The Groovys' New Home: An Adventure In Reno

[groovygenie 0]

Its time to take the plunge and have our own reno-blog! Let's see how well we keep this up

To start off, here are some photos taken about 3 months ago (ps: our reno is still incomplete, sigh...)

Anyway, welcome! Pardon the quality (hp), more better photos in the next few days. Hope you like our share-share corner.

We have lift off!

First to start was the aircon people, by the way, good service by Natcool, impressed with their punctuality and customer service, always keep you informed of the schedule.

Holes for aircon trunking in bathrooms...pretty happy with the planning as we did it ourselves, only visible trunking is in MBR 2, which was unavoidable...

The false ceiling folks conveniently stored their inventory in our kitchen for one month, good thinking guys! But they did a great job eventually, we thought.

Toa Payoh Sands

Cement and Sand for living room and bedrooms...homo tiles in living room and parquet in bedrooms..

Living Room

Bedroom 3

Bedroom 2

MBR..small isn't it?

Land ahoy!

Finally we had a flat floor that we can walk on, our homo tiles are the 800X800 kind...recommended by ID...although we have our own theory...bigger tile size means less tiles to use...less tiles to use means...less money spent! The diff in price between the 600 and 800 tiles is not that great anyway. Sneaky sneaky..

Our 'Italian' tiles made in China...

More soon! cheers!

[groovygenie 0]

In the mean time...

We went window shopping...

Vanity for MBR..decided not to have a built-in one. Off-the-shelf ones will save you lots of money! Fabrication and customisation is a good money making business

Saw these one was at Hoe Kee..

But we've gotten a combo of these at Ikea..

Sinks..small kitchen so had to make sacrifices..

Really like this one at Poh Joo but a tad too large, even the smallest one..so sad...

Eventually we got this..

Lights..we did the usual thing..walked along Balestier, then Jalan Besar, then Balestier again, then Geylang, then Jalan Besar...didn't buy anything. Pretty turned off at some of these places. And then we went to Lightcraft at Jalan Sultan on a Renotalk recommendation. Good stuff! Transparent pricing, reasonable prices and nice designs.

Some lights we saw at some places that we like..

Hoping somebody will get this for us for our wedding gift Hahaha..not shy one..this one is at Friven but I think can get cheaper eleswhere.

You'll get to see our purchased lights in the next posts

[Starscream 0]

Nice Genie keep em' coming!

[Yang Guo 7]

yup yup..keep the pics coming

hope to see the final product soon

[groovygenie 0]

Nice Genie keep em' coming!

Thanks, Starscream, more to come!

It's nice to see some work get done...

False ceiling: completed, first round of painting: completed and parquet: laid..

Living Room (We still think HDB forgot to give a dining room, so small!)

BR3

MBR

It's even nicer to see even MORE work done...

And all this happened in one day, June 20. For starters, we had our feud with ID, over kitchen cabinet and zero-work days/weeks issues, erupted, boiled over and resolved...once we paid more money hahaha...how typical..

So June 20, almost everyone decided to work on that day. Electricians, wall tilers, aircon people, paint touch up dude in the corner, a very less than tardy plumber...it was a flurry of activities..what a rush..being the boss...being the project manager..problem rectifier...tea-time snacks and drinks procurement specialist..skipping work to be in charge of house reno....eh..wait! Didn't we pay someone to do this?

Anyway, here goes some shots with our new Powershot..courtesy of PC Show last weekend.

Mess.

More mess.

[low_amanda 0]

Thanks, Starscream, more to come!

It's nice to see some work get done...

False ceiling: completed, first round of painting: completed and parquet: laid..

Living Room (We still think HDB forgot to give a dining room, so small!)

BR3

MBR

Hi, newbies in blk 79 too. Very pissed off by my ID, started the reno in mar, till now still not ready. Many unhappy encounters with them.

[groovygenie 0]

Electrician guys at work...nice guys..very accommodating and patient with my nonsense

Wa-lah! Mama mia! Goodness!

We have lights up! After 3 months, our quiet suffering in darkness is over..

Night shots

Our purchased lights in its rightful place...instead of the bomb shelter floor..

Sorry for the flurry of posts, folks, this was a long time coming. There WAS a reservoir of pent-up frustration and anger, so this is a release somewhat. We are happy to share our reno experience with you, just PM us okay! More posts soon in the near future!

Edited June 21, 2008 by groovygenie

[Yang Guo 7]

wah nice lights u have there

[applefreak 1]

spam chop

btw, 800x800 is more expensive than 600x600

coz the tile price is psf

so if it cost $2.60psf for 600, then it'll cost $2,600 to cover 1000sqf

similar, it'll cost $3,200 to cover 100sqf if the 800 cost $3.20 psf

i'm using 800 at home and it's really much nicer than 600, less lines too

[flyingballoons 0]

nice lights u have groovygenie!!!

Think our taste for lights is quite similar :)

can i ask where you got them from?

thanks much!

Hope to see more nice photos fro you!

