Stage 1 – Design

Overview of the lessons we learnt throughout the process building an overture elite with M:

• Take your time
• They will do what you ask them to do, they will rarely give you their opinion on what they think you should do. Eg. does this change look better or not? Whats more modern? What is more common with houses you build?
• The first quote you get will also be part of your final contract, with all the variations. For this reason, it gets really messy. We have 10 variations and 2 quotes created. I wish they consolidated all these quotes and variations into a single contract like an original quote but they don’t. So get organised.
• Something you fixed might not get fixed the way you intended it to be. You must check everything.
• Keep records. What your contact sends to head office (variations) and what they get back (their priced variations). Sometimes there are missed items.
• Check plans for errors, they happened to us a few times.
• Be patient with the people you a dealing with. I know you want your house built quickly but yelling at someone might get what you want but still makes you an ass. Be nice and patient. You will end up getting the house you want. The extra time will help you not rush into signing and then finding more things you need changed. We took 7 months to sign and still after signing there is something we want to change.
• Changes will cost you $2500 after signing contracts and $1000 after paying plan preparation fee, corrections are free. When you pay your plan preparation fee arrange to have a free change without incurring fee.
• M are keen to help you build the house you want. Really think about everything you want changed in the house and do it all in the original quote rather than additional changes later as these will add considerable time to the process.
• When completing your plans you want to get a ‘Complying Development’ so that it can be rushed through council. If you need to do a ‘Development Application’ it may take more time than M allow. M wanted to charge us approx $4500.
• Display homes are heavily modified. I asked to be shown the differences from the display home to the base house. They pointed out a few things but there were many others that they did not point out. Eg. heights of doors, size of back sliding doors.
• If you are in a fire zone get a professional report done rather than doing the self assessment. My council doesn’t accept the self assessment and it stalled us by a week in a period where you only have 90 days or you get hit with fees.
• [Updated] Selections Stage and Building Stage were so much quicker and easier than the Planning Stage. In retrospect, I wish I insisted on dealing directly with people in Sydney rather than their satellite office which would take 2 weeks every time we had questions. This added considerable to the time it took to build our house.