snoozee

you need to work out on your needs and wants if you want to keep your cost low but still make the house look good. for example, you want marble flooring, but if you're going to do marble for everywhere, it's going to cost you a lot. for areas like upper storey rooms and toilets, there's no need to do marble at all especially for shower area. wet marble floor is extremely slippery and accidents can occur as well. built in carpentry is also going to cost a lot if you are going to customise for everywhere. for my house, I saved on carpentry by just going what is required like toilet vanity cabinets, dry and wet kitchen cabinets, kitchen island and basic wardrobes for rooms. What i meant by basic wardrobes is just the wardrobe with clothes hanging bar and no built in drawers at all. For wardrobe drawers for my kids, I just bought cabinet shelves from Ikea and place them inside the custom wardrobe. Also don't spend on doing up laminates for inside the wardrobes and cabinets. No one is going to compliment you on how nice the inside of your wardrobe/cabinet is since it's going to be closed most of the time. Doing normal PVC or polykem interior will save a sum of money. For other items, there's always Ikea to buy from. Even though Ikea items don't last forever, it also gives you an opportunity to refresh the house after 10 years or so which would be quite difficult with built in furniture. for light fixtures, you can buy them online from China to save costs. Local stores will sell similar lighting fixtures but at a much higher marked up price. The only "problem" with buying online is you need to buy them early and then need to find space to store the items until you need to install. Make use of the 11.11 sale to get the most discounts. Normally contractors will provide items like sanitary and tiles for the project. if you want to supply your own, then you need to check with your contractor if he will be charging a profit in attendance or not. be up front with him on this aspect at the initial part during contract negotiations. For tiles, do visit the showrooms to find the designs you like and also check when the tile suppliers would have sale. I was able to save quite a bit on tile cost as we happened to visit the showroom when there was a sale of old tiles going on. Prices were like up to 70 percent off the original price. The only thing is that you need to calculate how much tiles are needed and purchase with some spares. Also sales items are usually non-returnable unlike full priced tiles which can be returned if there are too much excess and boxes are unopened. For sanitary ware, also do look out for sales as well. Toilet bowl is an expensive item and if you want to do concealed systems, it will cost even more. cold water only taps are cheaper than mixer taps so take this into consideration as well. items like bib taps and hoses can actually be bought online from China as well since these are not part of WELS requirements. Usually for tiles and sanitary ware, you can purchase the items first and then ask for them to be delivered later when they are needed. If you are redoing your staircase railings, note that doing glass railings would be more expensive than mild steel railings. Not to mention that if the glass railings shatter one day due to accident, you will need to pay for replacement. If you are planning to install ceiling fans, don't need to spend on DC fans unless you absolutely love the design and such. the supposed cost savings from electricity usage will never cover the much higher cost difference you need to pay for DC fans. For windows, don't need to pay extra for low emission glass. It would be cheaper to install solar films later on if needed rather than spending on low-e glass. Full height windows look nice but you also need to pay for the extra cost. If there's no need, you can just do half height windows for rooms. You also save on having to add a railing for full height windows to prevent falls. ironmongery is another area where you can save a bit of costs by buying online basically, draw up a list of the items you will need for the house and then work out what would be covered under the contractor's cost and what you are planning to buy yourself. Then you can start sourcing for those thing you need to buy yourself by taking advantage of sales and online discounts.

I went directly to buy by myself and got some discount back then

A single landed house is still just one house. Volume is considered small compared to big condo projects. So don’t expect too much discounts if any. If you want discount, ask for the commission from your designer. Normally they will get a small percentage of the total sales amount as commission.

Look out for sale items i bought a bathtub from ferrara for $300. Also bought a stainless steel kitchen sink from them at $250. Both are project excess stock.

A POE switch is just a normal switch which also provides power supply to the devices. Nothing fancy about them. Of cos some more expensive ones come with management software which allows you to turn on/off the POE for individual ports, etc. but if you have no need for these fancy stuff then a basic POE switch which has a power rating for more than what all your devices require will do. I’m not sure about the noise level of the ubiquity switch but you can check the technical specifications on the noise level. I have a HP 1920s 24 port POE switch and the noise level is rated at 36db which is hardly noticeable. But I have another HP POE switch which is an older model and this one is very noisy to the extent that I can hear the faint sound of the fans even though the switch is enclosed inside a server rack and inside a room. so I think as long as your switch is around 50db or less, it shouldn’t be that noisy at all

Meter box for new builds. Your electrical subcon will then lay the fiber from meter box to your internal location where you want the termination point to be. do note that if your house already has an existing fiber termination point, you will need to contact opennet to retrieve the cable first to the meter box. Not sure how much they will charge for this. But if you didn’t do so and your contractor cuts the fiber, then later on you will need to pay more than $1k to run a new fiber from the nearest manhole to your meter box. and also for single landed house, there is no need to do any fiber readiness certification.

