The Renovation Progression

The 'Hand-Over' of keys to our home to our ID was actually not really about the keys, he did not even want the keys in fact. He simply taped the main door's locking mechanism shut and used his own padlock on the gate. For most of the meeting that day, two days after we completed our Second Appointment and a day before our renovation is supposed to start, he is re-measuring our home's dimension and at the same time marking and drawing on the walls to illustrate to us what he'll be doing to craft our dream home out, room by room.

Week 1

We had more or less an idea of how long the demolition process will take, which is why we went down to the flat three days after our renovation started, and were duly impressed by how thoroughly the previous renovations had been torn down.

The next step was another meeting with the ID where he confirmed the designs and materials for the items that he will be installing next in our home. From the meetings we had so far, not only his depth of experience in renovation impresses us, but his meticulous way of handling our renovation set our hearts at ease. He confirmed our windows and doors/ door frames and showed us the tiles that arrived, making sure that those are the tiles we want before the tiling begins. He also took the tiles for each room and arranged it on the floor for us to determine what directions we would like the patterns on the tiles to be arranged, all in all a hot bothersome job for something which we had not even thought about but appreciate when he did it.

Week 2 -3

Another couple of weeks went by, we were visiting regularly after work and things were happening really fast. Stuff that were not there yesterday will be completed today, floor tiles, skirtings, bases for cabinets in our kitchen, wall tiles in toilets, low wall in kitchen, etc. Our ID met us at our home at the end of week 3 for a update and to set up more meetings for the next week, and also to arrange with us on some items not covered in our renovation contract which we have to start organize ourselves, such as our air-conditioner.



Week 4

This week was busier for us, I took a day off for the installation of air-con piping as our ID said it will be better if I am there and he can also go through our water piping and electrical wiring details with me. We went on to meet him in his office that evening to lock down on the designs for our carpentry and other details such as door locks, gate, glass doors, toilet doors, etc. It was extremely draining on all of us and took us about four hours plus to decide on colors, materials and design for all our carpentry.

Week 5

We are mostly done with all the decisions regarding our renovation by now, and there is frankly not much for us to do but sit back and wait for the masters to convert our dreams into reality. We had to run some errands such as getting LED lights and HDMI cables, stuff which will be integrated into our home's design but are not included in the renovation quotation. The false ceilings went up this week as well as all the water pipes and electrical wiring.

Week 6

This was an interesting week, they had taken down the old gate and door fame and had put up our new door frame. But the door is not installed yet, so they build a wooden panel 'door' to lock up the flat. Painting is done and the tiler came back to finish up our bath and foyer area. The most important thing that happened this week for us was that the flat was cleaned for the first time this week. For the past 5 weeks, the flat just seems to us like a construction site,  this is the first time that we can visualize what our home will look like when it's done. After the cleaning, the carpentry for our customized furniture began. On our end, we had started our crazy shopping spree. Over the past 3 months, we had been on the look out for appliances and furniture we like, and when the deal is good we brought some but we held back on most items. This week, the seal had been broken, and the wallet's is unleashed. By the end of the week, we had gotten a Bed for ourselves, TV, Sofa, Dining Table and Chairs for the living room and Fridge, Washer/Dryer, Microwave Oven, Kettle and Rice Cooker for the Kitchen, plus a Vacuum Cleaner and a couple of Fans. All set to be delivered on Week 8, handover day.

  

Between the First and the Second

Our First appointment was completed without a hitch, a testimonial to Singapore's efficient civil service. We met up with the current owner of the flat and their real estate agent before our appointment time at 8.45 AM and registered for our queue ticket. At around our appointment time, our ticket number flashed on the screen and the next thing we knew 2 hours had passed in a jiffy, spent verifying and signing all the sales documents. We settled the remaining cash component after the appointment and all we have to do next was just to wait for our Second appointment to roll along.

With the sales of the flat almost settled, it was a huge load off our mind, and we can now redirect our attention and focus fully on the renovation. Armed with a initial quotation for a basic design which our ID had  proposed for a re-sale 3 room flat like our's, we started negotiation to renovate and design our dream home. Actually, as the initial quotation covers many required renovation items such as demolition, painting, electrical work, we ended up mostly just adding items onto the already imposing list. After confirming the customized furniture, features and material we wanted, our ID gave us an idea of how he'll be planning the renovation.

Although his plan did seemed a little unorthodox and different from what we expected, his experience really shined through and everything went better then expected. The first phase will be choosing the tiles we want, and even if we had agreed that we should not choose too many type of tiles and keep things simple, we ended up choosing more then 8 types of different tiles for our home. The experience was mind-boggling, with  countless tiles of different material, texture, size, design and color, some tiles are suitable for living room, some for kitchen, some for bathroom, some can only be used as wall tiles, and some are know as decor or feature tiles. The most challenging element of choosing the tiles is that the chosen tiles must not only be suitable for their function and location, but their color and texture must also have some synergy in terms of the overall design of our home, so that our flat will not look like a patchwork quilt. We were thoroughly confused about halfway through, and proceed to smile and nod as our ID and the very competent tiles salesperson took out different colors and textures of the series of tiles we had chosen and were proposing and counter-proposing different layout and pairing of the tiles. It is at times like these that we felt we had made the correct decision when we chose to use an interior designer.

