Our Tiny Nest At Punggol

[jabbathehutt 3]

our ID selection process

Selecting ID to me was at first a very exciting task. then it got more and more tedious. Because Im in account management, I have the opportunity to run around to meet IDs during office hours, in between meetings of course!

Anyway, i think I met up to close to 20 IDs and contractors. seriously an overkill. It was my job to find the ID and once i selected a few, my hubby will join in the discussion. I was finding IDs while preparing for my wedding which was in nov and planning for one of a national event in oct. omg... NEVER DO THIS! i nearly tore out all my hair.

I started my ID journey in July because we heard news that our keys will be given in Dec. I'm the fussy kan chiong type of person and dont want to be caught unprepared and with my pants down. SO! here we go!! We did our ID searching in 2 batches. in July - Aug and in Dec. I submitted my floor plan to places like renotalk and other websites and the contacts just start to pour in. I set my budget at 15K. my actual is at 21K but i want to weed out the real and fake IDs. Those tt can do my hse in 15K, i will read their quotation like a crazy person for any hidden cost. and plus, i wanted a buffer in case i wanted to add on stuff later.

We did our homework by scouring renotalk and other sites for reviews of ID that we met. The top 3 IDs that we liked, had very little to no reviews. So we trusted our gut insticts and advise from family and friends.

These were the outstanding ones that I remember out of the few that I went. The rest that i met, either after first meeting they never got back to me or i didnt leave an impression.

July - Aug IDs

Lionel from Absolook (dropped)

Lionel was the very first ID i met. In fact, his company was the reason i started my frenzy in finding IDs. His company contacted me through fb. He came down to my place very late at night to go through his standard package for me. hubby and me had good vibes from this guy as we felt that we could click.

But after awhile, when comparing his quotes and getting abit wiser from meeting more IDs, i realize that there might be some hidden costs here and there. and also, he was supposed to provide me with a revised quotation which he did not. so we dropped him. I guess my budget too small.

D'Trenzo Inspire(dropped)

OMG this company left a bad taste in my mouth. Their organisation skills are very poor. I have nothing against the ID but i seriously dont like his manager. Firstly, when they contacted me, the manager contacted me. After that, another guy from the same company contacted me. Both didnt seem to have communication with each other and both asked me to submit floor plan. when i pointed out that they both were contacting me, the manager first told me to ignore the other guy. Since the manager contacted me first i tot "heck. okie lor..."

end up i was very rudely called and after a few verification of the situation, he handed me off to the other ID in a bo chup and rather rude sms. . LOL

I met the ID. The first impression he gave me was not good. He took out the WRONG floor plan. When the right plan was taken out, he wasnt listening to my requirements or what i wanted. he just kept on telling me what is good and what others did.. etc. by the time he drew out a draft, half the things i wanted, was not inside. i dont like wasting my TIME.

Lastly, He didnt drive. now..... im not against ppl who dont drive, ****, i dont even drive. But i worried that if i gave him my project, he may not visit my site as often as others with cars will.

I dropped him immediately after i met him.

Rest and Relax (dropped LIKE A HOT POTATO)

Met at expo. er... again, another ID who doesnt listen and further more INSULT me. say that my budget so low, how to do nice. told me minimum is 40K. ARE U CRAZY?! i 3 room flat lei! i MUST have bought a 3 ROOM BTO because I dont have tt big a spending power right?! THINK!

And the worse part is that every ID so far had allowed us to take back their standard quotation or draft quotation. She didnt allow me to. Even tried hard selling me to sign up now, put deposit for designer drawing.

Faith interior (dropped)

Nice boy i met. abit too young. he's actually my age. but when i asked him how long he worked in this industry and in the company etc, i can see him skirting the question. that made alarm bells ring in my head. so nope!

Famous Mr K(dropped)

M K... we dropped him because his quotation was nearly the same as one of the more expensive designers that we talked to... but without design. and he spoke in chinese which i felt was hard to communicate. but he was a nice man.

Maurice from 3d innovation(shortlisted)

We had super alot of "great" ideas and wanted to incorporate every single one of them, like hidden doors and 80x80 homo tiles. But instead of laughing at us or telling us no, Maurice would thoughtfully look at us then explain why it was great but not practical. He used himself as an example and put himself in our shoes and tried to understand why we wanted what we wanted.

