Our BTO Journey

I sourced around and asked for a few quotes from various companies. 

I narrowed down to Nippon(direct) and another guy,J, which had a group buy ongoing with my estate. 

I spoke with J on the phone. I’ve never actually met him, however he offered a really good package for my estate.

What J offered :

I also arranged for a meeting with nippon direct and manager Shiraz came down to do a free site assessment for me. During the meeting he was really nice, offered me advises like never to give your id 100% payment. He shared with me the stories he came across in his line of work.He also offered free Anti-mould for both my toilets.

I went with nippon because he offered me Anti-mould for my toilets, they also provide free colour preview and also a mayer juicer worth $89(because i am Singaporean and i can’t resist freebies). I also requested to do the first coat of painting after my electrician ran the cables and the second coat only at the end of the renovation.

Nippon requires a $200 deposit before the first coat and the remaining amount after the painting is done. 

I have to highlight that i am actually really disappointed with Shiraz after placing the deposit as he became unresponsive to my questions of if they have any sample photos of jobs they have done before. 

I had to drop him a text message expressing my disappointment before he sent an apology stating it’s hari-raya period and he has been “busy”. I told him that it would be good if he would have just dropped me a text saying that he is busy or refer me out to someone else. The past few days i have been asking him questions and responses are low. And it have been frustrating as i am trying to plan my renovation accordingly and painting has to go up before the carpentry, to add on to it he told me that his slots are filling fast which makes it even more worrying as i am planing to move in before the chinese 7 month which falls on 1st August 2019. I wished him and his family a happy hari raya and cited that that i understood where he was coming from but at the same time i hoped he could understand my view as a customer.

Before i placed the $200 deposit, his responses were really fast. 

Tip : Always negotiate everything before you commit to placing the deposit. E.g. Anti-mould for your toilets and possibly to give you another colour. Nippon gives default 4 colours, but i had a feeling had i try to request for another colour before the deposit i might have gotten it[i wanted purple for my service yard]- (because i heard from a friend that if the manager gives it to you it’s out of goodwill) :/  They also provided me with an extra free colour preview on the purple i initially wanted for my service yard. But hey on the bright side i managed to get an extra “white” colour for my service yard from Shiraz. I didn’t choose the purple in the end due to budget constrains. Nippon charges extra $50 per colour.

On the day of the first coat, the painters came on time, started work promptly. they carefully wrapped up everything which i am pleased about. They also informed me that BSC had painted over the skirting, however they used waterbased paint so i could easily take a wet cloth and remove it. The down side is that it would take me sometime to remove it. I asked Shiraz how much would it be if i asked his guys to help remove it. He said he would get back to me on this and NOPE, he conveniently forgot about it. 

The painters also painted the common walkway wrongly, which i spotted it and told Shiraz about it with screenshots provided. He conveniently replied what’s wrong? I highly think that he can’t be bothered with me after the Hari-Raya incident. I pointed it out and he just gave a “oh i see it now” reply. The painters manage to rectify it immediately so no qualms on that.

My preview

What the painters did 

After rectification 

We booked two days of painting and they managed to rush it out within a day. They did not do my service yard, toilets and my common room which i requested two coats(but they did only one) as i am not doing any major carpentry in the room. I asked the guys if they are still coming back tomorrow, they said Shiraz would let me know. I said okay, and they just left it at that. 

The next day i had to text Shiraz if they were coming and he replied nope, which left me a little disappointed as i wanted two coatings for my common room and service yard, i had also avoided plans so that i could be there for the painting. Lesson learnt, always text my painting manager if i needed answers as he can’t really be bothered. /shrugs

Overall, with Manager Shiraz aside, I am satisfied with the first coat of painting done by Nippon direct. Will update further after the second coat is done.

First coating : 

NPR 1306 P Sweet Deal  ,  NP BGG 1571P Blue instinct 

Master Bedroom :

NP OW 1072P Clear Day

Common Room :

NP YO 1201P Daylights

Our house had no major defect from HDB, most of it was the uneven walls. We opted in for tiles for living and vinyl for our bedrooms.  