All we need to do next was to complete the sales and officially take over the keys of the flat at the Completion appointment A.K.A Second appointment. We did had a short bout of panic attack during our second appointment as we had arrived and registered for the appointment too early, so when our number came up the representative from the law firm had not arrived and we could not start the completion process. It was also at that point of time that it dawned on us that as both the real estate agent and the seller will not be at the appointment, but had instead appointed a representative from a law firm. We did not realize that we do not have the contact of this representative, and were quite worried when we did not see anyone 15 mins past our appointed time. It turns out that the person had went straight to the HDB officer and passed the keys over already, so when our number was called again we were able to complete the handover successfully.

We had now managed to lease our flat from HDB for the next 70 years.      

Looking for Interior Designer

After signing off and submitting our Option To Purchase, OTP to HDB, the earliest available weekend appointment slot for our First Appointment was on the 14th of September 2013, 6 weeks after our submission date on the 5th of August.There will be another Completion Appointment A.K.A Second Appointment usually scheduled 6-8 weeks after the First Appointment.
Which meant we have about 3 months for Phase II of plan Cozy Home, the Renovation.

Of course, we had researched a little about renovation as renovation cost is a big factor in our affordability to purchase a Resale unit. We flipped through some renovation magazine and scrolled through Renotalk.com, but did not had any definite ideas as we did not even know what kind of flat we will be buying. So we had a herculean task awaiting us as we endeavor to find our ideal renovation for our home.

Before we talk about any design or renovation, we first have to search for a professional in this industry whose reputation, design and price we can accept. Before purchasing our flat, we had collected many renovation price packages flyers from interior design firms, from these and our research from the internet, we realize that renovating a resale flat will cost more than renovating a new flat. This is mostly due to the extra demolishing of the current renovation and the replacement of items some as water pipes, re-waterproofing the kitchens and toilets and re-tiling the whole unit.

We started looking for a interior designer with an initial budget of about 30,000. We sent out about 5 requests for quotation to 5 interior design firms which we shortlisted from recommendations from Renotalk.com. That was a bad mistake, as we thought these firms will all just reply with a standard quotation for a 3 room resale flat with which we can do comparisons and use as a baseline for further customization of our renovation.

What happened was that 2 of those requests sunk into the deep web ocean and were never heard from again, and my phone and email started to be bombarded by interior designers from the other 3 firms. They all wanted to meet and understand more before they are willing to give any quotations. The problem we had with this was that we only have the weekends available to meet with these designers, and it was a nightmare trying to arrange a appointment on the weekend with them. Another mistake we made was that, on Renotalk, most recommendation was actually for a particular ID from that company and thinking that we are only just requesting for a quotation and that we can choose our ID later we did not direct our request to that ID. So, when we met with the 2 IDs we managed to arrange appointments for, they are not the IDs we wanted.

The first ID did try to make an effort to keep close to our budget and the quotation, although we were quite unhappy with it at that point of time, was actually quite reasonable. We did not contact him again after the first meeting as we felt that he is actually not that interested, perhaps due to our tight budget and size of our flat. The second ID showed much more enthusiasm and had much better designs and ideas, but was too pricey for us.

It was at this point of time, the 3rd ID replied. This ID had the most recommendations from Renotalk and we liked his work the most, but he is a one man show and although he have a squeaking clean reputation, we were still a little hesitant about even requesting a quotation from him. Yet, from very first meeting, he convinced us of his professionalism and passion.

 And so, we found our Interior Designer.

Home's Beginning

After almost a year's effort of searching and researching, it is almost unbelievable that we are almost at the end of our journey - our quest of attaining our own cozy abode. We had been actively looking for a HDB since after our ROM on 12-12-12, and we have learned so much since then.

One of the first decision we had to make was of course, BTO or Resale. BTO, acronym for Built-To-Order flats, are new flats directly brought from HDB. So new, that in fact the flat's building components might still be in their ore, sand and clay form when the flat's being offered for sale. Although BTO flats are new, cheaper and a Singaporean's privilege, we had decided that we would go for a Resale flat.

Next, we decided that we are going for a 3-Room Flat, and thus began our education in the HDB housing system of Singapura. We narrowed down our desired location to the western side of Singapore, and realized that even in the same estate, 3-Room HDB flats' price range can be pretty wide. The lowest Valuation price we found was $272,000 and the terrible terrible thing ( to a pair of newly married like us) known as COV range from $25,000 to $50,000. That was when we learned about the different classes of 3-room flats, from 3I, 3S, 3NG, 3A to the so-called 3 Jumbo or 3 and a half.

We started our search from 3I units under $300,000 and was hoping for a COV of about $25,000 for a un-furnished unit, which proved to be an impossible task. We gave up somewhere in July 2013 and hopped onto the Sale of Balance bandwagon and balloted for Casa Clementi, a SERS project. We didn't even get a chance to choose a unit. But the month long break while waiting for our SBF result allows us to re-look at our expectations and market situation, and 3 days after receiving notice of our failed SBF bid, we found our home.

The valuation was a little higher then what we had planned for, but the COV is reasonable and the location's good. The unit itself is well-kept and clean even though it had never been renovated since sold by HDB 29 years ago. We discussed for a night after viewing the unit that evening and called the agent to arrange for the OTP the next day. We paid the deposit immediately and we were then on our way to owning our own home.

Floor Plan

Living Room

Common Room

Master Room

Kitchen

Master Room Toilet

Common Toilet