Blocks and Banks

Why is it that banks are an entity to them selves? How is it that they can do whatever they feel like and get away with it?

These are questions that we all ask ourselves and I imagine we all come to the same conclusion of:- your damned if you do and your damned if you dont.

We have only the choice but to pick the lesser of all evils, if that does really exist - a lesser evil I mean! (I feel that CBA is the most evil - but - they have trapped us into their web of fees and charges for at least the next 2.5 years) [insert evil Barbara from Bankworld laugh here]

My problem with banks/brokers/conveyancers this week is that I still have not seen any paperwork from our settlement on Monday! I have no idea what is happening with our new loan and how it will be set up (banks/brokers)! They have put money in our account (bank), yet it isnt the amount we thought it would be (banks/brokers) and I have nothing in my hands to tell me why it is what it is (conveyancer)?

How come in this day and age I havent been sent all the paper work via email and post? I imagine its partly because our conveyancer, who is a lovely but old man, does not know how to (self-admittedly) work the internet or email yet! Also, apparently Australia Post is very slow this week, as I was told that the paperwork was in the post Monday arvo... its now Thursday arvo!

I have also emailed our brokers to get information, to which they have not had the decency to grace me with a response either!

So you can all blame the banks/brokers/conveyancers for my frustrated outburst!

My apologies!

On a happier note, I got a call from Porter Davis this morning which was nice. I had almost got to the point of thinking that they had taken our $1k deposit and left the country! But it was not to be!

So we have what's called a "tender appointment" booked in, where I imagine they will cover a number of things - number one being - "let us see your cheque please" then other things like; site and soil test outcomes, at which point they which tell us how much our site costs will be (with dollar signs flashing in their eyes like mini poker machines that have won the jackpot!), and then to confirm the next appointment which is the "Contract appointment" at which we will sign away every pay cheque for the next 100 years and lock in our souls in trade for our "dream home"!

They have also advised me that I will be contacted by someone from Hopetoun Interiors and Frank Walkers buddies at National Tiles to make the appointments to lock in my - sorry - our designs for the house! These guys will also have the mini jackpot eyes, when we walk through their door! "Upgrades Galore" they really should be called!

At least Derek will be there to ground me and my "upgrading" - to an extent anyway.

Somethings just have to upgraded and only the women reading this blog will really get why - but that I will leave for another post at some point in the future.

Anyway I will bid you adieu for today and leave you with some breathtaking scenery and vistas of our lovely piece of dirt!

Ax

The start of something new!

Hi All,

I never really thought I would be writing a blog. I am not much of an avid writer really, but I thought that this would be a good way of telling everybody how our new home is coming along and keeping you updated with the progresses, trials and tribulations of building our dream home...
I know some of you probably wont be that interested in reading all about it, but then I never thought I would be either till I was doing it myself! For others it will be interesting and hopefully informative..

So to recap on how this malarky got started...

Once back from Thailand with the wedding all over and done with and no projects on the go, I thought I would get us all caught up in a new project!
Amy - the girl with a never ending project!
No not really, although Dad did ask straight after the wedding what was next on my project list.. I answered "nothing, I am having a rest" - to which I am now eating humble pie!

We had decided to sell our Seaford home long before we actually put it on the market.
When we got home from Thailand we kept a bit of a watch on the market and decided it was ripe for selling.
So we took the plunge and sat down with a close family friend, Mike Scudds, a vendor advocate and sought his advice.
After having made the decision, it was time to go out and look at houses and see what was out there for us. We became dismayed at the prices in the areas we really wanted to live and what we would get for the money we would be spending. Nothing was perfect, everything we looked at needed something done to it or wasn't the layout or look we liked. We just wanted to buy something and pretty much move in and have it the way we wanted it exactly.

One of these days out I suggested to my wonderful husband to pop into Waterways, an estate not far from where we wanted to be, and have a look at the display homes there. And so it begun... the addiction to display homes and the seed of building our own "dream home" was planted!
From then on in it all happened very quickly! We sold the house, we bought land in Somerfield (a different estate from the first one we looked at, but still not too far away) and now this week we have settled on both.
In the last few weeks we have also decided on our builder, Porter Davis, and our home "The Cremorne 35" and have made our first down payment on that!
35 Squares of pure joy to plan, build and eventually clean!

I forgot to mention when exactly, that seed of building was cemented in my husbands mind. He was the Negative Nancy towards building originally, until he saw in a display home with a $15000 theatre room, complete with automatic sliding doors, automatic curtains, auto - lets just say everything was automatic! The arm was completed twisted, "Negative Nancy" went away and along came "lets-build-a-dream-home-Derek".

So my current task is to "design" - interior, exterior, bricks, render, mortar, tiles, cupboards, handles, splash back, paint... and the list goes on and on and on. Fun and quite frightening both at the same time!
Seeing as my husband is away this week, back in the motherland, I am assigned to task of finding/designing/researching out most of these things and having a portfolio for him to come home too and give the A-ok; without too many upgrades! God help me!

I have a couple of photos of our block of dirt so will try to work out how to post them and get them up on here soon!

Over and out for now
A