History

History - "I think we need a new stove"

In 2002, I [Mark] brought the little old home in suburban Guildford because it was close and central to work and family.  The old place has long since passed its use-by date and we've been waiting to nuke the old place ever since I first brought it.  Now that we have plenty of equity in the home mortgage, and with the current low interest rates, now seems to be a good time at long last to knock-down the old home and rebuild on the same block of land.

Pete and I started this project with earnest in May 2013 and it feels like it's taken forever to finally get this far.  The old place was stinking hot in summer and a freezer in winter and we're hoping to have a nice, modern, ECO-friendly new home to live in and enjoy.  It all began when Pete suggested that we need a new stove in the kitchen.  I told him that, "I don't think we need a new stove, I think we need a new home to go with a new stove" - the rest is history!

Our block of land is 594 square metres in size, but it is a narrow block, only 12 metres wide, and almost 50 metres deep.  Due to the narrow width of the block, we were restricted with the choices of our new home.

Here's some photos of the old home which is currently awaiting demolition.

Floor Plan for 'Douglas 10M' with 'Chase' façade

This is the floor plan for the 'Douglas 10M' which should fit comfortably on our narrow block of land.  However, we had to make alterations to the plan to comply with Holroyd Council's Development Control Plan.  Specifically, because of the gentle slope of our block of land, we have to install dropped edge beams to the concrete slab so that no unretained fill results at the perimeter of the slab.  We will therefore have to have 4 x 900mm wide steps leading up to the front patio.  We also have to drop the garage floor and remove an additional 60 tonnes of excess spoil.  Consequently, we have had to modify the floor plan and relocate the internal entry door from the garage to the home (as shown in this plan) to the rear of the garage (it will now be adjacent to the Home Theatre room).  To accommodate those needs, we had to sign variations to the contract to slightly relocate the toilet and the linen closet.

Dimensions for the ‘Douglas 10M’ with Chase façade

Dimensions quoted in metres (m).

Home width:	8.45m
Home length:	21.21m
Internal Ceiling Height (raised to):	2.70m
Height of doors (raised to):	2.34m

Room Dimensions

Open-plan Family & Dining rooms:	4.4m x 6.6m
Master Suite:	4.1m x 3.6m
Bedroom 2:	2.9m x 2.9m
Bedroom 3:	2.9m x 2.9m
Home Theatre room:	4.1m x 3.5m
Single Car Garage:	3.0m x 5.5m
Alfresco Cabana:	3.0m x 3.9m

Construction using Australian made Blue Scope Steel frames in lieu of traditional timber/wooden frames

I have been terrified of termites and the toxic chemicals regularly needed to keep them at bay.  McDonald Jones Homes are constructed with Australian made Blue Scope Steel frames and are therefore 100% termite proof.  Termites are a well known natural phenomenon in Australia and they're the angst of nearly all home owners.  Left unchecked and untreated a family home can easily be destroyed by Termites rendering the home worthless and unlivable.  The Blue Scope Steel frames also have a 50 year Structural Warranty and they remain true to form (unlike timber/wooden frames, which tend to bow or warp out of alignment over the passing of time).

The smaller 'Gen One' range of homes & why we chose to build with McDonald Jones Homes

McDonald Jones Homes also has a smaller range of architecturally-designed, brick veneered, modern homes available in their 'Gen One' collection of new homes with splendid extra features.  Their display homes for their 'Next Gen' collection of homes, which we have seen, demonstrated exceptional quality.  However, there doesn't appear to be any McDonald Jones Homes display homes currently available for the smaller 'Gen One' range of homes such as our 'Douglas 10M'.  The 'Gen One' collection of homes is a very similar, scaled-down version of the larger McDonald Jones Homes currently on offer such as their 'Next Gen' range of homes.  That's part of the reason why we decided to create our Blog in case it might be of help to any other Sydney-siders currently in, or considering, a situation similar to ours.

McDonald Jones Homes originated in the Newcastle/Maitland/Hunter regions of New South Wales and subsequently expanded to many other regional country areas in New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory (ACT).  They have recently expanded into the south-east Queensland property market.  McDonald Jones Homes is a relatively new entrant in the new home construction industry in the Sydney housing/property market.  Prior to the commencement of their recent TV advertising campaign in Sydney, circa 2013, many of us Sydney-siders had never heard of them.  In the Greater Sydney region, most of the McDonald Jones Homes currently appear to be constructed in the new housing estates in the outer Sydney regions at Kellyville (near Baulkham Hills), Georges Fair (near Moorebank), and in the Oran Park area.  McDonald Jones Homes consistently won the title of "Winner" of the Housing Industry Association's (HIA) awards for being the "Professional Major Builder" in the Hunter Region in 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013.  Our new McDonald Jones Home will be constructed in an older, established neighbourhood in suburban western Sydney (Guildford).

For these reasons and peace of mind, we decided to take the plunge and build our first new home with McDonald Jones Homes.  

Whilst there's numerous knock-down and rebuilds happening nearby, we have not as yet seen any homes in our area being built with Steel frames.  Our's will be the first home/domestic dwelling built in our area that is constructed with Steel frames (that will surprise the neighbours!).  We therefore decided to post this Blog to show the progress with our build.

For further information please refer to the McDonald Jones Homes' website at the following Internet Website:

http://mcdonaldjoneshomes.com.au

Nuking and demolishing the old place

It is important to emphasise that McDonald Jones Homes is only a builder and they do not specialise in any knock-down and rebuild projects (unlike Masterton Homes for example).  Consequently, we have had to outsource the demolition work to a separate contractor.  That has meant that Pete and I had to lodge a separate Development Application (DA) for the Demolition works and McDonald Jones Homes lodged their DA in respect of the Construction Development.  Naturally, that has resulted in an unneccessary duplication of Council costs and kerb and guttering bonds which have been payable to Holroyd Council (more bureaucratic nonsense which sees Council earning extra interest on our monies... "not Happy Jan!").

We have found a very good and reasonable demolition company, namely, ANA Demolitions (Baulkham Hills), and we sincerely appreciate their patience, help and assistance to date.  The old place has a lot of Asbestos cement in it and ANA Demolitions provided a very professional and affordable quote (under $15,000.00).  We paid the deposit for our demolition in September 2013 and we were anticipating demolition could have commenced before Christmas 2013... then January 2014... and February.  Unnecessary delays occurred due to a lot of bureaucratic nonsense from Holroyd Council that seemed to defy all logic.  All being well and weather permitting, the demolition of our old home will take 5 working days which is now due to commence from Monday 3 March 2014 ('D-Day').  We can't wait to see the old place come down!

Fingers crossed, we are hoping to be on McDonald Jones Homes' Construction List ASAP shortly thereafter.

Cheers for now!

Mark.