Welcome to Our 'Dark Side'

[Butterflious 2]

Hello everyone!!!

 

Beginning

I've been a silent reader for many months now and I thought it should be my turn to contribute what ever I can back to this community!

I had this sudden urge to pen down my experiences since we are 3 days away from the ACTUAL renovation. I am surfing the net for all the nitty-gritty stuff for our house, stressing myself out over those and thought coming here might be a good idea at 3am! So here goes!

How it started...

After my 'then' boyfriend proposed to me last year, we started looking out for properties in the eastern and north-eastern side of Singapore! R (now husband) and I prefer a newly empty space for us to build a home together so naturally our first choice was to ballot for a flat through "sale of balance". We didn't pin our hopes too high cause our queue number was out of the number of available units and there were little units among them which we shortlisted. 

We started browsing through resale flats for months while R was still optimistic about our ballot (never say die). 

Months and months of waiting and finally our prayers were answered!

We got one of our favorite units! 

 

Search

Early this year, we finally locked in our first 'love nest' at TPY HDB Hub and we started searching (almost frantically) for both ideal moodboards and ID/Contractors. 

Before we started anything, we sat down and had a serious discussion about finance. Zero loans. So we have extremely strict budget to work with and we broke it down into 3 sections. 

Renovation (quote given by ID/Contractor)

Electrical (wirings, sockets, switches, lightings)

Furnitures & Appliances (Bed, W/C, fridge etc)

 

I must say this budget has been working extremely well for both of us cause we made it as detailed as possible, itemised, and did quite a fair bit of comparison! Be as realistic as possible and ask around with your family or friends for quotes! Most of them are more than happy to share!

Back to the search for ID/Contractors.

Thanks to renotalk, my knowledge about renovation widened, deepened and saved me from looking too noob infront of those guys. lol. 

Both R and I prefer engaging an ID because we both lack quite badly in the creative department and we are hoping to minimize the need to liaise between different suppliers or contractors. 

Nevertheless, all in all we met up with 4 IDs and 2 contractors (semi-ID) over a period of 2 months. This is by far the most tedious process for both of us cause it fried our brains so badly. It's not until we met these professionals that we realised renovation has A LOT, A LOT, A LOT of details and factors to consider. 

 

1) ID A

A was the very first ID we met and we had no idea what to expect from the meeting! We met up near my place, he was early, dressed well, pretty young and speaks well. He nervously took out few sheets of papers with drawings on them and I could see his hands trembled a bit. When I saw those papers infront of us, I like him already!  He came prepared with proposed space-planning sketches according to my specifications through a 20-mins conversation prior to our meeting! Of course, he also prepared a drafted quotation based on what he drew and the quotation wasn't too bad! Though not all details were captured, he was really patient in jotting down our needs/wants and identifying any potential difficulties in our ideas. We were having our hopes high on this ID and really excited in receiving his revised space-planning sketch and quotation but sadly, he did not send us till almost a month later. 

 

2) ID B

We met up with B right after ID A and we weren't really pleased. First of all, he was late for our first meeting, I refused to wait for another 30mins so I called the meeting off. R was being kind and suggested we should give him another chance since he apologised genuinely, we did. Okay, so our first meeting happened and unlike ID A, he is very down-to-earth in both his dressing and his personality! He was punctual, cheerful and very approachable. He also came to us with a draft and he is definitely way more experienced than ID A. As much as he would accommodate all our crazy ideas and wants, he would stop us nicely to inform us of the pros and cons of materials/ placements/ appliances etc and the potential roadblocks we may face. The first meeting with him took 2 hours and he didn't even at any point sneaked a peek at the time. I couldnt remember how long, but he came back to us within 3 days with a hand-sketched space planning + 3D of EVERYTHING we discussed via whatsapp. We could feel his eagerness in our projects and was pretty sincere. 

 

 

I shall continue the rest another day. it's 3.20am now and I should catch some sleep!

Will try to post the visuals next time

Night night!

 

Edited September 18, 2017 by Butterflious

[Butterflious 2]

Search continues... 

3) ID C

The first time we met up with ID C, I had no idea we will be meeting FOUR of them at the cafe.  Then we quickly realised, the real ID is her dad. They are a very friendly family and it wasn't long before we got comfortable with them. This ID is extremely experienced but because he promised the moon and the stars for us, we were slightly concerned if he could deliver the results. He has slightly more ideas than the previous 2 IDs and he would find ways to achieve your dream home. Like I said, I had my reservations because none of them jotted down anything! Nothing! I am really impressed about their followup as I got a call 2 days after first meeting to inform us about our space-planning drafts and a unit for our viewing. Amazingly, ID C could remember every single detail we told him about including concerns and wants. WOW. He also brought us to a unit (ID C is the first to do so) to have a feel of his work! However, when it comes to revised quotation, a lot of the items mentioned in space planning were missing and we just feel he wasn't right for us. 

