Keys! 29/08/11

Its Done! The house is ours! Met our SS at midday today, went over things that had been fixed and what was left to do. Had a quick look around, everything looked good! So next stop was Narellan, a good hours drive but well worth the wait. Handed over the final payment and got some shiny metal in return. Oh and a gift pack too! Just realised how much we have to do and the fact that we havent even begun to pack. Next few posts are going to be pictures galore so those with low quota beware! Timber booked in for tomorrow, should take two days to complete. Also a little bit of concreting too.

House inspection 19/08/11

Since we have been constantly updaed by our site supervisor, we hoped that there wouldnt be too many problems to find. Our kitchen cupboards had already been fixed, with the kitchen sink to be moved early next week. Theres always the thought of hiring a private inspector to go over things that you might have missed. My suggestion is that if you're really not sure what to look out for, it might be a good idea. Basically the things we would be checking are: paint, opening and closing EVERYTHING, lights, powerpoints, check the walls are straight and level, cornice / skirting, location of tv - telephone points etc, scratches and the inclusions list. We were'nt too fussed as builders usually give 3 months maintenance period where you can find and document faults for them to fix. The build quality of Wisdom Homes has been very good so far. The only problems we found were a few minor scratches, areas to be repainted and possibly 1 missing whirlybird. Nothing to worry about really. For those worried about a really thorough inspection I found a great website. Its
http://www.anewhouse.com.au/?page_id=235
A lot of great advice on what to look out for. Also includes a link to the aussie building standards and a checklist guide. Generally a great website for those building. Wish I had found it sooner.
In other news our driveway was completed yesterday and it looks absolutly amazing. Our SS had told us to expect handover for 29/08/11. Cant wait!

Painting, Electrical and Carpet 12/08/11

Work has been steadily progressing the last few weeks. Hard to get updated now as we are locked out. but here are a few sneak peeks!

 Carpet looks a lot different then what we expected. The colour does vary greatly depending on how much natural light there is. For example it looks a lot darker on the stairs.

House is nearly complete. Inspection date is set for  19/08/11. Finger crossed all goes well!

Phone line and Internet

If you're building a new home, don't forget the phone line. In most cases when building a new home, it's necessary to dig a trench for cabling when telephone services need to be provided to a new site.You can dig and backfill the trench yourself or hire a contractor / Telstra to do it for you. Find out if this is something that your builder will do for you or if its in your contract. With our driveway to be done soon, I realised that this was a good time to find out. We were lucky in our case as Wisdom Homes would do this for us as part of thier inclusions. All we had to do was call up telstra and apply for a new connection. This will cost $299. A Telstra technician will most likely come out hook up the line and also test it.

On the subject of internet I know that I definately wont be going with telstra again. I am looking for a company that is reliable, affordable, generous in thier quota and wont lie to me. For affordability I have been thinking of tpg but i have also been eyeing off iinet. Iinet has been recieving good reviews and is constantly in the tops ranks for service. This will most likley be my choice, hopefully they can give me a good deal.