I did pick up two hollow spots with the hollow checker. (Refer to pic below)

https://www.redbrick.sg/blog/11-tools-every-homeowner-should-have/

Remember it’s always important to knock every tile and every wall. I bought mine for like 6-7 dollars from a nearby hardware store. 

Bring along a flashlight to pick up defects easily. you would be surprised at the amount of flaws you could pick up from simply shining on the wall.

I bought a number bicycle lock and locked my main gate with it and gave the number to BSC so that they could rectify the defects.

Tip : I couldn’t find anything covered on this in blogs, but apparently if you slide open your door adjuster and it’s oily it is a defect to be reported to BSC. I got to know this when i installed UNIARM.

Is it worth it to invest in uniarm? YES. I installed it before renovation as i was afraid the contractors would not treat my door with tender loving care when moving the heavy objects in.

Why did i choose uniarm over smarthome’s slide arm? Uni-arm provides 2 years warrenty vs smarthome’s 1 year. However bear in mind that if you choose the colour ones(i chose black as it fits closest to my door’s stopper) it costs $65[Group-buy] compared to smarthome’s $50. UniArm was also highly recommended by my neighbors on our estate’s group chat + facebook.

On the day of the installation, as i was busy running errands and i couldn’t make it back in time, i gave my number lock to the Uniarm guy and he installed it promptly and provided me photos of it before he left. I like the fact that they have the trust between customers and allowed me to paynow only after installing and if i find the job is satisfactory.  

Photo of my uniarm after it’s done. 

Start planning your renovation early.

Start saving as early as possible.

Create/join your estate's Facebook group/telegram.

Look for group buys, propose group buys with vendors to get a cheaper pricing for the whole estate!

Start recitifying defects as soon as you can after keys collection so that it doesn't get delayed and you can start your renovation early!

Google is your best friend for a list to check on for defects. I used this : http://www.bridetomum.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/HDB-defect-checklist-BTO-Singapore.pdf

Always look for at least 3 quotes from IDs/Contractors

Have an idea in mind on what you plan to do so that it saves you time.

If you drive, remember to apply for your 4 months worth of free parking from hdb.

https://services2.hdb.gov.sg/webapp/SX05AWSPCP/SX05PSPCPLogin.jsp

There's also websites where you can draw out your rooms and furnitures for free like

https://www.floorplanner.com/

I sourced around for different contractors and i wanted to take into hand everything by liaising with the different people; electrification, wet works, carpentry and quartz. However i found this too tedious and i looked for a contractor to do all the work (believing a contractor would be cheaper than an id).

I approached my ex colleague’s husband who is a contractor to come up and measure everything. He drew up everything for us and gave us all the pricing. in the mean time i also approached a few other contractors and two ID(recommended by friends). 

The market should be quite competitive right now and to my surprise, Contractors are actually charging higher than interior designers. So that pops the bubble, Contractors does not necessarily mean cheaper.

Always get 3 quotations to compare pricing and remember to bargain(!!important)

Also, some IDs would throw in “free gifts” like hood+hob. However bear in mind that nothing is really free in the world and it would be added to other costs into your renovation.

Eventually i settled on Lynn from Luxurious Design. 

A few reasons why- she was recommended to me by one of my close friends, i told her my situation that i was on budget before engaging her.

She offer to purchase 3 fans for me from Malaysia, 

Offered genuine advises, which are the things that we can save on and which we cannot. As a new home owner, usually you would be clueless to all this details.What are the things to look out for and the lists goes on. 

She ALWAYS has fast response to any of my questions. Following up on my inquiries on the same day. 

I only found out from my estate’s group chat that i am very fortunate to have an id that responses to my never ending lists of questions almost immediately or within the same day. 

she stays very near my bto and i know where she stays so anything i could always ask her to come over to take a look so this is a bonus.

The reason why i am creating this blog is so that i can look back on our journey and also to help other home owners.

Keys collection : End April 2019!

Estate : MacPherson Spring♥

Okay so as a young couple with a 5 year old child, we were totally unprepared and had ZERO savings when it was key collection time. I would totally advise couples to start saving as soon as you book your flat or even better still, before getting married. 

With that being said, as we are on a tight budget it forced me to research a hell lot.