Reconstruction A&A D.I.Y Advice

[Bentanqj 3]

Not sure if it is appropriate to share my story of my landed rebuild here in this forum. But I guess its the piece of vital information that all house owners like me need and will just like to share some experience I gained in my rebuilding journey.

Being new landed home owners, my family bought a old semi detached house which was 1 storey high around Jalan Kuras, most of you should know that these houses definitely come at a steal  because of it being relatively old and just 1 storey high.

However, it definitely needed a reconstruction as it was not spacious enough to hold my big family. After the transaction was done and receiving the keys, the next step was definitely to call for a tender for my new home. It was indeed a tough job, D&B contractors and small scale contractors turned up for my interview and each submitting their pricing. There were about 11-12 contractors whom visited the site walkabout, prices ranging from $1.1million to $1.3million.

These prices were abit steep and due to the preliminaries I  have to set aside to the main contractors whom will help to manage the sub-contractors.

Besides, from my new neighbor whom did his reconstruction 2 years before me had a nightmare with his main contractor whom owed all the subcontractors even after being paid by the owner in full progress payment.

As we can see from this industry, the main contractors are like the "big brother" in the process, they are paid by the owners and can also choose to cut payment off from the sub-contractors and sometimes even refusing to pay them altogether. This leads to a vicious cycle where they sub-contractors will lead to poor quality and workmanship for all the works done. Even when these main contractors earn big profit, they will sometimes even abandon the project. The end results was us homeowners who paid for our house and yet get defective works all around.

After hearing these horror stories from my new neighbor, I begin to consider doing the reconstruction my own way, by myself.

I sourced for my own Architect and Consultant, where after 3 months of submission, the structural and architectural drawings were out. This was where I sourced for my own "sub-contractors".

I appointed my main structural contractor as my builder to apply from BCA, as he was a qualified general builder. The main structural contractor was referred to me by my friend whom studied in civil engineering in ntu, this contractor was a young man whom had a father and son combination for the entire of my project, and they were in this industry for more 21 years and completed numerous landed projects all around Singapore. This further gave me assurance as the number of years and experiences with a proven track record was definitely what I was looking for.

Guideline on Total Cost and Duration of my work:

1)Architecture Fee: $41,100

2) Consultant: $52,700--> 3 Months to release of approved drawings  from BCA

2) Demolition Of Existing 1 Storey Corner Terrace: $21,100--> 3.5 Weeks  (Actual quoted price: $25,000)

3) Excavation and foundation works: $60,000---> 2 months  (Actual quoted price: $70,900)

4) Structural Works: $320,900--> 4-5 months (Actual quoted price: $330,000)

5) Plumbing Works: $50,800--> together with structural works (Actual quoted price: $68,200)

6) Electrical Works: $40,00-->together with structural works (Actual quoted price: $48,900)

7) Interior Designing and Finishing: $118,600---> 3-4 months (Actual quoted price: $140,100)

Total cost:  $705,200 , Actual Quoted Price: $776,900, Total Savings:  $71,700

 

Actual Savings from handling the whole projects: $1,100,000-$705,200= $394,800

I basically have to keep track of the timeline I have given to each contractors and pop by 3-4 days in the afternoon to make sure that all these contractors have their man at work each and every day where the progress are up to date. This basically saved me the money for hiring project managers, as smaller building projects need not have an expensive project manager to be on site everyday.

These were all the savings when I skipped the steps of hiring a main contractor to cover the whole work, and the relentless haggering the prices from each individual contractors. A savings in the housing cost, is a savings towards my future. As what the old saying " A penny saved is a penny earned."

 

[DragonFireSG 1]

Thanks for sharing your experiences

[cymon 6]

Care to share what are the "interior designing & finishes" consist of? 

[nerrad 7]

what's the floor area of your completed house?

[sfada 0]

Well done! Thank you very much for sharing your experiences.

[greeeen 0]

Thanks for sharing, solid information.

I also added Solar Reflective Coating to my house exterior to keep it cool, can reduce air con electricity consumption.
HeatAX coating so far best specs.