Something Old, Something New

[benauhc 3]

Hi! Is your place a corner unit? If so, it will be exactly like mine in the same orientation except that my air well is on the right and not left.

I find the space where u intend to place the wardrobe quite wasted and its kinda odd to have the toilet bowl facing the bed IMO. What I did was to have the bed on the same wall as the door, and the wardrobe placed on the extreme left wall. You can consider to have another stretch of wardrode ourside the bathroom if you need more storage. Hope it helps..

Yes, it is a corner unit.

We checked with our ID on the feasibility of your suggestion but found the wall was only 2.8m. With a wardrobe (0.6m) and King Size bed (2m), we will only have 20cm left between the two !

[Ms Polar 1]

Yes, it is a corner unit.

We checked with our ID on the feasibility of your suggestion but found the wall was only 2.8m. With a wardrobe (0.6m) and King Size bed (2m), we will only have 20cm left between the two !

Hi!

I'm too left with a mere 60cm after placing my queen size bed and a sliding door wardrode, but could still fit in two small beside table. I understand that King size bed is kinda tough to fit into the tight space. Anyhow, Here's what i did:

Btw, care to share how much you paid for your unit, please pm me.. TIA!

[emlovers 0]

Hi!

I'm too left with a mere 60cm after placing my queen size bed and a sliding door wardrode, but could still fit in two small beside table. I understand that King size bed is kinda tough to fit into the tight space. Anyhow, Here's what i did:

Btw, care to share how much you paid for your unit, please pm me.. TIA!

Hi Ms Polar,

Mind sharing what's "H1", "H2" and the light blue area in your master bedroom?

Maybe can post a picture of your bedroom ?

Thanks.

[benauhc 3]

House Hunt

Like all journeys, our house hunting journey was filled with moments of excitement (like when a new listing appears in propertguru or when we view a place that we just knew could be the one ), anxiety (like when we waited for the seller's agt to respond on our offer), frustration (when we missed out on one), resignation (when our dream house seems out of reach while the COV continues to set record highs) and finally relieve (when we took home the OTP). It is easy to pen down now what we went through then but when we were stuck in the middle of the journey, we really did not know where or when the finish line would be.

At the beginning of our house hunt, sometime in July 2012, we sort of decided that our next house would be an EM. Of course we were naive about the COV, thinking $50k would be enough for most places. So we started by outlining the areas of interest. I had a fondness of little 'hamlets', places that are less congested, located a little off the main 'town' areas, with a little more greenery and 'kampung' feel. On top of my wish list would be places like Elias Road, Sunset Way, and Lorong Ah Soo. Of course we knew that budget, distance from work and availability would lead to us extending the net, even to places that were originally in the 'Do not consider' list.

We started off by viewing this quaint ground floor corner 5A Mais in Hougang Ave 5. It had a small porch in the front and a strip of grass outside the gate that you could grow something or place a swing. But it just did not have enough space as we needed a 4th room for the maid. Caught on by the excitement of viewing houses, we quickly arranged viewing for 2 more units in Hougang that same evening. After viewing more houses around Hougang, we decided to cast the net wider and considered Serangoon North. Though it was far from MRT stations, it was not too far from where I worked, plus the old town vibe around Serangoon North Ave 1 feels interesting. Alas, it did not worked out as people were asking ridiculous prices for their old units.

Next we decided to look west around CCK and Bukit Batok, places close to where we are staying. We almost closed on a 8th flr unit in Yew Tee; even had the option fee cheque written, but alas the seller could not obtain sufficient loan for his next house. Our hopes rose each time we hear that his loan application may be successful, but eventually we had to move on. One night while viewing a 3rd flr EM in Bukit Gombak, we got the feeling again. This could be it. The place was reasonably done up, it was near the MRT and the owner was selling the place directly (no agt com). We quickly arranged a second viewing and made an offer the same day. In the next two weeks, we were still in negotiations, but somehow the asking COV got higher each time and it eventually went beyond the limit we were willing to pay. No luck again.

Along the way, we did satiate our curiousity by viewing places that were too far away (EM beside the Pasir Ris Fishing Pond), too expensive (Clementi Ave 6 and Sunset Way), units of different sizes (EA in Bkt Batok that overlooks the Church compound) and those that were never in our original plan (like Jurong West). So when our unit eventually came about, we were already 'wiser' and knew not to set our expectations too high or get over-excited. Well, the rest is history and we are glad that we pushed on not knowing how it would end.

Sorry for the long post, just had to pen this down somewhere so that 20 years down the road, I can look back and relived the days when we were looking for a new home.

[benauhc 3]

It has only been two weeks since we started working with our ID, but it seems like we have been planning for our new house for ages. Before we discovered Renotalk, our only exposure to home designs were the glossy covers of magazines and the nice interiors of other people's homes. But one thing that always caught my eye were the beautiful home designs found in the pages of the IKEA catalogue or in the showrooms of the Alexander and Tampines outlets. I liked the laid-back and warm feel of the IKEA design, especially with dark wood flooring, cosy furniture and warm lighting. So when it was time to look for a new home, I decided that we would design the place around that style. And of course after discovering Renotalk and reading the many helpful t-blogs, we discovered many new styles (eg. Scandi, Industrial, Mid-modern, Vintage) and we hope to incorporate some of these in our designs as well. Just pray that the different styles would mash well and not turn out like 'rojak'.

