Framework Finished

Our frame was finished on the 11th April and our bricking has started but the mistakes continue. If we didn't check regularly god knows what shoddy building work would be covered up by the bricks and gyprock. When my husband was building the retaining wall along the boundary with the neighbours, he noticed that a steel support post which is holding up the floor above had been placed over part of the slab that was damaged during excavation work for the waste water plumbing. So there is barely anything but crumbling concrete under a major structural post. In fact we can fit our fist under the post which is only secured with one bolt because there was nothing underneath to attach the other bolts to. The contractor that installed the post would have seen this but obviously chose to ignore it. Had my husband not seen it, it would have been covered by the bricks and not discovered until our floor started to drop. Don't expect any professional duty of care from these people. As one contractor said to my husband they don't see a home when they work, they just see a building site. They don't really care about the big picture or the long term consequences if they make a mistake, because it is the home owner that is left to deal with the problems afterwards.
There have been other steel supporting posts cut too short, a buckled window installed, slab not very level in our living area which will affect our floorboards if not fixed, upstairs waste plumbing installed incorrectly, which if left means we will have some bulkheads that were not on the plans. We are also pretty sure that a lot of dirt has gotten into our rainwater system due to poor capping of the pipes, which according to our neighbour who built with Allcastle and has the same problem, is very difficult and expensive to remove.
I still love the layout  and look of the house but am very concerned at the level of care taken by the sub-contractors used by Wisdom. Our SS has 20 builds to supervise and said to my husband that he is so busy that he only spends a couple of minutes at a site to check the work has been done. He is doing his best to rectify the problems but at the same time is getting very impatient with my husband for constantly raising issues. However we will not be made to feel like a nuisance and will continue to raise issues as we find them, and if that means we have to regularly meet him on site, so be it.
I also had to chase Wisdom this week because the Demo company they used to pull down our old house, removed our electricity meter and did not return it to Ausgrid, as they were supposed to. I have over a $1000 in estimated electricity bills for a house that doesn't exist, because my Utilities company haven't received a final meter reading from Ausgrid because Ausgrid don't have the meter to read. Wisdom assured me that the meter was returned last week but I am yet to see my power bills cancelled.
Oh the dramas and incompetence. Will it ever end?

Our Pot of Gold?

 

Pooling on the slab 15mm at deepest point which means slab is not within tolerated levels.

Steel support post in alfresco doesn't reach the slab. A piece has been welded on to the bottom now so it meets the slab.

Framed in fridge space. This has been fixed now.

Tools, Trucks and Tradies

Things are moving so quickly now. We've only had  a few days with no one on site and that was while the slab was curing.

Site cut was on 12th March, form work and piers went in on the 19th March, slab was poured on the 26th March, plumbing on the 31 March and frame commenced on 3rd April. The pace is really moving along much quicker than we expected. The only downside is we have made our first progress payment which means we have to start paying interest on our construction loan.

The pain of the admin process seems to be almost a distant memory, although it has come back to haunt us recently. Due to errors made in our drawings we have had a few mistakes made during construction that, because we can visit our site daily, have been noticed immediately and communicated to our site supervisor.  The first one was an incorrect placement of the pier under the rough in for the air conditioning unit. Somehow Wisdom had reverted to some old drawings which had it in a different place and these were provided to the concretor. It was fixed quickly by placing a new pier in the correct place before slab pour. The plumber cracked a drain pipe badly by driving over it with his own machinery and left it that way. we have been told it will be replaced when they connect all the pipes up. After the first floor frame went up we found they have framed in our fridge space and parts of the frame cover some of the drain pipes because the plumber placed them in the wrong spot. We still have to tell the site supervisor about these mistakes. The fridge space should be easy to fix but not so sure about relocating pipes that are set in concrete.

We also have to install a retaining wall urgently on the boundary with one neighbour as after the plumber excavated they started having subsidence issues along the fence line. My husband had to rig up a temporary structure until we can get the materials delivered to build a permanent one. The site supervisor has given him permission to go on site on the weekend of 12/13th March which clashes with his monthly golf day. Wonder what he'll pick.

First Swim

Pool covered until after construction is finished

Site Cut

Formwork and Piers

 Slab

 

  

 

First Floor Frame

Pool Installed

The pool was installed this week. Something exciting at last and what a pleasure to deal with a builder that actually got everything right. I cannot recommend Irresistible Pools highly enough. Jim Wilson is the owner and he is very professional in the way he does business and his work is meticulous. He could teach Wisdom a thing or two. Once the house is finished the pool builder will return to install the filter and pump. We will also get tiling done then. Now we just need to cover it for the duration of the house build because apparently builders are known for using pools as somewhere to dump rubbish.

Pool hole

 Pool shell

Pool Installed

Site pegged

We've had our portaloo and temporary fencing since December 2013, but now our old house has finally been demolished the site could be pegged. The peg out was done on 17/2/14, but in usual Wisdom fashion there was an error. They placed a peg where our pool excavation was going to be. The pool has to be installed prior to the house starting as it is fibreglass and needs to be lifted in while the land is clear. Wisdom were given the plans for the pool before contracts were signed so the area for the pool was always noted on their plans as a service free zone. It was also included in their landscape plans so they couldn't claim ignorance and blame this one on us, although we expected them to try as that is their way. So we got it in writing from them that they would not charge us to replace the peg. A small win.