Edited June 22, 2008 by flyingballoons

[groovygenie 0]

Hi Amanda, tell us about it! Same issues here, we signed in late March too. To date, we have yet to see a completion date in sight...i think both our IDs are busy people

Hi, newbies in blk 79 too. Very pissed off by my ID, started the reno in mar, till now still not ready. Many unhappy encounters with them.

Thanks, Yang Guo! We wanted to keep things simple and modern. Pretty happy with how its turned out.

In fact for MBR light, we didn't even get to see the real thing, bought on recommendation as the one we wanted (same style and design with MBR light) was HUGE! You know how small our rooms are

wah nice lights u have there

Ah, was wondering when you will turn up

Thanks for the spam chop, applefreak sis!

Oh, why haven't i thought of that haha...have to chuck my theory out of the window... with all the 'drama' we're going through lately with the renovation, sometimes we don't think straight Hehe, your explanation is so simple!

It is true, we're quite happy with how its looking, big big and shiny..

spam chop

btw, 800x800 is more expensive than 600x600

coz the tile price is psf

so if it cost $2.60psf for 600, then it'll cost $2,600 to cover 1000sqf

similar, it'll cost $3,200 to cover 100sqf if the 800 cost $3.20 psf

i'm using 800 at home and it's really much nicer than 600, less lines too

Thank you, flyingballoons!

In that case, you will enjoy Lightcraft They've been around for ages. That day we went to the store at Jalan Sultan. Lots of modern and simple designs..

but the best bit is its transparent pricing..you pay for what you see (with a bit of discount on some lights.)

Also, fyi, our lighting bill for the whole house was not more than $750, so the prices are reasonable. Going to revisit for our table lamp.

nice lights u have groovygenie!!!

Think our taste for lights is quite similar :)

can i ask where you got them from?

thanks much!

Hope to see more nice photos fro you!

[applefreak 1]

Ah, was wondering when you will turn up

Thanks for the spam chop, applefreak sis!

Oh, why haven't i thought of that haha...have to chuck my theory out of the window... with all the 'drama' we're going through lately with the renovation, sometimes we don't think straight Hehe, your explanation is so simple!

It is true, we're quite happy with how its looking, big big and shiny..

hehehe me quite busy recently so a bit slacking on the spamming

looks like most stuff are done

any handover date given?

[groovygenie 0]

Most of the major bits are in...but did you see the mess in the kitchen..simple= bad carpentry getting it rectified. Some people think they can get away with murder.

No date, hopefully in a couple of weeks (we hope very much) still left to do, wardrobe, Besglass kitchen and bathroom doors, plumbing stuff, painting touch up and chemical wash.

hehehe me quite busy recently so a bit slacking on the spamming

looks like most stuff are done

any handover date given?

[groovygenie 0]

Playing the Plumber Day

Since ID's plumber was very late on 2 previous occassions, we decided to 'play plumber' for a day to show we can do it too, why wait around?

Here is how to save some money by recycling what is 'free' from HDB.

1. Dismantle your own sink and tap - HDB's default sink in MBR

2. Tap transplant operation completed (look familiar right?) - New Ikea's vanity sink

3. The Operating theatre - Projects Room, hopefully we did not/have not scratched the parquet floor

We rented a storage space (Extraspace) in Boon Keng for our many many stuffs...so today was partial move-in day too (and save more money from paying rental!) Got Vernon the Mover from a Renotalk recommendation, pretty good, no complaints!

From one store, into another.. - Messy aint it?

Bed frames at washing area because house not completed yet, don't want to get in the way of anyone

[low_amanda 0]

Hi groovygenie

We signed up the package with the ID firm because we thought the ID is creative from his presentation. He did follow up closely with us for signing the contract with them. When we went down to the shop, we saw many photos displayed where the boss took with celebrities and even with our MM Lee. They have actually designed and built the kitchen cabinet for Zoe Tay's house. In view of these, we were very impressed. We thought with all these compliments, surely their services and quality is not bad too. In the end, it turned out to be a big dissapointment. Here are some of the unhappy experiences:

1) After payment of deposit ($500 for the 3-D drawings), nothing came out. Only hand drawings were produced. Only after we made several complaints, the 3D drawings for kitchen and living room were given. Also, the designs were not what we discussed. The ID in fact not that creative as we thought! He was quite limited in giving us ideas or design concept. I had no choice by browsing reno magezines, web and visiting friend's house for more design ideas. In the end, we told him what we want and he just follow.

2) The ID always went MIS. Hard to find him. Call him no respond also. Many times when we had appointment with him, he will use all sorts of excuses to tell us he can't make it on the day and postponed the appointment. That's why our reno keep delay and delay lor.

3) We paid 55% downpayment with no drawing given. So, we don't even know our design theme and concept. Believe? You guys might think how come we were so silly to pay downpayment with nothing concrete. This is because we are first time engage in reno works and no idea how it should go about.

4) What promised was never been delivered. A lot of empty promises. Furthermore, things were done not according to our discussion.

5) Many many more..... dissappointment..... unhappiness......arguments.....frustration......

6) Call the boss, he didn't do much and instead asked us to look for the ID's asst to feedback..... OMG!