He has sort of the ah beng uncle look. I guess my hubby being quite.. "ah beng" had abit more click ability with him. He was easy to talk and laugh with. never felt embarressed about our low budget with him. in fact, he asked us one important question that no one asked. "how long u intend to stay". AH! the golden question! we didnt intend to stay in our flat long because my hubby is the only child and his parents are old. we plan to move back into his parents home if they needed us.

He advised not to go crazy and do too lavish a reno. stick to our budget so we can have left overs for our furniture. Do a simple reno.

My hubby liked him very much. He was in our top 3. Ended up dropping out of the race because we wanted to shortlist only 2.

Allen Nah from Thom Signature( Top 2)

Allen was someone who was in the top 2. I gave a review about him somewhere else. Allen left a deep impression in my mind. No hard selling. He was actually recommended by a very close friend and future neighbor. Again, another Ah beng which my hubby could super relate to, since he was about the same age.

But dont let the ah beng look fool u. This guy was good at what he did. He carefully listen to my requirements then finally dug out from me, what i really needed. He was the first ID to point out a design flaw that I never realized with my L shape cabinet. He solved it by thinking out of an idea to help me reduce space wastage in the dead corner which i felt was very cool and futuristic. My hubby was originally very adamant about signing with Allen. The price, the clickability and also Allen's sincerity. During our meetings, allen will answer calls and the way he handled situation with his workers impressed us, calm and direct which i feel will be good during reno. but I was afraid that Allen will not be able to match up with My ID's designing skills.

He was very much in the running that so much so, one week we were about to sign, we were still considering Allen. But our ID gave us too good an offer that we couldnt resist.

Johnny formerly from Plush Living (releasing his name now as I reciving many PM for his name)

I met my ID the same day as I met Maurice. My ID from the first time he called, he was very PR. He did my ex colleague's flat before. so the first thing he did was facebook me! haha talk about smart. We had a very nice chat and he got me to come down to his office. I am the type of person who wants ppl to come to me, not i go to them. But there was something about him that made me go to him.

Anyway, met him at his office. He showed me several works that he did and the first thing tt came to my mind was " i LIKE!". I gave him a problem of not having enough space for a table and he on the spot drew me a design of a hidden table. Now, this is not the first time i heard of it, so its no big deal. but what impressed me was how he solved the problem i had. A hidden table is great, but the problem with it is the hinges. My hubby is in the furniture line and he highlighted to me before that hinges after awhile, will wear and tear and become misaligned. My ID solved it by using simple methods which i loved. I cant disclose the method because its his idea. not nice to share out here.

This hidden table idea and solution was one of the reasons i have confident in him that he will be able to solve functionality problems in our design plus, his design was pretty strong. He listened to every idea i had, gave suggestions and counter idea.

He was from a "big" company and was an assistant manager. He was the only one who followed up with me from July till the day we signed which was in Dec. Talk about perseverance. Throughout our search, he was always giving me advise and insider information without even knowing if we will sign. I did my homework by talking to my ex colleague and her process with him. Had pretty good reviews on his attentiveness to detail and responsibility.

I wanted to sign with him, but his offer was quite over budget. And hubby was very keen on another ID Allen, and will only give me the go-ahead if his quote was nearer to our budget. I explained to my id that another ID was giving us a better price for the same items. And that my budget is burst if i sign with him. I really didnt want him to waste his efforts of following up with me for so long. So he went back to his management, talked to them, and gave me a new quotation. The new quotation was brought nearer to my budget. Signed with him because he put in much effort for us to talk to his new boss.

*By the time we wanted to sign with him, it seemed that his original company （Plush Living) had merged with another company. =( i didnt like the new company at all, it had a reputation!! And some items he could originally give us at his old company, couldnt be honored in this new one. but i wanted the ID so bo bian. just pray hard no cock ups.

We finally put our deposit in on Jan.

Sorry to say, your strategy to select designers was based too much on personal assumption and that is really not a very wise approach. OK with dunking rude and sarcastic designers or those who do not have the basic professionalism and responsibility to respond punctually. But to put a potential designer off because of age or whether driving or not was a little immature. Aesthetics is not compounded by age, whether one has a car or can speak proper English. You have to really see how the person describe his or her portfolio or if you are the first portfolio, what are the concepts and enhancements he or she can bring up to your home.