Find the designs of bathroom fittings you like and then search for where you can buy them locally. If budget is not an issue, can always buy Toto or those German brands. Is sanitary fittings part of your building contract? If yes then you need to check with your builder on what can be chosen unless you opt to top up the price difference. volakas marble is mainly white with darker grey veins so search online for photos and see if you like the look of the marble or not. Marble is very nice but you also need to maintain it. After installation, make sure to polish and seal it properly. Also any spillage must be wiped off immediately to prevent staining. The sealing of marble buys you time for clean up but doesn’t mean it prevents the spilled liquid from penetrating the marble if left for some time. Other than that, regular cleaning with water should be done to maintain the shine as well. In short, clean marble like any other type of tiled flooring but take special care when it comes to spills.

Search online for sinmac tiles. This is the direct source. George’s supplier should be a middleman who got from sinmac

So you are essentially paying for a router but just using as an AP instead. not sure how much your routers cost but I think still cheaper to run a POE AP since don’t need to have extra power socket

Neighbour notifications can cause delays if your builder cannot find the neighbour or you have a uncooperative neighbour. My project was delayed by 2 months due to one particular neighbour

Your builder still has to submit all the neighbours precon survey and acknowledgements to BCA before BCA will issue you the permission to start demolition works. After that still need to apply and receive permission to start construction works you will also need to pay fees to BCA for ST-02 as well before they will process it. have you engaged a RTO or your builder covering this? Normally there should be an independent RTO engaged directly by the owner as the RTO will be checking on the builder’s works. So if the RTO is engaged by the builder, then there might be a conflict of interest

Not necessarily will have PP. my project was straight away issue WP funny you mentioned that URA requested you to change to RC roof because of HS. Normally HS issues should be covered by SCDF and BCA is the coordinating agency for HS technical requirements.

A mesh network would not work well in multi storey houses unless you can get line of sight between the nodes and the main router. Wi-Fi signal strength drops when it needs to pass through concrete and along goes the performance. It is still better to use multiple access points with dedicated wired back haul for multi storey houses

Either he use your account and pay for it. Or you cancel your account, then he open a new account, then after construction is finished, he cancel his account and you open a new account again. Either way you are the one paying for the utilities so you see which option you prefer.

I believe authorities will compel him to comply or risk a huge fine. I read somewhere quite sometime back on the fines which could be imposed on illegal works and it is a substantial sum as it is computed based on the size of the illegal GFA.

Rain gutter ban only came into effect in October 2005. So it is not that long. Most likely the illegal extension was done with a flat roof with slight gradient and then rain water will flow into the gutter and rain water down pipe. If the neighbour is a 3 storey house, more likely it was built within the last 30 years or so when there would have the proper setback regulations in place already. Many very old houses in 3 storey zone were only built up to 2 storeys

basically he knows that he has no case if the illegal extensions are brought up to the authorities which could be why he is behaving aggressively and trying to divert the attentions somewhere else

My guess is the line of sight that your neighbour sees the light which he is finding fault with. Even if he had stuck with the setback requirements, the line of sight to your flood light may still be there. It's like your rear neighbour look out of his house and see your bright light even though the light beam is not being cast into his house.

Today's PV panel systems cost maybe about 20 percent of what they used to cost almost 20 years ago. Whether it will further reduce in cost is something we won't know but I think is unlikely. Instead what we would most likely see is improvement in technology to make them more efficient. long time ago, these are called solar panels because they need the strong light from the sun to work. But these days, they are termed as Photo-Voltaic panels because they can work even if there is no strong light from the sun. With things MIC, it will always be cheaper to buy over there. When you ship over to SG, after factoring in all the costs associated with logistics, marketing, margin etc, the price will definitely be much higher.

assuming your lights are installed at the ceiling level of your 2nd storey, it means the light is about 8m high from ground level. Since it's so high, the beam will spread wider. Would it be possible to shift the light downwards to reduce the width of the light beam? Or can you angle the light away from the side where the 4 houses are? Of cos the other alternative is to put lights on the side wall and use these to illuminate your garden instead. While you are only turning on the lights in the evening when you are in your garden and not throughout the night, I can imagine the "disturbance" which is felt by your neighbours when the light gets into their backyard especially when they are in the area. Personally, I would be irritated if I'm in their shoes. Imagine yourself sitting down in your backyard to relax in the evening and whenever your raise your head, you are blinded by the lights from your neighbour.

