snoozee

the person who you can go after is the one who signed on your approved housing plans which is submitted to the authorities. you can't do much about the so called "coordinator" unless there's explicit contracts signed with him/her. technically whoever signed on the plans is the one responsible. saying that letting someone else use the company name just for endorsement doesn't absolve all responsibilities since to the authorities, they will go after the person who signed and put down their name in the building plans. the PE I'm referring to is the Professional Engineer for your project. since you are doing a rebuilt, there is a PE who will be involved in signing off the structural plans. the TOP inspection needs a Qualified Person (either an architect or PE) to do the application so you can try to get the PE to help since the architect isn't doing anything. as mentioned, call board of architects for some advice on what you can do to the architect/firm and force them to do the TOP inspection.

The architect has a responsibility since he signed his name on your house plans. You can lodge a complaint to the board of architects if he refuses to perform the TOP inspection. My advise is that you call the board of architects and seek advice from them on your possible course of actions. As mentioned, you can try to find the PE to get him/her to apply for the TOP inspection for you.

Find the actual architect who signed off the building plans and get him/her to do the inspection. I'm assuming that your suspended architect is not the one who signed off the plans. alternatively you can try to find the PE who signed off the plans as well and get him/her to do it. If I'm not wrong, the TOP inspection just need a QP (either architect or PE) to apply.

Having a sewer is not the end of the world. Just need to spend some $ to built something that we will never see. Of cos if the land is big enough, one can always choose to build up to 1m away from the sewer line and have a bigger open area.

some old houses have electrical and water meters inside the house so these need to be relocated outside the house so will incur fees.

lucky you that the sewer is not in your back yard. I have one running at almost 3m deep. don't know how much it's going to cost me to built the RC trench for that. buying plans is cheap. the submissions for approval are going to cost quite a bit. one year ago, URA raised the submission fees for new erection from 3K to 6K. as what cymon had said, just appoint an architect and get them to settle all the paperwork for you.

if you are going to tear down the existing house, don't really need to buy the structural plans from BCA. unless you're doing reconstruction or A&A then need the existing plans. for the various plans from the authorities, the contents may not be able to be understood by laymen so still need consultants to decipher and do the necessary action. RLP is purchased from SLA, not LTA. submission of changes would be to LTA just to add on, the cadastral plan is now available for free download from SLA website by the owner of the house. this CP is needed by the topo surveyor. can save several tens of dollars by getting the existing owner to download if it's not too much of a hassle.

have you gotten a builder or architect to design your house? the house design would play a major part on determining the piling needed.

could be an end-terrace or corner terrace...

the 1.8m screen wall is to provide some privacy between yourself and your immediate neighbor if your car porch is abutting your neighbour's boundary. meaning if your car porch is built right up to the boundary, you will need this screen wall unless your neighbor agrees not to have this. if you are going to use the car porch roof as an open terrace, you should install a parapet wall (using glass panels or railings) for safety reasons. 1m is the maximum height of this parapet wall so you can build it to whatever height below 1m as you like.

I bought a set of door handles from a locksmith shop in Jalan bersah. Dismantled the handles and used them to replace the broken toilet door handles. Much cheaper and unlikely to break off again like the original plastic ones

Your survey should have been done even before the design started since your architect need to know the site boundaries for your new house. i don't think soil investigation report needs to be submitted. how much the survey and soil investigation cost depends on who your architect/builder appointed as different companies charge different rates. Best is check with your architect or builder on the payments

go and look for an architect or builder. there's documents to be purchased before the new house can be designed. Things like sewage interpretation plan, drainage interpretation plan, road line plan can be purchased by yourself but you still need someone who is familiar or qualified to interpret the plans and the descriptions. There's also the topography survey which needs to be done to verify your land's boundaries and make sure there's no encroachment. Normally the topography surveyor will rely on the cadestral plan which can also be purchased. but if you had completed the house purchase and the land is transferred to your name, the cadestral plan can be downloaded from SLA for free. Then there's also the soil investigation which needs to be done for your land as well. The topography surveyor and soil investigation normally will be arranged by the architect or your builder (if you choose not to deal with an architect). Once you have finalized your house design, it needs to be signed off by an architect and approved by URA before works can start. so as you can see, the first thing you should do is to look for an architect or builder to guide you through the process.