Looking at your final design, much clean and nice to look at (ok after spending that much money, it better be nice to look at), it is really nothing spectacular and compose of a bit of this and that in the overall appeal. If you look carefully, the anchoring thing in this "design" is the use of alternative colours and basically that's it. The rest is similar to those ID package catalogue showrooms that you see. And lights within wooden beams? They totally deconstruction the solidity of using wood structures on ceilings. I hope it's not the designer's idea.

I may sound rude here but I hope can bring about some consideration for future peep when selecting a designer. Spending a good amount of money on the home is one thing, but selecting a designer base on good strategies is fundamental.

[werrew 0]

Hi NingNing

Care to share the link of the extendible table and downlight from tabao..

Thanks so much!

[bentan76 2]

pm-ed

Hi Ning Ning,

Can PM me the link for the table as well? Thanks!!

[mitchiko 3]

Hi, can I ask for link for the extendable dining table from Taobao?

Thank you.

[wzz 0]

hi ningning,

cld i also have the taobao link of the extendable dining table (goliath) replica.

and would also like to hear your review too!

[Tri5tan 0]

Hi Ning Ning, thanks for sharing your tips on the reno and hope issues had been resolved. Looking forward to see more nice pics of your completed dream house.

Can you share and pm me your id contact ? My email is deyn_t@hotmail.com. We'll be getting our house soon and looking for a trustworthy id.

[Jasmine Cabrera 0]

Hi NingNing,

Kindly let me know the Taobao link for the Goliath table please? =D

Thanks so much!

[Fazeera95 0]

Hi Ning Ning can PM me ur quotation and ID? Thanks in advance ☺️

[xavi 1]

Hi Ning,

are to able to share your ID contact and quote?

If possible can you send me at xavilee28@gmail.com? Thanks!

[NingNing 28]

Sorry to say, your strategy to select designers was based too much on personal assumption and that is really not a very wise approach. OK with dunking rude and sarcastic designers or those who do not have the basic professionalism and responsibility to respond punctually. But to put a potential designer off because of age or whether driving or not was a little immature. Aesthetics is not compounded by age, whether one has a car or can speak proper English. You have to really see how the person describe his or her portfolio or if you are the first portfolio, what are the concepts and enhancements he or she can bring up to your home.

Looking at your final design, much clean and nice to look at (ok after spending that much money, it better be nice to look at), it is really nothing spectacular and compose of a bit of this and that in the overall appeal. If you look carefully, the anchoring thing in this "design" is the use of alternative colours and basically that's it. The rest is similar to those ID package catalogue showrooms that you see. And lights within wooden beams? They totally deconstruction the solidity of using wood structures on ceilings. I hope it's not the designer's idea.

I may sound rude here but I hope can bring about some consideration for future peep when selecting a designer. Spending a good amount of money on the home is one thing, but selecting a designer base on good strategies is fundamental.

Thanks for your advise. Actually looking back and comparing my reno journey with other friends from other designers, i realize that i was let off quite easily. although some bumps at the end, everything was resolved once johnny recovered.

As for the english speaking properly thing, its not tt i dont wan to consider anyone not able to speak english but in this case, I worry about communication. The last thing u want is communication breakdown.

But i will bear your advise in mind when finding my next ID.. But haha.. now im getting Johnny to be in charge of my mother in law's house since he did a good job the first time.

[xclusive 0]

Hi Ning,

can i know where you got the "expandable table" and the link if possible? Or what is it called so i can google and find.

Anyway, its been awhile since you gotten your love nest. Any feedback on the table and other stuff?

I just gotten my keys to my new 3 room BTO. and i think you living rm and bed room look awesome!

[angelmyst 0]

Hi Ning!

Do you mind sharing the link to the expandable table you got from Taobao? I def want to get that table and I can't seem to find it on taobao

[Guest Calvin Cheong]

Hi Ning Ning, can pm me your id contact and reno quote? Thank you in advance.

[hazellina07 3]

Hi pls pm me too.Thanks so much

[sczone 0]

Hi Ningning,

thank you very much for sharing your reno experiences.

Could you please pm me your ID contact and company name? Thanks a lot!

Edited June 19, 2015 by sczone