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So many people asking for Ah Soon's contact. I am getting really worried. Supposed to get a quotation from him tonight, and was planning to give him the job if the price is right (and why shouldn't the price by right?) Now I guess I better reconsider. No matter how good he is, he has only 24 hours a day.

I visited NW @ TradeHub two months back and was served by Eagle. Eagle speaks mostly mandarin although he can understand my wife's English. Overall we are impressed with him, he is knowledgeable (except for laminated floor), non-pushy and has been following up with phone calls ever since. As I am still waiting for more quotations, I have not decided if I will go with NW. Their prices is average compared with the other quotations I have, so the chance of getting them is also average.

Am meeting Uncle Ah Soon tonight to go over his quotation. Really looking forward to it....

Actually I haven't made my reading glasses. So when I need read, especially at night, I will do so without glasses. It was during my recent medical screening that I found out that I have long sighted, *sign*.

What do you guys think about laminate? My condo comes with laminate and I have been using it for 10 years without issue, even for the sink area, which is almost always wet. After a decade of use, the laminate is still in very good condition, with no visible scratches or stains. The only problem seems like the colour has faded somewhat. Read about all the problems that people has with solid surface, so I am quite inclined to stick with laminate.

About the same as the quotations I have. I think the price is quite average.

Cannot be more true than that. The condo that I currently stay in now came with a fridge base. My wife wanted a large fridge. Although we have no problem opening the fridge door we could never fully pull out the vegetable compartment. So my vegetable compartment has never been cleaned for the last ten years. Yicks!

Softer than a standard vacuum machine, but still noise nonetheless.

This is the last photo I have on the existing property - the master bedroom toilet. Basically I like the toilet very much, from the shower screen to the basin. However, we will still be tearing down everything and redoing it. The shower screen will be replaced with a curved one that I bought from Sing Art Enterprise.

Nowadays many young people could not even speak a full sentence in Mandarin so I am always happy to meet my fellow chinese-educated friends. I also dunno why I need reading glasses. People who are shorted-sighted should have reduced chance of needing reading glasses, but somehow I am not lucky enough. So right now I have myopia, astimatism as well as long-sighted. Maybe I will consider lasik. Yes you are right. It need not be BLUM as long as it serves the function.

Now the master bedroom:- The master bedroom (and bedroom 3) has a ugly arc at one corner. The previous owner has put a small table there (see circle part). What we intend to do is to build a small tic-tac cabinet to cover it. That will also add some storage space. We will also be pulling down the existing cabinet, and elect one on the same side as the master toilet. We will shift the master toilet door closer to the bedroom door so that we can squeeze out a 6-ft cabinet. Initially we wanted to do L-shape cabinet but realize that corners are counted twice. So we rather shift the toilet door and have a long cabinet instead.

I am doing away with the fridge base. If you don't wash your kitchen floor like the 70's, you probably won't need one. Moreover, if you don't have a fridge base, you won't size consideration when you change your fridge in future.

Do you by any chance going to make "suspended cabinet" in your kitchen? Suspended means lifted off floor for about 8-inch with lights underneath. My wife told me Uncle told us to go over to the Pasir Ris flat to see suspended cabinet.

Actually I also don't remember Uncle asked me to look at what But my wife might remember because she took down notes. I went to Simei yesterday to look at a breakfast counter that he has done. Also checked out the carpentry there too - not too bad!

Oh really?! Which years were you there? Mine is really long ago - 1980 to 1983.

Hello familyof4, Met Uncle Ah Soon yesterday for a discussion on our renovation and he has asked us to visit a site he is currently working on at Pasir Ris. I am just wondering if that is your unit. Hope you won't mind if I just drop by with my wife somethime this week just to take a peep.

Thanks for your advice and comment. Yes, I am Chinese educated (anybody else from 华侨中学 here?). In order to save time maybe I will do the translation instead of bothering his son. Uncle also told us about he growing up from a very poor family with eight siblings. His faterh would cook the rice and vegs together in a big pot. That might explain why he could do the renovation work cheaper than other people.

Finally get to meet superstar Ah Soon yesterday. He was around Simei area yesterday so we got to meet him at about 3pm yesterday. On first look, he isn't that old for me to call him "uncle". In fact I suspect I am in the same age group, as we have about the same amount of white hair on our head and chin. We ran through the floor plan with our ideas fairly quickly. Ah Soon took down notes on our floor plan in Chinese. He wasn't too happy we have purchased laminate floooring directly from Supreme (saying that he could do it much cheaper) and shower screen from Sing Art (again saying that he could do it cheaper). He was also concerned that our individual purchases (without consulting the ID/contractor) would not blend into the overall design. At one stage I suspected that he was scolding us as he got a little loud. Without even us asking, he gave us the address of two properties that he is currently renovating. One of them is at Simei while the other at Pasir Ris. This is a big contrast with an ID we are currently working with: they discouraged us when we said we wanted to view a real site. When we insisted, he tried to arrange for us to visit a flat at Jurong (we are staying at Simei currently) that he had already handed over. So we could only visit the site at a very narrow window (like Sunday afternoon). Shortly after Ah Soon left, we made a trip to the flat at Simei to take a look at the renovation. My wife is happy with the carpentry - much better than another site we have viewed (with another ID). We will probably make another trip to Pasir Ris to look at the other unit, just to satisfy ourselves with Ah Soon's workmanship. Ah Soon said he will give us the quotation in two or three days' time. We will patiently wait for it.

Do prepare your mum - there is some noise when using the Roomba like any vacuum cleaner. Difference is that the Roomba will run for a while (maybe 45 min to 1.5 hours depending on the size of the room you are cleaning) so the disturbance is longer than a vacuum cleaner. I am planning to turn on the Roomba just before I leave home for work. But of course, there is this risk of the Roomba getting jammed somewhere.

Oh I see - yes I read about this too. I think it is stated somewhere in the fine prints saying that warranty is only limited to North America. So I understand those guys that claimed warranty did not identify themselves as non-American. I guess they must have used vPost kind of services so as to get an American address for the shipping.

Hi Guy77, Do buy it for your mum if you could allocate the fund. That will ease her workload cleaning the floor. Roomba is quite effective picking up hair and cleaning under sofa/table/bed provided there is no obstruction. And thanks for the clarification on the BLUM.

Yes, that's correct. Sorry if I have mislead anybody. You only get warranty support from Singapore (distributor) if you buy it from them; otherwise, the charge per service will be [sky] high.

Is Ah Soon also using the BLUM system. Just went to see one of the flats that Ah Soon is doing, I think the brand is "INAX" or something, didn't have my reading glasses on so I can't read clearly :-(

My three rooms have parquet flooring. So far so good, no scratch. In fact the Roomba is more of a vacuum cleaner than a broom.

$100 pfr is cheap leh. The quotes I have are in the range $120-$130, like what you mentioned. What is decal? One way to save cost, you can get a lot of design magazines at the National Library, at no charge. For the current issues, I just read at NTUC while waiting to pay for groceries.