We had a pre-PCI walk through with our site manager and his manager (our construction manager) on Tuesday. Sam, the construction manager, walked us through each room and put bits of blue tape in places that need to be fixed.
We checked all our lights, looked in cupboards, ran all taps and checked shower screens for leaks. Overall, it’s pretty good quality. The biggest of the things were: leaks in shower screen in ensuite, a different light switch installed near on one of the 3-ways in the main bedroom.
Sam also proposed a really good solution to the major thing that our building inspector picked up. Around the pier of brick in our outdoor room, because it’s right on the corner, one side slightly doesn’t match up to the concrete – there’s a sliver of concrete that hasn’t been tiled. We are getting 1-m of exposed aggregate (the same as our driveway) on the L shape of the house from the laundry and meeting up with the outdoor room. Sam suggested that it gets filled with the aggregate instead of a sliver of tile – which we are happy with.
We also had our landscaping/fencing quote (and met our neighbours more fully) after the pre-PCI inspection. David from SEF has provided us with quotes, and we have to get back to him today to cut it down a bit – the rear fence is costing us $1600, which we hadn’t factored in, and the paving we had requested is $3000, plus we are going to put a small retaining wall at the front. In total the fencing/landscaping quote came to $17,000, and we need to knock it down to about $14,000 at the most.
Yesterday, we spent shopping.
We got to the Warehouse Furniture Clearance at 750am (for an 8am open) and stood in line – back to the road – until the doors opened. By 820 we had chosen our furniture – 3rr + r + r sofas and double bed – and by 9am had finished paying for them. After we had paid we went back to our sofa, and sure enough they were all sold out.
Then we were onto JB-Hifi Home. We already had our fridge/freezer and washing machine picked out so it was just a matter of organising the paperwork, delivery (set for 13 June), and financing. We got all the way through the HSBC application with the customer service chickie, and it was “pending” for quite awhile. While that was happening I saw a sticker that said they do offer interest-free with GE (I already have a card) so we ended up using that.
Next up was sticky-beaking around our house. The laminate flooring has been started, and all our security screens are in.
After some lunch, we headed to Fantastic Furniture in Windsor. Sem helped us through the finance application for the group that they use for interest-free finance, and we got our tv unit, coffee table, extension dining suite, chest-of-drawers and two bedside tables. Some of it has to be ordered and we’ll organised to get it delivered directly to our new house after handover.
Next week, our driveway (+ rear L-shape) is poured, I believe our blinds are installed and our flooring will get finished. 11 days until our PCI, 3.5 weeks until handover, and in 6 weeks time I’m hoping to be waking up in our lovely new house!