I think a lot depends on what is the existing condition and the rooms configuration and whether it suits your needs or not. without tearing down the house, you are always constrained by the existing structure when doing A&A. but if you are going to do a major A&A, it might be better off just doing a full rebuilt (for maybe 20% to 30% on top of the A&A cost) which means you can design the new house to your liking. paying 3M for 3300sqf of freehold land is still quite a good buy even if you don't keep the existing house. If budget is not an issue, I would say rebuilt would be the better option.

if your house on freehold land or 99 years land? if it's 99 years, then it won't make sense to rebuilt. but since you mentioned its very old, i'll assume yours is on freehold land. I'm not a valuer or property agent so I can't tell you how much increase in value the house will have after the construction works. Even professionals can only give you a new value after seeing the proposed new building plans. But if you are going to sink in 1M for rebuild, the bank valuation of your rebuilt house should be more than 4M (assuming you paid 3M for existing house and land). From what I understand, valuers use past transaction data of similar houses nearby as well as the physical aspects of the house itself to come out with a monetary value. If you are planning to sell after 3 years, you can only cross your fingers that nothing major happens in the next few years to cause the property market to crash.

for my case, the sewer is about 4m into my lot from the rear boundary, without doing a RC trench, I can only build up to 1.5m from where the sewer is which will translate to about 25% of buildable land area being lost. hopefully building the RC trench won't cost too much for us.

for old houses, it would be better to tear down to rebuild due to limitations of existing structure for any major A&A works. semi-d rebuild will definitely exceed 600K or even 1M. your 600k budget is something more of an A&A which isn't too extensive as I saw a quote for a semi-d A&A which ran to close to 800K. for semi-d, there is a need for a 2m setback at the sides so you are unlikely to be able to extend the house on its side. so most likely the only place you can extend is the backyard. if there is a sewer running through your backyard, you will need to build a RC trench over this sewer before you can extend the house since without the RC trench protection, nothing can be build over the sewer pipe. I would suggest you look for architects or builders for better advice on what is the best option and costing.

For semi-d I would say set aside at least 1m as budget

Basement information from URA guidebook

Whether the current ground level is above MPL or not is important as all first storey must be at MPL level. So if your land is below MPL, you need to raise the building up to meet the MPL for first storey. But if it's above MPL, you can just start building at current level. If above MPL, you can dig basement. But you may not be able to do basement garage. Again depends on your site constraints which only your architect can advise you when the topo survey is done. For semi-d, the side of the house is exposed. Normally this will be first storey. But if your basement is also exposed on the side that is not joining the neighbor, then it is limited to 2.5m if not URA will consider it as a storey and not basement. Unless your basement is fully underground then the 2.5m limit won't be there.

The manhole is in your property as that is the last link between the sewage pipes in your house to the public sewer. I doubt you can relocate it outside your property. Costs wise for relocation and basement you will need to talk to an architect or builder

If semi-d, there is the 2m side setback as well. For envelope design, attic don't require an actual setback. But if you look at the regulation, the envelope for attic (based on 3.5m high attic) is based on a 45 degree line from the top corner of the floor below the attic. This is why I mentioned the attic setback is 3.5m front and rear based on this buildable envelope. So if you decide to have you attic height at just 3m, your attic front and rear setback will be 3m which is within the envelop. Technically you can have a staggered attic roof to maximize the buildable internal area. Depending on where the house is, if it's in a low lying area, the house will need to be build above a minimum platform level (MPL) of about 104mrl. So depending on how much the current ground level is below this MPL, you can do some excavation to build a basement as anything below the MPL would not be considered as an additional storey. But do note that for basements that have exposed sides (because of semi-d), the maximum allowed basement exposed level is 2.5m from basement finished floor level to 1st storey finished floor level. Unless your basement is fully covered on the rear and sides then you can have a higher inter storey level for basement.

That manhole (inspection chamber) will be connected to the sewer. Most old landed houses will have one. It can be relocated but to construct a new one will be costly as well.

Need to purchase the sewage interpretation plan (SIP) from PUB. Normally your QP will buy it together with the drainage interpretation plan. From the SIP, you will know if the public sewer runs through your house. Depending on where the sewer is located, you could still do a basement but obviously not till where the sewer is. There needs to be a setback (I think is 2m) to the sewer as well. But if you are building over the sewer, then the sewer protection comes in where a RC trench needs to be constructed over the sewer to protect it. Without doing this protection, you need to set back your building from the sewer.

Basement will cost a few hundred k due to all the additional work like excavation, piling, etc. if your land is a inter terrace, you need to set back the house 7.5m from front boundary and 2m from the back. 2nd floor follow the same set backs. For attic, it is 3.5m front and rear from the building line. Meaning 11m from front boundary and 5.5m from rear. So the attic will have less internal floor space but area within the set back and open to sky can be used as balconies