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18 March 2015 Our entry starts midway through everything, our renovation is just beginning and its slated to complete in about 2.5 months. We completed the purchase of our Serangoon Maisonette mid December 2014 and decided to wait till after CNY 2015 to begin the renovation. Will take this space to document the reno journey and share our thoughts and purchases as well. The next post will provide the catch up for the initial few months before present day.

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 All This is my first time trying out a blog. I figured that we should document our journey of metamorphising our resale EM into our dream Sky Parlour. Kindly pardon if we get our formatting wrong. This is something very new to us. Just a bit of background. We have been married for many years, and have been living in a small 4-room HDB. Recently in the last few years, 2 little people suddenly appeared, and started running around in our house. There is a need for a bigger house for all our belongings now, as well as for the 2 little people to run around in. Hence we decided to move to a bigger house. But Singapore is so small, all our houses are merely pigeonholes, and getting private/ landed/ condo is definitely within the "Only in our dreams" category. So we decided to get an Executive Maisonette. This is only affordable after we sell our 4 room. But after taking all the financing / bank loan/ 20% down for the EM, we realised "Oh $#!Ϯ We forgot to budget in the renovation!!" Hence here we are, reading other people's experiences in their journey hoping to learn more. And now we're blogging our journey. Floor Plan Cheers!

Hi fellow renotalk peeps! We have just purchased our first home and it's an executive maisonette in Hougang! Love that its walking distance to the MRT and there are lots of amenities nearby. Recently exercised our OTP in Nov and we are waiting to collect our keys in March! Let me share my floor plan first. We have engaged S from Three-D Conceptwerke to design and style our home and working with our own contractors to do the works. Prior to that we have met up with a few IDs: BPS (not very responsive) Rezt n Relax (too commercialized) Dreams Concept (omg... don't get me started) Hklassic Design (nothing special) DAP ATELIER (no connection and typical space planning) Three-D Conceptwerke Both of us love potatoes and we cannot live with it, Thus naming our home #thepotatohome. But our theme is definitely not going to be anything related to it! Going for the industrial/new yorker feel.... We want our home to be unique and different from the typical reno designs, something out of the box and daring. We are so excited to share our exciting reno journey with everyone! We will be sharing our space planning plans next!

Hi all I'm new to this forum, and I need help from Executive Maisonette (EM) owners who have renovated their EMs recently. I am not sure if my ID / contractor is taking me for a ride. -------- 1. Background: This topic concerns the staircase railing. Last Dec, I took over the keys to my resale EM in the West. The previous owner owned the place for >20 years and kept the flat in a really dilapidated condition. When I engaged my ID / contractor (note: not a reputable firm, based on a friend's recommendation) I told him I would be hacking many walls and changing the staircase railing. HDB approvals have thus far taken a painful and frustrating 3-4 months; I am not sure if this is because of my ID sitting on the approvals, or if HDB really requires that much time to vet through the submissions. They had rejected my application to replace the old staircase railing (Old EM flats have vertical bars connected by a thick wooden slab, which is visually unappealing to me), citing the requirement to involve a PE and subsequently, BCA, in the approvals. My ID explained that the staircase railings need to comply to new BCA regulation, which states that the railing needs to have even more closely-spaced vertical bars. This is puzzling and frustrating for me, as: (i) I do not wish for the approvals to drag on for much longer; (ii) the vertical bars ruin the concept of my apartment which I have painstakingly designed (I very much prefer horizontal bars); (iii) I see a lot of EMs featured in Home & Decor / other magazines which have staircase railings that would be considered ridiculous by BCA / HDB guidelines (if what my ID says is true)...some examples completely did away with the railings! -------- 2. Your Help Needed: As such, I thought to seek your opinions on the following questions: (1) Is my ID / contractor taking me for a ride? Do BCA / HDB guidelines really require railings with so many vertical bars? (2) How have others gotten their modern / minimalist staircase designs (with horizontal bars) approved? What are some suggestions to help me on my situation? (3) Should I speak with the HDB officer directly? (My contractor has thus far blocked access to the HDB officer) -------- Please feel free to PM me, thanks so so so much in advance for your help!!! My renovations haven't even started, despite my engaging the ID in Nov 2015...imagine that....

