Saturday, July 24, 2010

Good progress this week, all is done ready for the pouring of the concrete slab on Monday. We did a few drive bys this week, the concrete piers were completed by Tuesday, plumbing Wednesday, and delivery and installation of the waffle pods Thursday and Friday. The guys on-site confirmed the concrete would be poured on Monday.


Front view, garage in front, porch, study, home theatre to the right.


Looking across the step down that divides ground floor into 2 levels



 
Back view with alfresco in front (which won't be part of the slab).


 
Another from view overlooking the entrance, study and home theatre

Saturday, July 17, 2010

Finally.... we have a start.

Tuesday 13th July - drove by and still nothing had started. This was 8 days after the supposed: "will start in a week". So I got on the phone again, but they couldn't provide me an answer because everyone was in training. Later in the afternoon, I received a call back with the same old explanations. One of the points made was the time to complete orders can vary depending on the complexity of the order. I asked specifically if there was any issue causing delay with our orders with the response something along this lines of: "I'm not sure, it's done in the ordering department". I don't know why I bother.

5 minutes later, I received a call from our site supervisor. He confirmed he would be on-site on Friday for a start. He seemed like a decent bloke and was happy for us to give him a call anytime. From this point on, we hope we don't have to call head office again. They can improve alot!


Friday 16th July - 4 weeks to the day since the benching was completed, and we have lift-off. A couple of guys were measuring and hammering in the wooden frame.


Saturday 17th July - We dropped past this morning with the family. We had 2 guys with their kids spray painting markers for the pier holes. The kids were doing the spraying (with guidance) which was a little un-settling. But a least dad was concentrating on the plans. They confirmed that the piers were going in on Monday.


It gives us our first sight of how the house will sit on the block. The backyard is to our expectations, but the front of the house looks alot closer to the street then we thought it would. Can't wait to see how high the slab finishes up to see the gradient of our driveway. At the moment it looks short and steep. We can also imagine sitting in the alfresco on a nice winters day with the sun shining in.




An interesting development, our next door neighbours (the site in the background of these pictures) are building with Claredon. In one day, they had their benching, slab frame and pier holes drilled and concreted. While we have been teased for 6 weeks with little progress, our neighbours are in front of us after 1 day.


2 doors up we have a single storey Eden Brae home, which started with their benching and within 5 working days had their concrete slab poured. 2 examples of what can happen in little time.

Saturday, July 10, 2010

22 days since benching - still no progress

Yep, 22 calendar days since benching with no further progress. They will have to re-do the fill that has eroded away. You can probably tell, we are getting very frustrated. We just want to see a start! The homes around us are all progressing nicely, with 2 concrete slabs completed last week (on properties benched after ours).

A 2nd email was sent to Wisdom on Tuesday, at least this time we got a response:
"Please be advised that the estimating have 20 working days in which to place all the orders for your house. The benching of the property is generally done in the first 2 weeks & then once the orders are finished your Supervisor is given the file & will start on site. I believe we will be on site in 1 weeks time as per the estimating manager.".

It has been 8 weeks since our plans were approved at council. So why does it take another 3 weeks to submit orders, and another 5 for the orders to be completed?

A sign of hope, the Wisdom Home opposite had 2 blokes on site today hammering in the frame for the slab. This site also has seen no progress for 3 weeks, so it was good to finally see workers on a Wisdom site.

We will be very disappointed if we dont see a start in the upcoming week.

Saturday, July 3, 2010

15 days since benching

It's now been 15 days since the site was benched and there has been no signs of further progress (very disappointing). The only thing to change is the graffiti tag on the portaloo. The weather has been great, so there really are no excuses. We don't know what they are waiting for?

What's worse, an email we sent on Tuesday to administration@wisdomhomes.com.au, has not been responded to. It was simply an email asking for a status for when things would kick off. How hard is it for the head office to check into a file and respond back? We get better service from BIGW on a $50 sale!!!

A Huxley home and a Platinum home in the street are moving along nicely (the Huxley looks like they are ready for the pouring of the concrete slab on Monday). Us, and another Wisdom Home in the street have both not moved for over a fortnight.

Our guess is either they have over-committed on jobs and cannot keep up with the demand. Or they took too long to get the orders out.

Rain is forecast for Tuesday, so who knows when we will get a start?