@leechaorui I assume the neighbour you are having problems with is from the row of 4 houses on your side. Since you mentioned their houses are on higher ground, how much higher is their ground compared to your land? If it's more than 1.5m high, then I don't think there's any cause for concern over the roots. Also, plant roots usually go deeper to search for underground water. Since the neighbour had extended the backyard, most likely the backyard is already tiled up. With lack of water in their ground, the roots from your tree is unlikely to go upwards to get water from their land and damage their house in the process. How high are your lights being installed? Also, what is the purpose for these lights? Don't get me wrong but I'm just trying to understand the rationale of these lights. If they are installed for your own security, then you have every right to provide a safe location for yourself and your family. But if it's for aesthetics reasons, would less bright lights perform the same function? Possible to relocate the lights? Or can use solar lights and place them around the land to brighten the area?

even before envelope control was introduced, there were clear guidelines on setbacks of the house. illegal is illegal, doesn't matter which set of regulations were in place during the time when the house was construction. Unless the house was built way before there was proper governance then it's another different story.

with regards to reduce monthly electrical bills, it depends on how you look at it. a PV installation may cost about 20k and assuming useful lifespan is 20 years, this would mean the cost of the system is about 1k per year before factoring in any maintenance and parts replacement costs. so it's how much the PV installation can reduce off your monthly electrical bill. if every month one can reduce the bill by $100, over 1 year you will "save" $1200. But do note that you had already paid for 20 years of electricity up front when you first pay for the PV system. so your real savings from the PV system could be $200 a year. Multiply the $200 by 20 years, you will save $4k. But if over the 20 years the cost of maintenance and parts replacement is more than $4k, then essentially you are paying more for electricity compared to the so called savings.

i'm no botanist but is your neighbour's house constructed with wood with wooden foundation? I think normally plants' roots will grow around obstructions. Unless your neighbour's house foundation already has problems then of cos this would be a concern since the tree roots may get into the problem areas and cause further damage. How far is your tree from their main building? You can gauge how far the roots of your tree had spread out by estimating the height of your tree. Dried leaves flying over can't be controlled. Is your neighbour going to complain to NParks if the leaves from trees from outside his house fly into his house during windy days? One cannot control where the leaves are being blown to. I even had leaves from don't know where ended up on my attic balcony at times. My neighbour A has a huge tree at his backyard with leaves often dropping over to my side. I just pick up the leaves and throw into a corner of my garden as compost. There are also branches from the tree coming into the airspace on my side so once in a while my neighbour A will prune the branches. I have also seeked permission from him to prune away branches when they start growing too near to my upper storey bedroom windows. My other side neighbour B sharing a fence with me also has plants coming over to my side and my plants also sometimes grow over to their side. So leaves and flowers dropping is common and we just give and take. This neighbour B also grows bougainvillea on the other side of the house and the fallen leaves and bracts from the bougainvillea will sometimes fly/drop over to the other side neighbour C. What neighbour B told my mum is that neighbour C will sweep up all these dead leaves and then throw it back over the neighbour B side. for your light, is any part of the light beam shining over your neighbour side? If not, then I don't really see a problem and you neighbour is just being a PITA. Of cos you can try to adjust the light so that it shines further from your neighbour side or change the location of the light such that it is at the side of your house, meaning the backside of the light is facing your neighbour side so he cannot complain that the light is too bright. For my house, my garden lights are positioned in this manner such that they are casting the light towards my house and back of the lights are facing the neighbours. Anyway, we are all living in a community in the same area so sometimes have to give and take.

You will also need to get the existing plans from BCA as well as download the cadastral plan from SLA website. The cadastral plan will be needed by the surveyor to conduct the survey. Can also go to pub website and buy the DIP and SIP drawings as well. anyway surveying is usually completed in one day unless there are things which are missed out. The surveyed plan can be obtained within one month. once you confirm your architect, he/she will advice you more.