MingzhuAng

Early in the morning hb called fsm and consult him on the hacking date, and its going to be on next week's wednesday, 31st Aug. Last day of august. After i had received message from hb, i promptly messaged Alan and asked him to apply permit for us. Now waiting for the permit to be approved and the letter. Hopefully we can get it in time. Yesterday, after confirming Alan, i can feel the weight of burden is put down. As this thing is weighing me all the time, as it is not done yet. Just cross my fingers, hoping it will be a smooth reno. Of course, we would be checking the progress of reno every 1 or 2 days. Will be posting the selection of tiles later part of the day. Actually, hb and i are not expecting our house to be show room alike. Just hoping it looks simple and decent, that's it.

Hi El LoCo, thanks. It's actually a 5i unit, so its about 120 to 122sqm. EA would have 130sqm then.. If its EA, the mbr would have been much bigger and i can have what i wanted all in the MBR already. Since hb's parents had an EA with the same layout, i can say its really very big. They had a 19ft wardrobe. So envy...

This is the floormap. We're actually the third owner, as the second owner got their BTO flat in queenstown, so they have to sell off the house which we bought. And the house suppose to have balcony and the walls for the balcony was hacked and now it forms part of the living room. And the wall between MBR and common room was hacked and forms a big MBR. Just as what i wanted. And this layout is exactly the same as hb's parents house just that a little smaller, since their's is EA. And below are our planned arrangement. We will open another kitchen entrance due to the fengshui to suit hb's. As well as the bed arrangment.

After lurking around for 6 months in renotalk, and after confirming the contractor to engage. I have decided to create a t-blog like many others on renotalk, to record our reno process. A long story below, for people who hates wordy things like me beware... We search for the right place for 8 months in Serangoon N area last year march, since it is near hb's parents' place. Few reasons i chose the area: 1. Easier for him to go to work with his parents. 2. the house around that area is slightly bigger then those in Sengkang. 3. we can get the grant. 4. That area is where i grew up in before my parents shifted to Sengkang and i like that area. We took that long to search for the right place, it is because at that period, sellers are all asking for ridiculous cov and another reason is that i'm really picky. The unit must not be the highest floor, and 5th floor and above. The layout of the house matter to me too. Such as the size of living room and MBR, placement of furniture. Since hb is the most easy going type, any house he went into, he felt they are alright, for me i just didn't felt it is the right house. After 8 months of search, we found the right house. Before viewing, we had a hunch that this is the house. We didn't tell each other we had this feeling, only after viewing, hb told me he had this feeling which i had too. So we performed the OTP in oct 2010, and got our keys in Dec 2010. And promptly ROM-ed on Dec 2010 as well. Follow by, engaged a Feng Shui Master to view the house, as my hb wants it to be done. Since i'm the picky one all along, the fsm master says the house suits me perfectly for my bazi but not hb. So we had to make some arrangement for the feng shui to suit him since man are always the main house owner. After fsm has viewed our house, we really really really took our own sweet time in searching for the right person to do our house, since we are not urgent on moving in. During the search period, my dad and hb's dad is really anxious to get the renovation started. As the saying goes, 皇帝不及太监及. This is really the case for us way before we got the house. They kept hounding us when to get a flat, when getting married etc.. So we always bruch them off.. After getting the house, every other week, i can say they hound on us, asking when the renovation will start.. -.-" For us, we would want to take our time to find the right person who we can entrust this renovation to. And we finally found one and that is, lo and behold Alan from Aian Furniture and Renovation Contractor. Before that, we wanted to get contractor all along since we have an idea what we wanted, but was introduced with ID, and their quotation always gone too far from our budget. And through recommendation from Immunity. I called Alan, and ask him to do an onsite quotation, he is rather efficient. After viewing the house at about 8pm, i received his quote at 10pm +. I can say he is rather efficient. After receiving quote from Alan, since I'm always the indecisive person. I asked hb to make a decision between Alan and another contractor recommended by my friend. And hb felt more comfortable with Alan, i was too, but i still can't decide, just indecisive. After hb gave me an answer, i'll just follow with the decision. Actually i took really very long to decide even hb gave me the answer.. And finally, we started choosing our tiles yesterday and will be going for a dry laying session on the coming Friday for our marble tiles. My dad and mum will come too.. I will post the floor map etc in my later post, allow me to learn how to post the pictures first.

thanks! will take a look.

