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Hi ALL, i collected my keys in Jan 2017, in Boon Keng area, and finally works are starting!! This is my floor plan!

Hi all! I've been a grateful reader of renotalk for quite a few months now and have learnt so many things from here! I am hoping that by starting a T-blog, the discussions in it could also somehow help other people as well. My husband and I are "newlyweds" (when does one disqualify from being newlyweds? 1 year? 2 years? before kids?) and were lucky enough to spend a year away in London straight after getting married, where he studied for his Masters and I worked and also kept our tiny student dorm room clean and full of food. Since coming back in July this year, we searched around for our own place whilst living with his parents in his room, and in October, managed to exercise our option to purchase on a nice 30-year-old first-gen executive maisonette in Jurong West, which is also near to his parents' house. We've nicknamed our new place "Emma" (because it's an EM?), but actually it's not really our place yet till our second HDB appointment in end Jan 2016, and even then the owners have asked to extend their stay for another two months, so in reality we will only get our keys sometime in March 2016. Even so, we've basically been looking at renovations and furniture and tiles and light fixtures and appliances since October, so you can say we are preparing quite early. The layout! I've actually modified this from the version we received from HDB, since the current owners had done some modifications to knock down the wall between the utility room and the kitchen. The layout is very similar to twinklecloud's EM otherwise, a typical first-gen EM with the long balcony at the living room and much of the unit still in original condition or at least 15-year-old decorations. We don't intend to do that much modification to the existing structure, though we wanted to reinstate the utility room (and make it slightly longer to accommodate storage shelves and a bed if possible) and as a result, make the kitchen slightly smaller. After seeing twinklecloud's desired layout, we've also become a bit more daring and are hoping to change the kitchen toilet to an L-shaped toilet so that it wouldn't feel so cramped and potentially be wheelchair-accessible(??). There's also the usual hacking of tiles on the first floor (the existing ones are pastel, matt, 30x30cm and super retro) and thinking of overlaying HERF on the second floor to save some money. We are keeping the balcony open and maybe just installing a retractable awning. We are also not intending to have too much built-ins as we intend to start a family soon and want to keep the house quite flexible in terms of layout. Despite that, we've been looking at relatively expensive quotes, guess that it comes with the EM territory...

Hi fellow Renotalkers, we are currently in the midst of renovation and found reading and learning from the collective experience of others to have helped us so much in our journey! As such we have decided to document our renovation and review the good and bad decisions we have made along the way. Hopefully it helps some of you out there! Our theme for this house is Eclectic Scandinavian. We wanted a mostly Scandinavian theme but wanted to attempt to incorporate some eclectism into it! Basically indecisive people needing an excuse for random out of place furniture I suspect the house is going to still turn out 99% scandinavian but we'll see how it goes! Below is our moodboard for the house! Living Room Kitchen Toilet Master Bedroom Of course, the journey first started with stressful ID/Contractor search and space planning We met about 6-7 ID/contractors in total. There's so much to say about this step but I think it can be summed up by going with your gut feel and with someone whom you can trust/can click with! Some thoughts on the whole process meet a few IDs/contractors at least before deciding Try to know your requirements before meeting them, and try to standardize the items that they quote you as far as possible so that you can compare cost Research and know the market price of certain items before going - e.g know the rough cost of floor tiles PSF, cost of labor for tiling psf, cost of quartz/granite/solid top per feet run, cost of cabinet carpentry per feet run, cost of paint etc. Much easier to bargain if you know which are the overpriced items on the quote! Specify the material you want as far as possible When one ID/contractor tells you something isn't possible, run the same problem by the other ID/contractors. We found solutions for many problems that way! Most importantly is how prompt they are. You will need to contact them a lot during the phase of renovation and it will make a huge difference if they are fast. If they cannot even give you a quotation on time, there's no way your renovation will be on track. Our main areas of built in Living room Craftstone brick wall Wall low cabinets Kitchen Hacking of wall Kitchen island Top and bottom kitchen cabinets Toilets Vanity cabinet and shower screens (half for common, full for master) Barn door for master bedroom toilet Master bedroom Straight Wardrobe Flooring Floor tiles for living room and vinyl for bedrooms Decided to minimise built in furnishings in the bedrooms so that they will be flexible in their use in the future! In the end we decided to go with a contractor as we felt he was efficient/prompt and had the confidence that he would be able to pull off the requirements we had. Didn't see a need for an ID as we felt that we would be able to design the house by ourselves! Turned out to be both a right and wrong decision at the same time! We had the space planning and concept in mind but honestly ended up struggling so much with paint colours, lighting positioning and furniture selection ! Below is a super duper untidy and unprofessionally drawn copy of our space planning! Funny circles with crosses in the middle is my way of indicating chairs HAHA We're some ways into the renovation and will try to compile categories together so that it will be easier to read!

So... I decided to do this. I have actually finished my reno and moved into my place. I thought I share some thoughts on this forum about my reno experience. I don't think I will write a lot of posts, but will try. My journey started about a year ago on 13 Oct 2014, when I first viewed this 4 room re-sale HDB. Made a very quick decision and issued the cheque on the very day after I viewed the place. I am actually very happy with my purchase. Near to MRT, parents, city and high floor. The flat is about 31 years old, so would need some major reno. Will show you guys more photos of the old place in my next post when I upload all the photos! Below is the layout plan of the flat. I started to look for an ID in Nov 2014. Only met up with 3 but already felt so tired! Appointed my ID in around early Jan. Collected my keys on 21 Jan 2015! That was a very exciting day! Next post I will show the photos of the place before reno, and the experience with the 3 IDs.