House has been gyprocked

A sneak peek on the progress of the gyprock insulation so far.

Garage

Main hallway feature wall and bulkheads

Formal Lounge room

Kitchen wall

Rumpus room with feature wall

Downstairs living

Upstairs living

Master bedroom bulkheads

Insulation complete

Today, the insulation was done. Here are some photos.

Upstairs living room corner issue, still unresolved! Arrgh!

Still a corner, not a box!

In our tender, we have been charged $220 for rubbish bin with lid for food scrapes. I mentioned to Masterton, and this is what we got. Expensive sign! I think I need to be bit more firm. Get one or refund.

Internal cabling work

All data cabling has been run through. These include TV, Foxtel, CAT6, Alarm & antenna on the roof.

We also have the ducted vacuum ducts installed and wired with 4 outlets.

Also some carpentry work for the bases of all the wash basins.

The sliding door frames are in.

The back of the house weatherboard installed. The only section of the house that is not brick.

The power switch board box

Electrical & Air-Con

The electrical wiring rough in has been done today. Lots of wires everywhere. From memory, they look all in the right places.

At main door entrance

Lighting

Upstairs hall way.

They missed the allocation for electrical point for the ensuite spa. I could not see any cabling.

Also installed on the same day, the Air-Con ducting and distribution unit.

Main distribution unit.

Now to some issues.

You might have read in my previous posts about the air-con dropping being located in the wrong room. Well this did not get corrected, that it would have taken 15 minutes, now the air-con people have placed the ducting using the wrong dropper point!

Wrongly placed dropper point. Bricks already knocked for access.

Should be on this side of the wall.

I plan to meet our SS tomorrow and make sure all issues are resolved before they go any further.

Sound insulation

Since we are having all the downstairs floors tiled and upstairs laminated wood, after some thinking, we decided to insulate the internal walls for sound absorption.

So I contacted Masterton to have a add on variation, only to be told it is not possible! Once the tender and contract is signed, no changes allowed. Grr!..

So I called our SS and had a chat, as obviously it is not something I can do later, take off all the walls down and install the insulation. He offered me to provide the contact details of the sub-contracting company doing the outer wall insulation and deal directly with them.

I contacted the company and they quoted me for upstairs and downstairs in separate quotes. Upstairs to supply and install R1.7 Soundscreen insulation and downstairs R2.0 Soundscreen insulation.

After looking at the price (around $2300), we decided to go ahead and do the whole house.

Gas plumbing done

There has been no activity for the past few days.

Today they had completed the internal gas copper pipes.

Gas entry point

Kitchen gas point

Family room gas point

Kitchen does not have the added water point for fridge!

Big gaps between brick insulation!

All Colour Selection Finalised

Now that we have done our external and internal colours, I have a possible name for our new house.

External colour is Earth Colour Theme with brown/espresso bricks and roof tiles, as well as front facade feature in dark chocolate colour.

Internal is all white, from walls to floor tiles, bathroom walls, vanities, kitchen, benchtop etc. Pretty much everything.

"A Tropical Coconut Delight"

You may wonder why the whole of internal (except bathroom/ensuite floors) is white. This means any furnishing, features or ornaments we add, will stand out. It will be modern, bright, happy, pure and inviting.

Not long before one of our dream becomes reality.

Flooring & Air-Con

Today I received calls from both Accent Carpets & Flooring and Penrith Air Supply for our upstairs timber flooring and our ducted air-con options appointments.

So, for the next 3 days I'll be travelling around from one end of Sydney to the next.

Not sure if we will elect Laminate Timber or Bamboo Timber for the floors. Once I visit the showroom I'll have to make the decision.

As to the air-con, I hope they will offer a reputable manufacturer for the Masterton $5999 special offer. Luckily I have a relative who installs air-con systems and just a phone call away to ask for advice.

Contract signed

Signed the contracts and paid 5% deposit this morning.

Now we wait for the CDC plans preparation and colour selection appointment for the next 3-4 weeks.

I managed to re-visit some of the display homes and take lots of photos of kitchens, bathrooms, vanities etc, to give us some more idea on our internal selections.

P.S. Finally, this morning, when I did the final plans sign-off, they had the right plans! After 4 times trying to correct the same issue...

Floor selections

Looks like I'm able to give a visit to another tiles supplier, Tiles Direct, to see if I can find matching 'white' tiles from the same manufacturer and range, but with at least 2 of the sizes` 450x450 & 300x300.

As we have selected timber laminate floors for upstairs, I need to make an appointment to visit Accent Floors and make the choice.