Edited February 3, 2013 by benauhc

[benauhc 3]

Our ID has done sketches of the Kitchen and Bathrooms using Google Sketch. Here are some for them.

Kitchen (yes, it is exactly like the IKEA kitchen set)

Master Bedroom Bathroom

Kitchen Bathroom

[retchlow 7]

Our ID has done sketches of the Kitchen and Bathrooms using Google Sketch. Here are some for them.

Kitchen Bathroom

seems that the subway & retro tiles are here to stay

[Ms Polar 1]

Our ID has done sketches of the Kitchen and Bathrooms using Google Sketch. Here are some for them.

Kitchen (yes, it is exactly like the IKEA kitchen set)

Master Bedroom Bathroom

Kitchen Bathroom

Hi there!

I realised the proposed placement of your vanity sink top (in your MBR bathroom, next to the WC) is where two big water pipes are. You could just place a washbasin inbetween the pipes, and there will not be much room left. The pipes are really huge eyesore, I concealed the pipes with a full height cabinet after all. Hope it helps!

[benauhc 3]

Hi there!

I realised the proposed placement of your vanity sink top (in your MBR bathroom, next to the WC) is where two big water pipes are. You could just place a washbasin inbetween the pipes, and there will not be much room left. The pipes are really huge eyesore, I concealed the pipes with a full height cabinet after all. Hope it helps!

Hi. Thanks for the tip. Do you mind sending me a pic of your MBR bathroom? Need to see the location of those pipes.

The current layout has the sink opposite the WC. We won't get the chance to see the place until after the New Year.

[Ms Polar 1]

Sorry, I can't show the insides of my cabinet here, it's a mess. What I can tell u is that, the distance between the two pipes are about 550mm. The bigger pipe is about 590mm from the wall (where the WC is), and the smaller pipe is about 720mm to the bathroom entrance. Hope u can get a clearer picture from here.

IMO. It's really impossible to place a vanity top next to the WC. The two likely spots will be opposite the WC or left side of the entrance, near to the little window. The other alternative is to expand the MBR bath by hacking down the wall (next) to the WC and expand into the common room walkway and create another opening for your common bath and bedroom..

Cheers!

Edited February 4, 2013 by Ms Polar

[Ms Polar 1]

Sorry, I can't show the insides of my cabinet here, it's a mess. What I can tell u is that, the distance between the two pipes are about 550mm. The bigger pipe is about 590mm from the wall (where the WC is), and the smaller pipe is about 720mm to the bathroom entrance. Hope u can get a clearer picture from here.

IMO. It's really impossible to place a vanity top next to the WC. The two likely spots will be opposite the WC or left side of the entrance, near to the little window. The other alternative is to expand the MBR bath by hacking down the wall (next) to the WC and expand into the common room walkway and create another opening for your common bath and bedroom..

Cheers!

Found a pre-reno picture of my lower floor bathroom (directly below the MBR bathroom) that can show you how the two pipes are like. Do ignore the horizontal pipes at the bottom though, it's not found in the MBR bathroom.

[benauhc 3]

Thank you so much Ms Polar! Your description really helps. Looks like we will be sticking to the current layout.

[benauhc 3]

One of the first thing we did once we confirmed the ID was to look for tiles. And looking for tiles at those big tile shops were like going into an ice ream parlor looking for a simple ice cream cone and then being presented with a choice of 40 flavors. Except that the tile shops literally have thousands of them. As we had limited time to look around, we only ventured to the popular ones like Soon Bee Huat (Toh Guan), Hafary (Defu), Hup Kiong (Defu) and Unlimited (Bendemeer). We got part of the work cut out for us as we havd decided to use Allure HERF flooring for the main areas early on. We just had to make a pit stop at Evorich to finalise the color.

Here is the result of our tile/flooring selection. It seems like we went wild at times with some of our selection, but hopefully the mix of themes (mid-modern, european, modern, chinese retro) will blend well together.

[benauhc 3]

Ordered a Mitsubishi Starmex Sys 4 Inverter for $3929 at Gain City. Free $200 GC voucher. Is this a good deal?

System consist of

1 x 28k btu Compressor (Rated is only 24k btu according to salesman)

3 x 9k btu blower for rooms

1 x 24k btu for living room

[benauhc 3]

Reno starts in less than a week but it seems that we still have 101 things undone.

1) Carpentry - Will be having a session with our ID this Friday to finalise (cross fingers) some of the designs and storage ideas.

2) Color scheme - Sail white on all walls? Or should I venture beyond the white ....

3) False ceiling - Need to see the layout and lighting plan

4) Sanitary/Kitchen accessories - Got a rough idea of what we want, just have to find time to shop

5) Lights/Fan - Our taobao purchases are on the way and we got a few from IKEA. Have to buy the rest soon - vintage wall/hanging lights, downlights, halogen track lights, fans, etc.

6) Furniture - Sofa, dining table/chairs, beds for us and the girls ... sigh ... more weekends spent in shops...

etc ...