There are a couple of them if your read through the t-blogs. I will pm you 1 contractor who i will be engaging, just that i need time to discuss with my hb, as hb is very busy don't have time to sit down and discuss yet. There is few renotalk users used him for renovation and his quotes are pretty reasonable in my opinion. When getting a contractor, do keep in mind that you have to have an idea of what you want to do, placement of furniture etc.

Well, why those big named electronic shop are selling at higher prices is due to one word, "Marketing". They paid so much on advertisement, radio advertisement, tv advertisement, newspaper advertisement, and whatever medium that helps in advertising. All these advertisement adds up a big sum, and of course these expenses are not going to eat into their profit. Rather, it is going to be paid by all the consumers who bought the product from them. Small retail shop are able to sell at cheaper price, is because they don't go by those expensive advertisement, their advertisement is done by their customer through words of mouth. And the sales person who told you that, it may be a display set, is trying to smoke you into buying their product. Where can they find so many display sets in Singapore to sell at that price yet fulfill all the consumer's demand? Beside, those small retail stores, they do not have that much of space to display all the models. Only specific few, and they will only show you the models via catalog. So, that explains why they can sell at cheaper price. The location and rental plays a big part as well. Those big names store is always at the shopping mall etc.. All these comes with money, so these expenses is being paid by consumers. See the picture? If the small retail shop can sell the same brand and model of product at this price, you can see how much those big named company earns. And why they can always extend and opens a new branch.

Yeah, lock & lock is better, more expensive then tupperware, but then it is really air tight. I used lock & lock to keep my dog's kibbles. And it is still as crunchy as when i just opened the new package, since i broke the kibbles. Besides, if the kibbles is no longer crunchy my dog will refuse to eat.

Actually, experienced contractor would do the job as well, just that you have to let them know your idea and how it should be done or looked like. Have to explain in details. E.g. space management, you have to do on your own, material or color to use you have to decide. Generally, ID is more of doing design, project management, to make sure everything runs smoothly, on time and anything happens will be rectified. Some responsible contractors will ensure things are done properly and rectified without extra charges. So it also boils down to individual contractors. Most of the stuff are still being done by contractors. How ID operates is, ID goes to a main contractor, then main contractor will go to sub contractor. Maybe some ID will know the sub contractor, even so their price is pretty mark up. Of course, we can't expect that ID don't earn. Cheaper way is to go to a main contractor straight.. Price diff for main contractor and ID will be around 10 to 15 percent, some even 20 percent. Main contractor and sub contractor price difference about 10 percent. Easier way and to save a little, would be going to a main contractor. I forgot to mention, since you would want to combine the bathrooms, you would like to consider there are times when 2 person at the same time needed to go to the toilet. Since you have only 1 bathroom, another person will have to wait. A little inconvenient. For my house, we have 3 person most of the time at home. And quite often, 2 person needed to rush to the bathroom. So you might want to consider in future you have your parents or children needed to go to the toilet at the same time, and there is only 1 bathroom.

Well, i guess for your case, you need to hack a lot of stuff, hence that explains the price. If you already have an idea of what to be done. Go for contractor then ID. For my case, i got the quote of 70k to 90k for my 5 room. Since i know what i want to do, i seek for contractor, its 55k and slightly less quotation. Of course, look for responsible and reliable contractor.

