The earth is slow, but the ox is patient...

No idea what the title is really supposed to mean, and in all honesty, things aren't really moving that slowly at the moment, but it just feels like it!

Chantelle from Metricon called today to arrange times with us for our Electrical, Studio M, Tile and Contract appointments. Idealistic me was hoping for early July. No dice! August 2 will be spent going through the details of the contract and the wires needed to make the house 21st century compatible, while August 6 will be the tiles at Beaumont and the house bling at Studio M. Looks like the start date for the build is still some time off. On the plus side, it gives us a month to save a few extra dollars and think long and hard about the things that are important to our new home... Any suggestions??

Well, that's settled then...

Sare and I are now officially land owners! Settlement day has now come and gone. Admittedly, it kind of snuck up on me, as I was expecting it to be tomorrow. There were no hold-ups at all and as a bonus the bank also settled on my Coburg refinance at the same time. Love the work NAB have done so far(okay, there's the product placement out of the way. I've been watching too much Masterchef). Now all we have to do is turn it into a farm and make it productive until our build begins. Anyone got any sheep or cows?

In a slightly less exciting news, Jamie from Metricon called to let us know that the design of our house that we've wanted isn't quite possible without a couple of small changes. Either we lose the 3m ceilings in the living area or we take up the option of a verandah on the back to support the raised roof. As there is an extra cost involved and we weren't advised of it at any stage of the quote/design stage, Metricon have kindly advised that they'd be willing to halve the cost of the change. I kindly advised him to let me know the outcome after he speaks to his manager tomorrow! Worst case scenario is that we get an extra al-fresco area at half the price that it would have been had we known from the start. Looking forward to hearing back from him tomorrow!

The other bit of work I've had to do is contact the Casey City Council to apply for approval to move the driveway from the right side of the block to the left to allow us to get the floor-plan as we want it. I called the Planning department at 5:30, half expecting them to be closed and was lucky to speak to someone who was actually very helpful (shock, horror!). He said that they'd send an inspector out tomorrow to advise whether it would be possible before I spent any money in applying for a permit. This is the kind of service that other councils (I'm looking at you Monash City!) could learn from. Fingers crossed for the outcome we're looking for.

Site costs are in

Moving along slowly but steadily, we received our fixed site costs yesterday. They came in at a touch over $10k, a little less than the estimated 12k and well below the allowance we'd made of 15k. Apparently there is a part of the block that will need extra reinforcement in the slab which bumped the cost a bit, but all in all, I don't think we can be too unhappy with the overall cost compared to some of the horror stories I've heard!!

Houston, we have contact.

Only small news to report today. Chantelle from Metricon made contact to advise that she will be our CSC throughout the process and that the site testing had been completed along with the survey and was being sent through to their team to ensure that the design we've decided on can be done. It sounds like there shouldn't be too many problems with our block and that we'll be able to lock in our Studio M, Electrical, Tile and Contract appointments within the next few weeks.

It's all progressing along nice and quickly by the sounds of things. Settlement of the land is just over a week away which will be a big milestone. So much to do and so little time...