Here we go!

The final plans arrived today-and I'm excited!

The consultant from Colour World has also called and made our appointment-April 8th. We couldn't go any earlier due to wok committments. The Princess will be coming with me as His Lordship is colourblind and trusts me implicitly!

The plans are being lodged for the building permit so within the next 5 or 6 weeks our slab should be down and it's all systems go!

Good things come to those who wait...so they say!

Ok, it's been 7.5 weeks since we received our plans for modification-we express posted them back on the 9th February-and are still waiting for our finals!!!! Apparently, the process involves the plans being vetted for 5 star energy efficiency.........

I've also had to arrange a letter from the planning department at Moyne Shire so that NBG would believe that we are allowed to build across the two blocks............aaarghhhh!

On a better note, we have some fencing done, the crossover is installed, we have erected our compost area and the company are ready to erect the garden shed & chook house........

Cris and I have been out there mowing and slashing to prepare for the installation of the vegie beds, with more to do this weekend.

"Ärpa"with Zane & Angus at the back boundary of the block.

Plans and progress!

Woohoo-we have our preliminary plans! There are only a couple of minor changes and then they can be submitted to council-fingers crossed!~

We have also found out that more blocks have been sold-one to a physiotherapist.

After much thought about what to do with water requirements, we are nearly sure that we will sink a bore for the garden and toilets and have one 10,000 gallon tank for the fresh water.

Fencing will be done on Monday-so I will be able to start the vegie area!

The Princess and the tree....

OK, not much has happened in the last 4 weeks due to the Christmas break that the building industry takes. However the excitement is beginning to build! Our block of land settles in 2 days and we sign the contracts for thebuilding next week.

We meet with the vendor of the block early next week to arrange for the fencing and driveway crossover which were included in the price. Then we will look at getting the garden shed erected so that we can begin the process of setting out the vegie garden prior to moving in!

This photo is Chloe in our tree the first time that she actually walked on our block.

We are ready to select our colours for the house-the appointment at Colour World in Melbourne will be made when we sign the contracts next week-woohoo!

We have a couple of sets of friends who are also about to commence building-one couple with Metricon on a town block and the other couple are building with National Builders down the road from us. It will be interesting to see how the process goes for us all!

Here we go......!

OK, it's been over 3 weeks since my last post-and what a lot has happened!

We've managed to move into our rental(despite the husband going fishing for a week-luckily he brought home fresh schnapper!), had settlement on our old house, applied for our bank loan for the new house, accepted a final quotation from National Builders Group and now all systems are go!

The valuation from the Bank came back just what we hoped for, so we will be able to build what we want (and still have an indecently large mortgage). We did delete the verandah off the front of the house-couldn't justify the $11,900 cost! Maybe when we win Tattslotto.... :-)

Oh the pain......

Well, we received our quote from National Builders-and i think that I'm still quivering-$262,000! Because of the soil test as "H", they want to add $5500 to the cost of the slab!

The cost of the water tanks is also $5000 more than what the builder indicated it should be (I'll be contacting local suppliers and getting other prices)...other than that quoted items were actually reasonable. We had got NBG to quote on a verandah across the front of the house, which came in at $11,500.If the loan is approved I think that we will delete the verandah as a luxury, not a necessity (the house will front South West).

In regards to the soil test and slab, we have had another company peruse the Intrax report and give their opinion as to whether we should have another test done in order to get a different recommendation. The reply was that their company would rate the slab as requiring "m"with 600m footings-so we are waiting to see whether or not that is a cheaper option.

We have submitted the quote and land contract to the Bank for our loan application and are now waiting upon valuation-which can take up to a week. Our issue will be that although we have paid $90,000 for our acre, our land can immediately be sold off as two half acre lots (at $75,000 each)due to the two titles. We need the at completion valuation to reflect this so that we can avoid mortgage insurance.......

Questions & Quote

Tomorrow Cristian and I will be heading to Ballarat to have the building quote presented to us-should be an interesting exercise! We haven't heard anymore about the soil test debacle and what ramifications will follow from that-all will be revealed tomorrow!

In the mean time, we are in the process of moving into the rental. Luckily, number 1 son (actually, only son!) has a ute-so has been ferrying furniture from one address to another for us......saving a small fortune on removalist fees! His fuel costs are a fraction of what we would have had to pay the professionals-mind you, when we move out to the new house next year we will pay for the experts!

I'm not sure whether or not I'm looking forward to tomorrow..after we receive the quote we will submit our loan application to the Bank (Which bank?) and wait for their response. The loan will depend on the valuation upon completion of the property and what equity we would have at that point in time. Winslow and Mailors Flat are both areas of growth due to the fact that they are within 15mins of Warrnambool and are offering lifestyle blocks (1acre plus) from $90k. Our block is on two titles with dual access, so the valuation should reflect that fact-fingers crossed!