Almost a Home???

Today was the first time I had been to site and honestly felt that the end was finally in sight. Our bathrooms are all complete with the exception of final paint finishes. Our kitchen has been repaired with the exception of some small issues with one of the plinths which will be addressed early next week. A number of door jambs need to come out and be replaced due to some splitting issues and that should be completed by early next week.

Some realignment of the front fascia was needed after we had one of our brick pillars redone and this may have been completed late today. It's all now starting to come together but we just need to keep knocking down some of the other smaller issues to tidy things up.

We managed to get a few quotes for the driveway and need to book in our trades to have our flooring installed but again we need to sort out some firm dates first.

Deja Vu

Today saw the completion of our wet area floors after being redone due to some tiling errors. From first glance they appear to have been done really well and I am quite chuffed with the finished product. It will be nice to see them when they are all cleaned up so here's hoping they will look even better. We have had all of our skirting completed and now only have a few of the architraves still to be replaced. Our new laundry tub is in and our other replacement bit and pieces have been ordered and are due to arrive early next week.

Our last brick window sill was also completed today and appears to be much better then the last attempt and a number of our small mortar defects have also been rectified. If all goes to plan apparently the construction side of things should be completed early next week with only painting matter to then be addressed.

The list is getting shorter which is great to see, but we still have a little way to go yet.

Treading Water......

And so we are back from the darkness and hopefully moving ahead with no other mishaps as we look towards the light at the end of the tunnel. We had some issues that we appear to have overcome and fingers crossed we will not incur any more. I don't really want to dwell on the issues other then to say they were with contractors and their standard of work. When these issues were raised with MDJ they were dealt with and are presently in the process of being rectified.

Our column has been redone and looks far better then the former. The windows sills are predominantly complete with one still a work in progress. The wet area floors are nearly done and are a vast improvement on the original. The pantry door has been replaced and the front door repaired. Today saw the installation of our glass splashback and to be honest it looks "Shit hot"!

Hopefully over the next few days we will see a lot more progress.

Our Darkest Day

It is with a heavy heart that I advise I am unable to further update the blog on the progress of our build. We have encountered  issues with the build this year and today has been the lowest point of our entire journey.

We have raised these issues and are awaiting a reply.......

Progress

I got a call today from the Region Construction Supervisor who was kind enough to update me with whats happening at the build. It turns out the the floor tiles in our ensuite were running out of square and by the time they made their way into the toilet they were quite noticeable. As a result a meeting was had onsite today with the head tiler and the floor will be coming up later in the week. There is also some rectification to be done in the main bathroom as there was a mix up with the floor and wall tiles surrounding the bath. The brick pillar out the front of our home and a number of the window sills are also to be taken down and redone due to some problems with the finish of them.

Our electricians rang this morning to make an appointment with us to come back and replace all of our power points and light switches as they had mistakenly installed the incorrect ones. They sounded a bit surprised when told any time was suitable as we are not in as yet! As a result they will also be turning up later in the week to rectify this and the issue with a number of the switches being way too close to the architraves.

Our fly screens are on and the air conditioning has been installed so there another couple of things off the list and here's hoping things keep moving along steadily.

The silence is deafening..............................

It's been over two weeks since I heard anything from anyone at McDonald Jones! What's happening people.......

The Meeting........

Early last week I received a telephone call from the owner of McDonald Jones Homes Mr Bill McDonald in regards to the issues we had noted in our blog. Our conversation was not that of what we had raised but more that he and his team were committed to addressing the issues and resolving any concerns we may have had. As a result a meeting was scheduled within the next two weeks for both he and the Senior Construction Supervisor to attend our site.

True to his word, yesterday I received another call asking me to site for a walk through with both Mr McDonald and the Senior Construction Supervisor which we completed today. To be brutally honest I really didn't know what to expect as both my wife and I are first time builders and we really didn't want to fall into the trap of being too pedantic with some of the issues we had raised. I also didn't know what if anything we were walking into after some of the horror stories published on the renovation forums.

As you all may recall very early in our build we had a slight mishap with our frames which was addressed in no small part by Mr McDonald so I had had some previous dealing with him and found him to be a straight shooter who cut straight to the point. Well today was no different and I must say that both Mr McDonald and his Construction Supervisor's professionalism and dedication to their customers could only be described as outstanding. We spent a good hour walking through, discussing issues and working out solutions to the things we had noted. There was not one single thing that either of these men batted an eyelid too and we were left in no doubt that we would be delivered a polished, well finished home.

I wonder how may other building/ construction companies the size of McDonald Jones would have the owner of the business contact you personally to address issues then come to site and spend the time understanding and addressing your concerns? My guess....... not many at all.

We were of no illusion that with a build of this nature there would always be some issues along the way, accidental or otherwise. However as a wise man once said to me during this journey "Don't judge us on our faults, judge us on how we fix them" they have so far risen to the challenge and given us a firm undertaking that all of our concerns will be addressed.

To both Bill and Mick, thanks gents we truly do appreciate your assistance, assurances and dedication to bringing us a home not just building us a house.