Demolition Dramas

Demolition was finally completed on 14th February. What a huge relief because of course, as with anything to do with this build it turned into a drama.
The demolition company engaged by Wisdom initially told us that they would have the demo completed by the New Year. Well it got to the end of January and apart from a couple of hours work here and there, and removal of the asbestos sheeting from the walls, the house was left standing in a half demolished state and no one could give us a date of when the demolition company would complete the job. They had already breached our council DA conditions because they had not notified the neighbours 7 days prior to removing the asbestos. We asked them to do this on numerous occasions and they kept telling us it wasn't necessary. They also hadn't posted any signage on the safety fence showing their company name or licence number which is a breach of Workcover regulations. The neighbour notification letters are also supposed to show the licence number. I was a bit suspicious of why they weren't willing to give a licence number. Out of frustration with the lack of progress on the demolition, I called to get a quote from another demo company to see if I could expedite the demolition. They said they required a site clearance certificate for the asbestos removal before they could come on site and advised I could get a copy from Workcover if one had been issued. So I called Workcover only to be told that the owner of the demolition company did not hold a current licence for asbestos removal and asked if they could investigate. Now I understood why there was no public notifications forthcoming that needed to include licence information. I asked if perhaps they were subcontracting and Workcover said an investigation would clear that up. So I thought if they found he was unlicensed we could get another company in to finish the demo quickly. In the meantime Wisdom's demo company had finally moved their heavy equipment in to complete our demolition. Workcover also decided to do an audit of our demolition to make sure the demo company was above board. Suddenly letters from the demo company went out to our neighbours notifying them of the asbestos removal, which had already mostly been done, so the letters, complete with poor grammar and spelling were backdated. Signage went up on the fence with the name of a totally different demo company, which apparently the job had been subcontracted to. Suddenly everything was being done by the book.
The demo company was really annoyed with me because they they said the Workcover audit would delay things. I don't understand how doing the job the way it should be done can delay things. Anyway once the house was cleared, they lifted all the concrete paths and driveway and found lots of asbestos buried beneath. We are still awaiting the bill for the additional asbestos removal but are expecting it to be at least $5000.

Contract build time has started but no builder in sight or on site

Well we are officially on Wisdom time now. Under the contract they should have started on 20/12/13 but then there was was the 5 week Christmas shutdown period which brings us to today. So the longer their appointed demolition company takes to demolish our old house the less time Wisdom have to build our new one. 30 weeks from today we are supposed to have a house, weather dependent, so we are counting down now.
Once again we have received empty promises from the demolition company about when they will be back to complete the demolition. They were supposed to return either yesterday or today with their heavy machinery but surprise surprise they were a no show again. They will not answer our texts or phone calls.
They have appeared on site for the odd day here and there since before Christmas. Must be the longest demolition ever. My neighbours are over looking at an overgrown dilapidated property, not to mention that Wisdom are now considered a joke by so many people we know, especially those who have done knock down rebuilds with other builders. They certainly won't be getting any business from any of our friends or acquaintances.
On top of it all we have been evicted from our rental property after only 6 months because the owner wants to do a knockdown rebuild. Ironic. We asked for a 12 month lease and were told by the real estate agent the owner only wanted a 6 month lease so he could verify his tenants were reliable, and he would renew if we were. So we signed the lease. What a load of BS that was. So we need to move for the second time in 6 months and are desperately trying to find another rental property within our price range and area. So far we have not had much luck. More wine please!

This is how our old house looks at the moment.

New Year New Start. Bring it on!

Well it's a brand new year so we are hoping all things in relation with house building will be more positive.

Have enjoyed the last few weeks of not thinking about the house enormously, but we can't let things slide too long or otherwise Wisdom may not start our house for a very long time, causing the stress levels to rise again.

Have reviewed the time lines provided by the builder and so far we are:

18 days over the 20 business days quoted in our Building Agreement under HIA Clause 8, which states the builder must commence works within 20 business days after all building permits and planning approvals have been received. This clause is not subject to Clause 9: Delays and Building Extensions (i.e. adverse weather, Christmas 5 week break, etc.). Clause 9 is only effective from the date of commencement of building works.

35 days over the date quoted in the Building Agreement under Building Condition 12 that states that all conditions required to be met to facilitate the commencement of Building works must be met by 07/12/2013. This includes demolition. Wisdom Homes are responsible for the demolition and have not met this condition. In fact the demolition company are still unable to provide us with a date for demolition, despite advising us at the end of last year that it would be mid January 2014.

13 weeks over the 20 weeks time frame quoted in the Procedures of Purchase - KDR documentation we signed on 13 November 2012. Under Stage 3 this document states that the period between Contract Signing with Wisdom Homes and commencement of works (subject to council approval times) is 10-20 weeks. We only had minor delays in obtaining council approval, and these were as a result of errors made by Wisdom in the DA. We signed our contract on 25/5/2013. It is now 33 weeks since we signed the contract.

10 days over the time frame quoted in an email received from Wisdom Homes on 25/11/2013 stating that demolition would take place within 21 working days. It is now 31 working days since we received this email and our house has not been demolished.

The only thing that has happened since we finalised all paperwork with Wisdom is the temporary fence went up just before Christmas.

They are so unreliable. They need a bloody good kick up the backside. What to do next, apart from the email I have sent bringing to their attention the above breaches of contract? Another review on Product Review or perhaps a discussion with the Department of Fair Trading.