snoozee

all questions you asked can be answered by an architect. how much it will cost for site visit I don't know. you will have to do some cold calls to architect firms to find out. floor plan is needed if you need to do the works. it can be bought from BCA. my house plans were from 1958 and are old hand drawn plans which BCA scan into pdf format. just pay $ can buy. but only owner or owner's authorised person can buy from BCA. if you already have a ramp, why don't keep it. it would be better than having to walk up steps especially if you are planning to stay in there till you get old. I think what you have is a single storey house with an attic instead of a 2 storey house. if the existing house is declared as a single storey with attic, then you will need to do a reconstruction to add a full level. but I may be wrong on this so get an architect to advise you on this. if you want, share the location of the house and can see more from google street view of the house.

my suggestions is that you go and engage an architect or PE to look into this. preferable an architect as they would be in a better position to understand URA's guidelines. URA allows the retention of non-compliant structures for certain cases. So it really depends on what case you can present to URA via your QP. if URA does allow for the non-compliant structure to be retained, you will most likely need a PE to certify that the non-compliant structure is structurally sound and do submission to BCA. at the end of the day, I think you need to weigh the cost of doing all these submissions/checks for this non-compliant structure or just having it removed totally. if you are just planning to do a simple extension, then you could make do with a PE as your QP. but if you need to engage an architect to check on the non-compliant structure, your cost of engaging the architect may end up more than just removing the structure. eg: engage an architect cost you 8k. demolish the structure cost you 5k. which one would you choose? my guess is your non-compliant structure is just a roof canopy which is extended from the side of your house to full cover the 2m open area which many semi-d or corner terrace owners build to provide additional shade. if this is indeed the case, then removing it would be the much cheaper option. the other alternative is to see if the contractor you engage can reduce the canopy to be just 1m wide which will then be compliant to the regulations.

if you need to submit to URA, then you will need to go through all the inspections and such. if your renovation need not go through URA, then SAF rule 7 will apply. there are a lot of houses in SG with non-compliant structures so buyers need to be careful when purchasing houses. you can feedback to URA on why your neighbours can keep their non-compliant structures but you will most likely be digging into a big can of worms and end up your neighbours will be requested to remove these structures. not a good way to start the stay in a new neighbourhood I would say. BCA not interested in these non-compliant structures. it's URA who is in charge of the planning hence they will be the "police" for this

nope. URA specifies what type of houses can be built based on the zone. if 2 storey landed, then can only built 2 storey plus attic. if based on 1.4 plot ratio, then can built 3 storey subjected to total GFA. at my estate (east side), URA (weirdly) demarcated one area as 2 storey landed houses while across the road is a 3 storey landed zone.

with reconstruction, you can retain the existing floor level. however do note that there is a limit on how much you can change to the existing house in order to qualify as a reconstruction. with a 7.5m setback, you could actually build a ramp from the gate to the main building of the house to that there's no steps involved. if i'm not wrong, URA now allows for earth fill to mitigate this low lying issue. taking into account say 20cm thickness of concrete for the ramp, you only need to backfill up to 0.8m which is within the limits.

you will need to have 2m set back at the back and sides as well as 7.5m set back at the front. so technically your buildable area becomes 10m x 25.5m which gives you 255sqm for the ground floor. assuming the house is in a 2 storey landed housing zone, you can build another storey plus an attic level above. so if you decide to max out your available floor area is 255sqm (ground floor), 255sqm (2nd storey) and 185sqm (attic). attic is assumed to have a further 3.5m setback both front and back from the building's foot print. of cos if you decide to do a pitched roof for your attic, this area will become bigger if the area under the pitched roof is taken into account. since your architect told you needs to be 1m above ground, it has to be as this means your house is in a low lying area and the house needs to be raised up to prevent flooding. the level above ground is determined based on a relative level which is the Singapore Datum. if your house is below this datum, it will need to be raised above this datum level hence the 1m. BUT the "good" thing is that URA can consider this 1m to be a basement and your building height is then calculated from this 1m level. of cos there are other guidelines which need to be adhered to for this basement. a basement would cost you another 400k to 500k of construction cost. a lot of the money will actually go into providing for Earth Retaining Stabilising Structure (ERSS) which is a temporary structure to prop the ground while it is being excavated. since you are already in a low lying area, this is much more important since you have a high chance of your house being on clay like soil. If you want a basement, the only way is for you to tear down and rebuilt. If you can forgo the basement, then you could build a pool in the existing house within the current 2m setback. of cos if you are planning to dig anything more than 1.5m for the pool, you might need to do ERSS as well to prevent the soil from collapsing during the building of the pool. Budget wise, I guess it depends on if you are doing a reconstruction or new built. a new build could cost you 1.5M without basement. Then again, it depends on what type of finishing you are looking at. if you want to have marble or granite everywhere in the house, be prepared to fork out more money for the natural stone. edit: forgot to mention that you will need to check if there is a public sewer running through your land. if there is and the current house isn't built over the sewer but you wish to build your house over the sewer, you will need to build a RC trench to protect this sewer. This RC trench can cost you about 50k to more than 100k depending on how deep your sewer is and how much it is within your plot.

