Em On A Shoestring

[penthouseLover 0]

Gotten the keys to our EM last year, but due to various reasons, we haven't started reno yet.

We have started planning though.

Although we try to do minimal...the contractor's quote is still exorbitant!

Still in the midst of tile selection. Trying very hard to keep to a budget of less than $3psf for tiles, albeit without success.

Edited March 23, 2013 by penthouseLover

[spikedoll 2]

Welcome and u have the same layout as mine!!! Care to share where is your EM? Another EM transformation !! will camp here !

[penthouseLover 0]

Kitchen Floor Tiles

Still undecided about the tiles. Had ordered a rustic design.

But thinking it's too rough and hard to maintain. Considering wood tiles for the kitchen floor now. One of these, possibly the beige ones at the bottom. However, as our kitchen cabinets and wall tiles are white, thinking whether the whole kitchen will look too white-washed and plain.

Edited March 23, 2013 by penthouseLover

[penthouseLover 0]

Welcome and u have the same layout as mine!!! Care to share where is your EM? Another EM transformation !! will camp here !

Hi spikedoll, your reno is turning out great! Your layout is better; mine isn't a corner unit like yours.

Wow, your EM is at bishan. Nice! Mine is at an ulu location, somewhere in the north-east.

[penthouseLover 0]

Kitchen Toilet Tiles

Originally had chosen gray floor tiles for kitchen toilet. But now thinking of changing all floor tiles of kitchen, toilet & balcony to wood tiles (Trying to create some form of theme for our reno).

Wood floor tiles for 1st floor toilet. Not sure which one to choose. Help!

Using floor tiles of 15x60, would there be any water flow issues for toilet?

[spikedoll 2]

Woah I like the rustic wood tiles! The tiles you post here are all nice ..

Is your EM located at Hougang or serangoon area?

Edited March 22, 2013 by spikedoll

[cleong 1]

If ulu + Northeast then probably in the Hougang in the vicinity of Buangkok?

[HappyAng 0]

Hi penthouseLover, welcome and congrats on ur purchase.

Think it's quite difficult to find many choice of homogeneous tiles below $3 psf.. Maybe its a form of marketing strategy for contractor or ID. So when u select the tiles that u like, end up u will need to top up the difference. For my case, we also top up the difference for our master toilet.

[penthouseLover 0]

Yes, it's at HG . ulu cos it's not v. near to the mrt.

[penthouseLover 0]

Open Concept Kitchen

Although open-concept, for practicality reasons, glass doors and panels will be installed. Our "designer" is very talented at hand-drawing 3D perspectives. V. grateful to him.

Walls that have to be hacked to make way for the open-concept kitchen:

[penthouseLover 0]

Hi penthouseLover, welcome and congrats on ur purchase.

Think it's quite difficult to find many choice of homogeneous tiles below $3 psf.. Maybe its a form of marketing strategy for contractor or ID. So when u select the tiles that u like, end up u will need to top up the difference. For my case, we also top up the difference for our master toilet.

Thanks HappyAng! The cost of tiles is actually not in our contractor quote. We have to buy ourselves, thus we self-impose this budget. Our kitchen walls are in fact $2.20psf, the cheapest we are able to find. The toilet tiles (with the exception of feature wall) are all $2.40psf. No choice, tight budget.

[penthouseLover 0]

Kitchen Inspirations

The look we're trying to achieve by using wood tiles for kitchen.

Would like to have those long island <3

Sadly no space. Can only make do with a small piece of bar-counter-island combi.

[spikedoll 2]

Definitely going to stalk your blog coz we have the same layout hehehe ! Have a smooth and happy Reno journey

[3Dyms 1]

Welcome. Another EM owner starting their Reno journey. Love your EM size & layout. So similar to spikedoll. I would have loved to get a bigger sized EM. But choices are limited in my preferred area. zzzzzz.

Look forward to more of your updates & photos.

[penthouseLover 0]

The reno finally started last week, and already we are encountering a lot of problems with just the hacking process.

1) Damaged wall

When hacking the kitchen wall tiles, they damaged the inter-connecting wall of the study room. So now our study room wall have holes! Worst, the kitchen wall tiles are half hacked, and the contractor say he's going to leave it as-is. 3/4 of the kitchen tiles are hacked, and the remaining 1/4 he going to overlay with new tiles. Isn't that weird? Will there be problems later on?

2) Hot water pipes

In our contract, the contrator quote us $1300 to supply and install stainless steel water pipes. But now he said $1300 only includes cold water pipes, so we need to top up $300 per toilet to run new hot water pipes. Is this reasonable?

3) Concealed pipes

The original house concealed all the water pipes in ledges, so we verbally told contractor we wanted that too, and he said "No problem". (Oversight on our part not to insist on it being put down black and white in the contract). While hacking the toilet tiles, the workers damaged the existing ledges concealing the pipes, then the contractor told us that we have to pay extra to conceal the pipes cos' his original quote was to reuse the existing ledges and the water pipes concealed beneath it. Huh?? We are ok to pay extra if he tell us upfront, but shouldn't he tell us his original plan to reuse the ledges? If the hackers had not accidentally damaged the concealed pipes while hacking the toilet wall tiles, he would have sneakily reuse the ledges and concealed pipes?? Then why are we quoted $1300 for stainless steel pipes we cannot see?? We are not asking for the pipes to be concealed within the floor/wall slab, but just build box-up ledges just like what the previous owner has done.

What should we do?

~ super frustrated first-time house owner~