Hi everyone, our renovations are ongoing now. We have viewed over 20-30 units over a span of 3-4 months. We loved some units but some was way over budget. The agent was very nice and she kept showing us despite us being so fickled minded. Finally we decided on this house! The reason being it is NS facing, high level, unblock view from bedroom and windy. It fits neatly into our budget too! Our floorplan:

Our main aim for this house: not to look like a conventional HDB. We have no money to stay in condo, but at least we can stay in condo like HDB and so we were telling ourselves. HAHAHAHA.

Like our house hunting process, we went to 10 different IDs (IMM, Balestier Rd, Eunos...) then asked for quotations online. Some IDs are really "chui" and their designs are worse than a 10 year old drawing. Others are very "smoky" and they don't know how to handle the requirements. (Told me cannot be like this, be like that) Of course, there are a few whom I loved the designs but the price quoted is way too high for us. One of the quotations was 120k without changing windows and floor! We have a contractor friend and we asked him to quote as well. However, he kept telling us that this can't be done and that can't be done . Is our design really that hard???

And so after seeing SOOO many IDs and was about to choose my contractor friend to do the renovation already. I chanced upon reno blog and read the review of several IDs. We went to some and called some. Finally, we shortlisted one of the IDs. I called him and he sent us the quotation within 2 hours. Seeing that he is quite keen and prices are reasonable, I went to research further about him on the renoblog. No negative comments, check. Doesn't look like ID, nevermind. Ok, him then! Actually one of the things that made us chose him is that he is not afraid to "scold" you if your design is unreasonable. That made us trust him and here we go!

This is the design that I want. Hack the wall between the 2 bedrooms, build WiW, hack away the kitchen and extend it so we can have an island. I want to have a room within the kitchen (for maid next time in case)

Edited December 9, 201411 yr by laladada

As you can see the original bedroom seems small and dark. After hacking it looks like this:

The wall at the side is my extended toilet.

After doing hardwood floor, it looks like this:

My WiW on the other side:

Edited December 7, 201411 yr by laladada

Then I hack away the kitchen:

And I start to build my "room" using cabinets:

Ok. I think this post is long enough. Next post will be my living room and study!

Wow is tt a built in wine fridge?

Yes, as requested by hubby. We put a shelf in between the fridge and microwave so that the heat won't affect the fridge. It's really nice!

http://imgur.com/LiZiF18

Edited December 8, 201411 yr by laladada

Do you need PE endorsement to hack the wall? How long is hdb approve the hacking permit? Thanks.

I am not sure bcos my ID handled all of the hacking of walls, shifting of doors, extension of toilet and building up partitions. I almost reconfigured my flat 😅😅😅

Hi, nice work

May I have the contacts of the ID?

Was intending to hack the MBR and the guest room, as well as extend the kitchen to the service bay.

May I also boldly ask what is the cost involved?

Edited December 19, 201411 yr by Norman Lee

have been busy with the final stages of renovations... some photos of the house now:

Chairs, lights and toilet stuff from Taobao! Decorations from hock siong. Love them!

Edited December 22, 201411 yr by laladada