 

4) ID D

This ID was highly recommended to us by a friend. Though her renovation cost was on a high side, she loved the service she got from ID D. From her experience, she would receive photos updates almost daily. The first meeting was at his office as he insisted on that and would not want to meet outside of his office. He is a very firm guy, has the most creative ideas amongst the rest I have had met but yet has slight artist temperament. Probably we would have a very nicely designed home but we know it wouldnt be easy for us to convey to him all our wants. He took 1-2 weeks before sending us the quotation and it was THE HIGHEST we got. And I'm talking about TWICE of what the rest quoted.  It wasn't tough for us to strike him out though his works interest us the most.  

 

5) Contractor A

He, is super super popular in this community and with rough ideas of what we wanted, we met up with him at his office. He is cocky indeed! He was constantly throwing sarcasms at us for our ideas and because our layout is a bit different, he looked pretty upset he couldnt propose the standard space planning.  His partner is wayyyyyyyy nicer, more gentle and more approachable. The upside, he did an immediate 3D drawing to show us his random ideas but he purposely added ugly prints on those 3D as 'suggestions', even though we told him the theme we wanted. Both R and I were SO ANNOYED by him. It was like we were there as a joke for the full 1.5hours. Even though a lot of T-bloggers mentioned he has really reasonable pricing, I beg to differ. When he broke the items down for us, they are on par with what our IDs quoted! Why would I pay contractors/ semi-ID so much if he doesnt value-add? Instant strike off! 

 

6) Contractor B

HE IS SO CUTE! Very down to earth guy recommended by my friend and I was pinning high hopes for him cause he did pretty well for my friend's house! First meeting went so well, R and I actually shortlisted him already! hahaha. He would try to improvise our ideas and warn us of certain blindspots so we were really looking forward to the 2nd meeting! We did! The followups were always filled with laughters and he was very enthu! Sadly, we needed 3D and he honestly told us he could not deliver the really professional ones cause he is still learning. HIs prices are pretty competitive but it's such a pity we could not engage him cause both R and I are extremely bad at visualizing! We wouldnt wanna risk it for our first home.

 

Eventually, we went with ID B! 

We will be starting renovation soon and I will not disclose my own ID until my own project is done!

Edited September 18, 2017 by Butterflious

[Butterflious 2]

Mood boards

1) Master Bath

We want a bathtub so bad cause we love soaking in hot water after a long day! With scented candles burning and a glass of wine, listening to relaxing music, ah~~

  

2) Master Bedroom

It's not difficult to tell by now, my preference for colors are grey, white, black, very unusual for a woman. Thus, our 'dark side'. lol. 

We prefer to have basic colors for our home and furnish with some touch of colors to brighten up the space. 

We are also not a fan of wood. We prefer modern, luxurious, stone feel. 

I really wanted this plush feature wall for our MBR but we bought our bed too early and we can not change the designer-bedframe =(

 

3) Living Room

[Butterflious 2]

Purchases before renovation

Months before our renovation, we already started window shopping for furnitures and appliances for a gauge on pricing. 

My love for slumberland beds never dies. <3 

Upon friends' recommendation, we drove across the causeway and started looking around for good buys and we unexpectedly bought 2 big items. 

Bed and sofa

A queen size Slumberland mattress with designer bed frame and a 2.7m long L-shaped sofa! I love how deep the seats are compared to the ones I tried in Singapore and customising one locally costs A BOMB! We knew we were pushing it by buying such a long sofa for our 5-room but the shop allows us to customise! So we are looking at reducing it to 2.4m instead. Of course, we are very happy to have a total cost savings of SGD2k+! If any one of you has great recommendations for bargains across the causeway, please please please share with me, I'll be so ever grateful

Almost every weekend we would go to different electronic stores to check out all the appliances and there were 2 times, we made purchases. 

Aircon

We got it from gain city because all our friends got it there since they have free upgrade of cables and insulations and I dont really know the technical stuff  Lol. The perks of buying from them, we could just place deposit, lock in the promotion and if we do change our minds along the way, dislike the product or we want to change to another item altogether, they allow it! Or that's why they say. But so far, many friends of ours sing their praises. 

TV

65", period. I didnt wanted a curve TV cause I didnt see the need to pay so much more for a difference I wouldnt be able to tell but R was pretty insistent on it. We were also deciding between Samsung and LG. AND THEN, luck was on R's side. We saw a 65" SUHD Samsung CURVE TV on a crazy sale, and it's the lowest I've seen so far, even till date! R didn't hesitate and bought it, so it's sitting in our house now waiting still in it's box, waiting for us to hang this beautiful piece of machine on the wall <3

 

[Songz 132]

If your house have ceiling fan, I will suggest you go over to JB to get them as its abt 40% cheaper.

You can also get the lights from there.

If you need local lighting shop, I did found 1 shop (I bought my lights from there ) at Sims Ave which offer quite competitive price.  

[Butterflious 2]

21 hours ago, Songz said:

If your house have ceiling fan, I will suggest you go over to JB to get them as its abt 40% cheaper.

You can also get the lights from there.

If you need local lighting shop, I did found 1 shop (I bought my lights from there ) at Sims Ave which offer quite competitive price

Hi! Do you mind to share which shop in sims avenue u bought?

[Songz 132]

On 9/20/2017 at 6:58 PM, Butterflious said:

Hi! Do you mind to share which shop in sims avenue u bought?

Nueva Pte Ltd 

Address : 500 Sims Ave

[Mazno 0]

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