Soil report results are in

My Sales Consultant emailed me the soil report, and it could have been better. Out of the 5 boreholes, all of them contained rock. The rock in boreholes 1, 2 and 3 was found really deep within the ground that it won't affect the slab, BUT boreholes 4 and 5 contained rock closer to the surface. This means we are going to have to pay additional costs for rock removal. And we won't know the amount we'll have to pay until we have our contracts, and we won't know the exact amount until they make the slab. After much excitement to see those little mounds of dirt on our land, my mood has now changed. I think I was in denial hoping that no rock will be found. Now I'm back on planet Earth, and realise that building a house comes with many, many hidden costs and complications.

Thoughts so far...

Ok, for cupboards in the kitchen, bathroom and ensuite I'm thinking Concept Oak by Panelart. It's a lovely rich dark brown, wood-look.



Now, I can't choose between two laminate benchtop colours

a) Pearl Bisque (Wilsonart): A nice neutral warm colour with no specks or swirls or anything through it. It's a plain colour, but shimmers when the light hits it. I think I will definitely have this colour for the bathrooms. But for the kitchen, I'm still unsure.



b) Crystal Topaz (Wilsonart): A stone-look laminate. It has a lot of little specks through it, but unsure if the wood-look cupboards will look good with the busy-ness of the benchtop. Also unsure whether the dark chocolate brown tones will go well with the very white/grey look of the benchtop.



Every day I change my mind.

Maybe our colour consultant will be able to tell us which combination is better.

Here's how they look together:



OR

Colour selections are a headache

Too many colours my eyes are hurting!
And out of all the choices it feels as though the "right" colour is nowhere to be seen.
Frustrated.

We are official land owners!

... and only 5 days late.

But it's ok. We were granted an extension without penalty interest.

We went out for dinner to celebrate. And then had some ice cream. After several hours of worry-free bliss, I have discovered that I may have another dead tooth.

If you have read my other blog about my braces, you would have known that I broke my teeth when I was young. Not once, but twice. One of my front teeth died as a result, and has been dead for a long time now. I had a root canal done last year due to an infection. Anyway, I always had one sensitive tooth - use to play up when I ate some ice cream or anything else cold. My dentist said it's a worry because the root was a little tender as well when touched. Anyway, 5 weeks after getting braced, I have noticed that I have lost feeling in the tooth completely. I held a block of ice on it for a few minutes and it didn't respond at all. So, in a way, I am hoping that the tooth died because of the trauma that occurred a long time ago. Otherwise it's infected. I go back to my Endodontist next week, so I will have him do some X-rays and the cold test to see what's going on. I think the pressure caused by the braces just pushed my tooth over the edge... or maybe it just committed suicide? Who knows. I thought my teeth would be happy that they'll finally be standing in a straight, arhcy line together. I should blog about this soon too.

Long story short, I take care of one worry, and I'm onto another worry in less that 24 hours.

BUT, in more exciting news, we are in the process of choosing all our colours for the house, and also organising our electrical plan.

Will post our colour selections soon! (When we finally make up our minds... I keep changing mine ;))

Bank problems and land settlement

Well, settlement for the land is tomorrow, the 9th of April by at least 3:00pm. I'm supposed to be excited, but the bank is making me everything but excited.

I have been ringing up and going down there personally for the past week, and the loan documents are still not ready. We applied for the loan in February, and I believe that's enough time to get everything organised. I know it is not my fault because I have given them everything they have asked for, so it's a problem with the branch, head office, the documents department, or my conveyancer. I am disappointed in all of them to be honest, and they all seem to blame each other.

Anyway, it's 10:30 now, and I have just given them a call (again), and they are not available to speak to at this moment. I'll give it a half hour and I will call again.

The documents MUST be signed today at the very least in time for settlement tomorrow. My BF has to finish work early to get to the bank by at least 4:00pm, so the documents can be faxed off to head office in Queensland, and then must be processed TODAY so we can organise settlement. IF this does not happen, I will be charged penalty interest at 16%pa, which is $71 a day. And I refuse to pay this money because all this delay is not my fault.

Oh, and I nearly had a heart attack yesterday when I was told of the interest rate. I thought my conveyancer meant 16% per day, which is about $20,000 - I was almost in tears.

It's going to be a long day...

The House

So we have chosen the house we would like to build.

It's the Columbia 211 by DFH. A lovely layout, small and sweet, perfect for us.


http://www.dennisfamily.com.au/dfh/ourhomes/overview.sok?-homeName=Columbia&-tabInfo=Plans

And we have chosen the Estate facade


http://www.dennisfamily.com.au/dfh/ourhomes/overview.sok?-homeName=Columbia&-tabInfo=Facades

Our Journey Home

Our Journey Home is a story about building our first home.

It all began late last year when we started planning to find a place to live.

Our initial plans were to buy an established unit or apartment, maybe something with 2 bedrooms and hopefully a garage, and to then renovate it a little to make it nice.

I wasn't too keen on this idea to tell you the truth. I thought that buying a house would be a much better plan. I thought that a unit would not be something for the long term, especially when it comes to having a family. I thought that if we started from now, and bought ourselves a house, at least we won't have to move again in another 10 years or so. Yes, I think a lot.

Anyway, after much discussion, and reasoning, and a little bit of arguing, we decided that perhaps building our first home is a good option.

However, we didn't quite decide on that until we went looking at land. We found this cute little block in a nice little nook, and fell in love with it instantly. It's not the biggest block of land out there, nor the smallest, but a nice size that would fit a nice little house we both would like. It's about 477m2, with a 16m frontage, perfect to build a house that's wider and shorter.

We didn't put the block on hold at first. We went home and thought about it, and the more we thought about it the more we wanted it. So I called the land sales guy the next day to put it on hold only find out somebody else had bet us to the punch! I was upset, and got a little obsessed. This guy who had a hold on it had three working days to put a deposit on. So it was an anxious wait for three days. I called the sales guy every day for any news... and when the third day arrived, I went down there personally. Nobody had turned up to put a deposit, nor were they answering their phone, so I snatched it up and held it myself! Victory for me! Or should I say us? ;)

Anyway, long story short, the land was ours!