My parents' previous house is of this kind of flooring, if you would go for brown, black, cream, white, grey, those neutral color, it should fit in pretty well.. If you would want to put in lime green etc.. It will be a little hard. So, plan your colors before hand.

i personally heart marble flooring, but not on broken marble, to me it seems complicated. Since i prefer simpler design and less details. If you are not into simple things, you can keep the marble flooring. As marble flooring really shines when you on your lights at night. And given the photos you have uploaded, it is really well maintained. If you like, you can ask specialist to apply water membrance and repolish it. My reason to heart marble flooring is that it gives cooling effect, especially there is no obvious grout lines. Which i can't tolerate, as those grout line which you see from complete flooring of homo tiles, will trap dust, and those grout lines will turn grey. And i am very sensitive to dust, so its a big no no to me. Marble has grout as well, but they can be polished, and the grout line will be even with the marble flooring surface. Then again, if you are really disturbed, change it now, in case you might regret in future. Or given advised by other users, keep it for now, in future, if you really can't stand it, ask people to do a laminate for you. This way you can retain your marble flooring still. Mind you, to redo marble flooring just on labour to tile it up and the marble tiles (average marble tiles price), it can cost 20K and above, which is 3 to 4 times of homo tiles. And marble tiles, need people who is expertise in it to tile it, unlike homo tiles. And marble grout line is really thin, about 1 to 2 mm only. That explains why need people expertise in laying marble tiles to do it. Consider wisely, since hacking will cost you some bucks as well.

Hi, i saw in renotalk forum in another thread someone posted www.pinpin.com.sg. I'm not sure of the quality nor price for this, as my renovation has not started nor i have inquired from them yet. If you guys are interested can try to contact, as from their website it seems they does false ceiling, L box, cornice etc.

looking for toilet accessories and mirrors or mirror with cabinet. Please share the contact with me too. Thanks!

Hi, i can try to ask my hb for you cos his family sells hardware stuff and makes ladders. Your budget? And just 1 piece only right? Can PM me. His office is at ang mo kio industrial park.

okie, okie. Thanks for the info. I was looking for something like this light, but can't find it.

for us, we have no issue, as it is dryer then the normal conventional mop after manual squeeze. Yes, there are water mark, but the water mark dries out after few minutes. i guess there are no mop after squeezing the water out, that has no water mark. Is it really that bad that it is 50% dry only? Perhaps was are still using the 2nd piece of sponge when we bought the mop, and we have 2 such mop. And my grandma has one too. Or perhaps is the make of the mop itself has problem since it is a new one?

Hi, your toilet is nice, it gave a classy feel. And i like your marble selection.

Hi, mind to share with me where did you buy this light and price? Your house is very prettily done. And i like your purchases.

My mum has one mop, can only be found in Tangs Orchard, if not wrong, not sure if Isetan or OG has it. Its called Roman magic mop. The mop has a pulling system that will dry the mop without using your hand to squeeze. And it is really dry. Its a little ex about $50 for the mop with sponge plus extra piece of sponge, given the mop can use for 2 to 3 years for a sponge. When the sponge is dry out, it is very hard, and after soaking it will turn soft. The mop is good, ever since my mum has this mop. I always help her to mop the floor. Reason, using the old kind of mop, i couldn't squeeze dry the mop at all, and it become the hardest chore to me. Now mopping is a lot easier for us. Maybe depends on the brand of mop you purchase also, some are not that efficient.

Thinking long term, they are more energy saving and less heat remittance. Normal downlight is cheap at buying, long term wise, not as cost saving as philips. Unless, you can find me one downlight that is as bright as philips, quality as good with QA, and as energy saving as that. Then i will consider that option.

hi, i have not installed the downlight before, but my new house i will be doing it. And buy philips downlight with ballast. So far, i was told philips downlight generate lesser heat, and i think if you buy back philips bulb, it should not blow off that easily. Since normal downlight generates more heat, i believe it will be blown off easier. I think you can go over to lighting shop(lightings.com.sg) and ask the sales person there. I went and the sales person was very thorough with us, and knowing that we will not buy the lights so soon, yet she is very patient and explained in details to us. The sale person there demonstrate to us, and showed us the voltage used for philips downlight with ballast and non philips with ballast each. Comparatively philips saves power more then 50% for normal downlight.

Hi, i'm interested, kindly PM to share the contact. Thanks!

Hi, Mind to share the contact for the false ceiling? thanks!