups - but then we realized this way it can hold BOWLS lol. Maggi and TV. My favourite.

This photo is taken from the top view, the brass/metal thing is what the sofa parts/modules go into.

That's all from us, I had alot of fun doing this! Reminds me of the days back in school, when blogging was popular haha. Ok! Good luck with your own homes

[Silentstars 0]

Hi jez and hubs,

Thanks for sharing your t-blog. The best one I've read so far. Would you mind pm-ing me your id contacts pls? That would be awesome. TIA!

[jez2014 16]

Hello Relacker - that's really good advice! Thanks!!

We actually never considered the fact that the goods would probably have been stored in warehouses for a long time. Don't have time to wash during the weekdays - but we're making it a priority to do so this weekend! We have been rolling around in dirt for the last 3 months - wonder what the little one has eaten OMG haha!

The rest:

Sorry for the late replies, work has been piling up recently :/ Haven't had a chance to properly sit down and use the PC for awhile now. Hope we have responded to everyone, do let us know if we have left you out

Random amusing thought of the day:

Work has been so busy... and today I finally got the chance to take leave but it left me unsatisfied!! I took many many leaves in fact. Still unsatisfied.

Stupid salad.