Slab down, frame up.

We are moving along at a cracking pace! Last week the site was leveled, the drains and various other conduits were put in place and the form work for the slab (including the mesh and waffle) was ready to go.  This week the slab was poured and the framers have started.  I expect that by the end of the day our ground floor will be done.  A small delay in the availability of the joists means the site will be quiet for a week or so.  Having said that we have been pleasantly surprised at the rate at which the project is moving so far. In fact we went away leaving only uneven ground and when we came back a couple of days later they were pouring the slab.  (That's also why I don't have any pictures of the work in between sorry about that).

From the front you can see the slab and half the ground floor framing.

A shot from the neighbours balcony. Fortunately the neighbours are also my parents so they have an excellent vantage point to watch all the action on the site.

It is wonderful to see the rooms, windows, doors and corridors take shape.  What has been left in most part to our imaginations is taking form and becoming  reality before our eyes.  It's very satisfying indeed.

We engaged New Home Inspections (NHI) this week who will come in to report on the quality of the build at the completion of various stages during  the project.  It seems as though they were already engaged by CG to do our house inspections. NHI will be taking us on as the client instead which means we will pay NHI directly.  More about this in the learnings.

This week I will go through all the post contract changes we have made (again) to make sure we have a matching building variation on file.

This weeks learnings:

When we started this process we read the blogs of those who built before us and were determined to engage a building inspector.  We realised that we were not qualified to necessarily know a defect when we saw one and wanted the peace of mind of knowing that we had hired someone who did. It is fair to say we allowed for an inspector in both our budget and our thinking processes.

Despite all of this when it came to booking the inspector and informing CG there was a bit of a psychological hurdle: the issue of trust in our builder.  How do you tell your builder you want an independent inspection without implying that you don't trust them to complete the work properly and according to standard? For us the answer was to change the way we thought about the independent inspections and in a nutshell this is what it comes down to:

We trust the independent inspection reports will come back with a big tick and hardly any defects. If there are defects we trust they will be resolved.  For us hiring an inspector is not about a lack of trust in Carter Grange; it's all about having another pair of expert eyes on the job so potential and real problems can be resolved quickly and with minimal effort. And whether you are a builder or an owner a quick resolution is always a good thing.