First question you should ask yourselves first is how are you planning to finance this A&A, Reconstruction or redevelopment? If you are planning to take loans to finance it, is your bank able to loan the money to you since this additional loan is subject to TDSR as well. Assuming you can fulfill the TDSR criteria, do you have enough cash to finance it? banks WILL NOT loan you the fill 100% needed. the usual case is 75% or 80% depending on banks. Assuming the bank is willing to finance you 75%, you will need to fork out 67K (A&A), 145K (Recon), 241K(rebuilt) first before the bank loan can be drawn down. Do note that I've added the 7% GST in the calculations for the above numbers. Also note that most builders WILL NOT put in authorities fees as part of their quotation. So you will need to factor in fees to URA, BCA, NParks, PUB, Netlink trust, PUB, SP Group, etc. These fees can total up to more than 10k depending on what option you choose. Let's say you fulfill the TDSR and have enough cash on hand(at least $250k), then what would the choice you should take? Questions then you should ask yourselves 1. how old is the current house? 2. is the layout of the current house (after A&A) able to fulfill you and your family's living requirements? EG: enough rooms/toilets or space to use? If the house was built more than 50 years ago and you feel that the additional space after A&A may not fulfill your needs for space, then you can only choose to add an additional floor or do a total rebuilt. Whether to do a reconstruction or total rebuilt again depends on the PE's assessment of the existing structure. If the existing structure cannot take the load of an additional floor, then the existing structure will need to be reinforced which means the columns and beams strengthened to take the weight of the new floor and this will eat into the floor space as well as lower the ceiling at certain points due to the thickened beams. One possible way to mitigate this is to do steel beams/columns for the 3rd floor which will reduce the weight (just a suggestion as I'm not sure what your builder had suggested). If you are ok with these and the additional 3rd storey space is sufficient, then just go with this option. However if even with the additional 3rd floor, you feel the space may not be enough and you wish to have even more space and also a roof terrace to entertain, then the only way is to bite the bullet and do a new rebuilt. With this, you can design the house accordingly to what you require and plan the living spaces accordingly to what you need. If you want, can also provision for a lift shaft to future proof the house in case next time you need to install a lift in the house. On whether houses can last for you to pass on to your children, I would say either option you choose, the house will last as most (if not all) of our houses are engineered to last. When I tore down my old house this year which was built in 1960/1961, the only visible defect was a slight spalling concrete on one of the beams.

There are a lot of guidelines and restrictions when it comes to conservation houses. if your intention is to self stay, then I would suggest staying clear of them and buy a freehold landed house instead. An architect who had dealt with conservation houses would be able to give you much better advise. if you are interested to know more, go and download URA’s handbook on conservation houses and read up.

No DC if the resultant building form is the same as the original. DC applies if you are tearing down a detached house and building a few semi-d or terrace houses in its place. Or you buy 2 semi-d side by side and then rebuild into a few terrace houses. Basically if the land value will be enhanced, DC will apply. if your plan is to tear down and rebuilt, why want to do site inspection? Just go buy SIP and DIP from pub to make sure your target plot of land does not have a sewer running through the land and the land is not affected by drainage reserves. Else you may have to spend money to build an RC trench to protect the sewer (if you are building over the sewer). If affected by drainage reserve, your house may need additional setback which means a smaller plot for you to build on.

you could try removing a section and see if the white paint had seeped through the wood or not. if yes, then chances are that other parts may have the same problem. if seepage had occurred, then instead of stripping the white paint and varnishing, maybe paint it brown? if you really want to have varnished skirting, then last resort if to replace everything with new ones.

you will need to sand away the white paint. problem is whether the white paint had seeped through the grains on the wood or not.

unless you hack the ceiling to create channels to hide the wire within these channels and then plaster the ceiling back. however, check with your mcst on whether hacking of ceiling to conceal wiring is allowed or not. else just go by SAF rule number 7. One thing to note is that you should find out what is the breaker that is being used for this lighting point and whether the breaker is also servicing other points or not. you need to know this so that you don't end up overloading the breaker which will end up causing power trips.

