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Showing content with the highest reputation on 11/28/2020 in all areas

  1. 2 points
    Not sure if it is appropriate to share my story of my landed rebuild here in this forum. But I guess its the piece of vital information that all house owners like me need and will just like to share some experience I gained in my rebuilding journey. Being new landed home owners, my family bought a old semi detached house which was 1 storey high around Jalan Kuras, most of you should know that these houses definitely come at a steal because of it being relatively old and just 1 storey high. However, it definitely needed a reconstruction as it was not spacious enough to hold my big family. After the transaction was done and receiving the keys, the next step was definitely to call for a tender for my new home. It was indeed a tough job, D&B contractors and small scale contractors turned up for my interview and each submitting their pricing. There were about 11-12 contractors whom visited the site walkabout, prices ranging from $1.1million to $1.3million. These prices were abit steep and due to the preliminaries I have to set aside to the main contractors whom will help to manage the sub-contractors. Besides, from my new neighbor whom did his reconstruction 2 years before me had a nightmare with his main contractor whom owed all the subcontractors even after being paid by the owner in full progress payment. As we can see from this industry, the main contractors are like the "big brother" in the process, they are paid by the owners and can also choose to cut payment off from the sub-contractors and sometimes even refusing to pay them altogether. This leads to a vicious cycle where they sub-contractors will lead to poor quality and workmanship for all the works done. Even when these main contractors earn big profit, they will sometimes even abandon the project. The end results was us homeowners who paid for our house and yet get defective works all around. After hearing these horror stories from my new neighbor, I begin to consider doing the reconstruction my own way, by myself. I sourced for my own Architect and Consultant, where after 3 months of submission, the structural and architectural drawings were out. This was where I sourced for my own "sub-contractors". I appointed my main structural contractor as my builder to apply from BCA, as he was a qualified general builder. The main structural contractor was referred to me by my friend whom studied in civil engineering in ntu, this contractor was a young man whom had a father and son combination for the entire of my project, and they were in this industry for more 21 years and completed numerous landed projects all around Singapore. This further gave me assurance as the number of years and experiences with a proven track record was definitely what I was looking for. Guideline on Total Cost and Duration of my work: 1)Architecture Fee: $41,100 2) Consultant: $52,700--> 3 Months to release of approved drawings from BCA 2) Demolition Of Existing 1 Storey Corner Terrace: $21,100--> 3.5 Weeks (Actual quoted price: $25,000) 3) Excavation and foundation works: $60,000---> 2 months (Actual quoted price: $70,900) 4) Structural Works: $320,900--> 4-5 months (Actual quoted price: $330,000) 5) Plumbing Works: $50,800--> together with structural works (Actual quoted price: $68,200) 6) Electrical Works: $40,00-->together with structural works (Actual quoted price: $48,900) 7) Interior Designing and Finishing: $118,600---> 3-4 months (Actual quoted price: $140,100) Total cost: $705,200 , Actual Quoted Price: $776,900, Total Savings: $71,700 Actual Savings from handling the whole projects: $1,100,000-$705,200= $394,800 I basically have to keep track of the timeline I have given to each contractors and pop by 3-4 days in the afternoon to make sure that all these contractors have their man at work each and every day where the progress are up to date. This basically saved me the money for hiring project managers, as smaller building projects need not have an expensive project manager to be on site everyday. These were all the savings when I skipped the steps of hiring a main contractor to cover the whole work, and the relentless haggering the prices from each individual contractors. A savings in the housing cost, is a savings towards my future. As what the old saying " A penny saved is a penny earned."
  2. 1 point
    Im pretty happy with my contractor which I've decided to go ahead with after hearing friends recommendation. Here is the finished product!
  3. 1 point
    if this is going to be your family home for the next 20 years or more, it would be better to just bite the bullet now and do a complete rebuilt. if not, the money you sink in now for A&A or reconstruction would be wasted if you decide to do a rebuilt some 5 or 10 years down the road.
  4. 1 point
    Snooze has given an excellent piece of advice, it's better to do a complete rebuild now, no point doing a bit here and there, then regret couple of years down the road for not doing so. Matter of fact is rebuild is more cost effective and you get to do what you like, whilst AA maybe smaller in quantum but not really cost saving.
  5. 1 point
    brick/concrete always work as a thermal mass and stores heat. metal roof is thinner so won't absorb the heat that much. you can put a brick and metal plate of same surface area under the hot sun for one afternoon and see which one still feels hotter after the sun goes down. moreover a metal roof is constructed with the metal skin as the top layer. between the false ceiling and metal roof are a sandwich of water proofing material, heat insulation material, zinc metal sheet. wiremesh and aluminium foil. all these provides the water proofing and heat insulation. your architect should know what to spec out for the builder as this is quite standard.