Hi all I'm new to this forum, and I need help from Executive Maisonette (EM) owners who have renovated their EMs recently. I am not sure if my ID / contractor is taking me for a ride. -------- 1. Background: This topic concerns the staircase railing. Last Dec, I took over the keys to my resale EM in the West. The previous owner owned the place for >20 years and kept the flat in a really dilapidated condition. When I engaged my ID / contractor (note: not a reputable firm, based on a friend's recommendation) I told him I would be hacking many walls and changing the staircase railing. HDB approvals have thus far taken a painful and frustrating 3-4 months; I am not sure if this is because of my ID sitting on the approvals, or if HDB really requires that much time to vet through the submissions. They had rejected my application to replace the old staircase railing (Old EM flats have vertical bars connected by a thick wooden slab, which is visually unappealing to me), citing the requirement to involve a PE and subsequently, BCA, in the approvals. My ID explained that the staircase railings need to comply to new BCA regulation, which states that the railing needs to have even more closely-spaced vertical bars. This is puzzling and frustrating for me, as: (i) I do not wish for the approvals to drag on for much longer; (ii) the vertical bars ruin the concept of my apartment which I have painstakingly designed (I very much prefer horizontal bars); (iii) I see a lot of EMs featured in Home & Decor / other magazines which have staircase railings that would be considered ridiculous by BCA / HDB guidelines (if what my ID says is true)...some examples completely did away with the railings! -------- 2. Your Help Needed: As such, I thought to seek your opinions on the following questions: (1) Is my ID / contractor taking me for a ride? Do BCA / HDB guidelines really require railings with so many vertical bars? (2) How have others gotten their modern / minimalist staircase designs (with horizontal bars) approved? What are some suggestions to help me on my situation? (3) Should I speak with the HDB officer directly? (My contractor has thus far blocked access to the HDB officer) -------- Please feel free to PM me, thanks so so so much in advance for your help!!! My renovations haven't even started, despite my engaging the ID in Nov 2015...imagine that....

Limited Edition HDB Executive Maisonette in Bukit Batok Central - Direct home owner is selling. - 150 sqm area. Block is on elevated ground. Peaceful & safe environment. - High floor with unblock view & lifts landing on every floor. - 4 extremely spacious bedrooms (3+1). - 4-5 min walk to West Mall, MRT & bus interchange. 1 min walk to Community Centre & coffee shop. Easy access to nearby bus-stops & easy to find cabs. - 8 min walk to wet market. - 24hrs Amenities to supermarkets (NTUC & Giant), McDonald, confectionery shop, coffee shop, Chinese restaurant, roti prata coffee shop. - Short walk to library, park, swimming pools, bowling centre, cinemas & post office. Near to Neighbourhood Police Post, golf range, driving school, country clubs, regional library, skating rink, Science Centre, Future Jurong Lake Gardens - Next to Jurong East Central Business District such as Gateway, IMM, TradeHub21, JE Hub, JTC Building & more. - Short MRT ride to JEM, Westgate, IMM, Big Box, J Cube, Genting Hotel, Devan Nair Institute, Lot 1, Clementi Mall, Yew Tee Point, Jurong Point. - Easy access to infant care, child care & student care. - Educations: MMI Montessori, Learning Vision, St Anthony's, Keming, Princess Elizabeth, Swiss Cottage, Millennia Institute (Pre-U), Canadian International, Dulwich College, Bukit Batok Sec, Pei Hwa Presbyterian, MGS, Nan Hua, CHIJ, Bt Panjang Govt High, School of Science & Technology, Polytechnics, NUS, NTU & German European School. - Enrichment schools: Morris Allen, Berries World, Tien Xia Chinese, Yamaha Music, Shichida Method, Aspire Hub, Stalford, LCentral, The Learning Hub, MindChamps & more. - Any buyers, regardless of their ethnic group and citizenship. - Strictly no agents. Only for direct buyer. **Contact Direct Owner @ 82106729

~5 Mins To Admiralty MRT ~Near Amenities (Giant Express Supermarket, Prime Supermarket, UOB Bank, MacDonalds, KFC, FoodCourt, 24 Hours CoffeeShop & etc) ~Big Spacious Room ~Fully Furnished ~With Aircon ~Utilities Included ~Friendly Chinese Landlord ~Move In 1st July 1 Pax $650 / 2 Pax Or Couple $750 Call Landlord Cindy @ 91448099 For Viewing Now!