Since you cannot change the façade which means from outside still needs to be green, the only viable options are for you to stick black sticker on the window frame or paint them black inside. the window frames are most probable power coated and it would be challenging to powder coat them half green half black. The bigger challenge is whether your MCST even allows you to remove the entire window to work on them or not.

why don't you check with your contractor or QP on whether they have contacts instead? usually they would have people whom they had worked with regularly on projects who can handle this. also this is not a new ruling but rather there are changes to the regulations/requirements. for submissions after 1 may 2019, they must be following the new regulations whereas any submissions prior to 1 may 2019 will still need to follow the older regulations. either way, a PE (electric) will be needed to do the submissions to BCA.

not necessary. assuming the entrance opening width is 2.4m and you have a split swing gate, that means each gate panel is 1.2m wide. so if your gate is installed at 1.3m from the front boundary, you will still have 6.2m clearance from the gate to the house (based on 7.5m setback) which would be sufficient for you to park your car inside since most cars are less than 5m in length.

Why not just put in some stone pavers instead of concreating everything? The concrete will just absorb the sun’s heat and may end up heating your house when the wind blows the hot air from the concrete floor into your house

Officially all swing gates MUST swing inwards. Unless your gate is set back such that when it swings out, it is still within your boundary. Main reson is for pedestrian safety if i’m not wrong

depends on what you are buying. NOT EVERYTHING comes under WELS. certain categories are not covered under WELS but the majority are covered. I think some of the faucets which I bought locally a few months ago does not come with the WELS label inside the box (need to go home to check to confirm this though). edit: just confirmed that none of my German branded faucets come with any WELS label inside the box and BTW, BCA building plan submission does not require that sanitary fittings have WELS label. BCA does not check on this. The WELS check is done during TOP or CSC clearance by PUB officers.

buy the floor plans from HDB. get a PE to look at the plans and determine which wall you want to hack. submit to HDB and see if they approve or not. 30 years ago is unlikely to have prefab for HDB.

Yes. SIP will show the information. But you will need to know how to interpret the plan. If the sewer don’t run through your land then there’s no concerns at all

PE is a must as long as building structure is involved. Architect’s role is normally everything else apart from items which involve the structure. One of the important job the architect will do is to do up the tender specifications for builders to tender for and call the tender. Inside the tender specifications will also be specs for doors, windows, types of finishes, etc. if you feel the PE is enough, then it’s your own call. SIP and DIP can be purchased by yourself from PUB/SLA actually. Some people buy it before signing the OTP so as to avoid building an RC trench. Depending on the depth of the sewer, the trench can cost a 6 figure sum to build.

well, in URA website, it does say that a QP (either a PE or an architect) can do submissions for A&A works. assuming that the PE can submit to URA for your reconstruction with additional storey, how confident are you that the PE will know all the necessary building regulations to design your house according to the allowed guidelines? the building/renovation of a house is not just involving URA or BCA. there are other agencies involved as well like PUB, NEA, SCDF, LTA, NPARKS, IMDA. I would suggest you speak to your PE to ask if they can do all the submissions to all agencies for you from approval of project to TOP/CSC. if your PE can and is willing do everything, then good for you to save on architect's cost. honestly speaking from personal experience, having different consultants for different purpose will save you money and headache. if you are not well versed in all the technical requirements and such for buildings, then having the additional person (architect) to check/verify the requirements is better than just relying everything on the PE to do. remember that humans do make mistakes. and mistakes in construction can become costly.

I don't think you can just build an extra toilet as and where you like. the most important thing is where are you going to run the waste water pipes? in HDB flats, all sewer pipes from the toilet are connected to a waste water stack for connection back to the public sewer. In condos, it would most likely be a similar arrangement as well. so unless your downstairs neighbor allow you to hack their walls and ceilings for connection of a new waste pipe, what you are thinking of doing is simply not possible. not to mention that the MCST would most likely reject your request as well.

question is whether you are engaging the PE directly or through a contractor. price will also vary between different PE firms based on what type of jobs the PE are normally handling. if normally handling big jobs, price also will be higher compared to those who are normally handling small housing jobs. do also note that chances of PE who are used to handle big jobs, may end up with higher specifications and designs as they are used to that kind of tolerances required for big jobs. since you adding another storey, you will need an architect to do the submission to URA and such. if you builder is quoting you a lump sum for everything, chances are that the architect is just putting the name on the submission to authorities and will provide minimal/no design input on your house design.

think should be at least high tens to mid twenties of thousand. you should be paying for the design of the upgraded existing columns and beams, additional/upgrade foundations (if needed), new household shelter, new columns and beams, new floor slab for 3rd storey, roof, railings. not to mention the PE would need to study the existing house plans as well as the soil investigation report. quite a lot of things to be done by the PE and not simply just put down the name and sign on the drawings.