  6. 1 point
    quotation was received around 2 years ago. I must clarify that the quotation is based on a full house rebuilt. the quotes your get from other contractors may differ due to many factors and there might also be associated costs related to rebuilding the wall. eg: if you have drains near/next to the existing fence/wall, the drains may have to be rebuilt as well since the workers would need to hack everything away to remove the existing foundations as well as cast new foundations for your new wall. this would increase the time needed as well as the cost. also since you are redoing the perimeter wall, land survey may need to be done to determine the exact boundaries so that your new wall don't encroach into any other private/public land. this survey also costs money. you may also need to purchase the Sewage Interpretation Plan from PUB as well to determine if there is any public sewer running through your property and if there is, how deep is the sewer. This is so that the contractor doesn't damage the sewer when doing the work. My builder does not have many manpower so he does not want to stretch himself from taking on too many jobs. I had asked him before as others had requested as well.
  7. 1 point
    Yes, this is a standard clause which can be imposed by the contractors. But percentage to charge I think its open to negotiation between yourself and your main contractor. items covered usually quite subjective. But from what I understand, if the main contractor is able to quote and perform the work item but if you insist on nominating your own subcon, the main contractor can claim for the fees for profit and attendance. One way to get around this is to have your subcon do the work AFTER your main contractor has handed over the site back to you. Cos as long as the site is not handed back to you, the main contractor is liable for any activities what happen on site and his insurance coverage would have to cover your subcon(s) who enter the site for work. Also if your subcon(s) uses water and/or electricity on site, the main contractor has to pay for the utilities right? Also normally subcontractors would have trash after perform works, so the main contractor also need to "help" them dispose of the trash which also costs money. In short, if you feel 10% is too much, negotiate with your main contractor on the percentage to charge. Unless you can save more than 10% from your main contractor's quoted rates for the subcontractors' works, I would suggest just getting the main contractor to cover the items in their contract. Reason for suggesting to get the main contractor to do are these : 1. you only need to deal with 1 party (main contractor) for any issues. Ultimately the main contractor would be liable for any defects, etc resulting from his subcontractors' works. But if you get your own subcontractors, then it could become a pushing of liability where the subcon push to maincon and viceversa 2. with the current COVID19 situation, BCA has implemented ALOT of rules/requirements for construction industry. No longer can there be like 30 or 40 workers on site at the same time to perform different works. eg: main con's workers doing structural form works while electrical subcon do pipes/conduits and sanitary subcon run the water and sanitary pipes all at the same time. With the limit on workers and activities on site at any one time, the main contractor has to schedule the subcons to go in during certain days/weeks to perform the works. It would be much easier for the main contractor to coordinate all the scheduling rather than you needing to also coordinate with the main contractor and your own subcontractor on when the subcons can go on site to work. Also, the main contractor has to submit to BCA the information for all workers (including subcontractors workers) who go on site to work BEFORE the workers can go on site to work as well as update BCA on what activities are happening on site week by week. So unless you have time and is also willing to do all these admin work to consolidate the information for your main contractor, then just let the main contractor cover the subcontractors' items and leave the admin headache to him.
  8. 1 point
    I'm just a regular home owner whose house has been delayed by the whole COVID19 situation. Am curious enough to read into all the various regulations and such so that I am not mislead by anyone be it the contractor, consultants or authorities. In construction, "no" may not be a clear cut rejection. it could mean "it could be done but depends on situations". It's really up to one to push the limits in terms of design, engineering and also the regulations. So if one has zero knowledge of what is going on, he/she would only be at the mercy of whoever is making the decision for them instead of being part of the decision making process which is what I prefer to be part of.
  9. 1 point
    not sure how long you had been doing "homework" before you started house hunting. but there are various types of sellers in the market ranging from genuine sellers to those just testing market. those testing market would normally have the agents put up a ridiculous price for the house. so don't need to be bothered with them as unless you match the ridiculous asking price, chances of them selling is close to zero. those genuine sellers also fall into various categories : 1. owners who want to sell the house for financial reasons 2. owners who are old and planning to downgrade 3. estate sale if you encounter a owner who is selling for financial reasons, chances are that the house would be sold at valuation or below valuation since they want to get rid of the house ASAP for owners who are old and planning to downgrade, they may let go at or below valuation but their children (adults) may convince them otherwise and ask for higher. sometimes the owners may hold off the sale due to sentimental reasons as they may have stayed in the house for more than half of their lives already. houses undergoing estate sale also have the problems especially if the owner who had passed on has many children. the children will have their own idea on how much to sell the house for and unless the price is agreeable by all the children, chances are the offer will not be accepted even at valuation. of cos there might be additional categories which I've missed out but these are the sellers whom I encountered when I was house hunting years ago. personally I feel that buying a house also depends on whether you are fated to buy the house or not. Prior to purchasing my house, I had made offers for 2 other houses which was undergoing estate sale but my offers were rejected as the sellers were asking for much higher prices. the house which I eventually bought was a house which I had declined to view when the property agent asked if I was interested in it. Fast forward a few weeks later, I contacted the agent again to view the house with the intention of just viewing for fun. But my wife and I like the house location and potential for rebuilt and we ending up buying the house. As for the 2 other houses that our offers were rejected, they were sold 8 months later at about the prices which we had made the offer for earlier but was still lower than the asking price the sellers were holding out for. if you choose to buy a house at above valuation, do note that you will need to top up the difference in cash as you can't take bank loan for this. this extra cash will end up eating into your budget for renovation.
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