I am about to embark on a mission of espionage against the above home builder. Dont get AVD knickers in a knot, I'll be doing it from my own website.

If you have any stories good or bad from building with Clarendon, could you email it to me at the address in my signature.

my wife works for wincrest, had a bit of a chuckle at it... whats the story?

Well it would be hypocritical of me to go into any detail when I have spoken out about against this kind of thing with VW suppliers. All I will say is that I am in dispute over $6000.

Any builder who uses private certifiers is hiding something but thats my opinion as a Council building inspector

No choice in Brissy. Private all the way. Try and get two decisions the same :puke

I havent had any dealings with them but know what its like,Have been down that road with Beachwood homes good luck.:thumb

wheres ur webby dude i wanna read!

at the moment it is just a threat. This afternoon I got an email saying they have put the wheels in motion for the construction certificate and will send me some of the paperwork I have been asking for. The other half doesnt exist so I will be credited with $1400. As for the $6K they say I owe them, they dont seem to want to talk about it at all. They havent mentioned it for a few days, but they havent said anything about dropping it. I'd like something in writing saying it has been dropped so it cant pop up later. I will keep the website on hold unless they bill me.

I feel sorry for the girl who is dealing with me. She wasnt the one dealing with my job when all the crap happened (that one mysteriously moved on) Obviously she doesnt have the power to make big decisions but she has to deal with my attitude. I'd love to speak to the highest level of manager there is, but I cant. I'm not being abusive or anything but I'm not giving her any breathing space either.

no longer a threat. They sent me the DA approved plans yesterday. They are wrong, You may say I should have checked beforehand. You are right. But they refused to send them to me (a fourth time) apparently 3 times sending me the wrong plans was enough. They insisted that the correctly amended plans had been lodged. Well now I have signed stamped proof that they werent.

The thinly disguised warfare will begin tonight when I have a chance to write the essay.
http://iblog.net.au/calraedonsucks 

Goodkuck with it all.I found the Depatment of fair trading very helpfull when i was fighting beachwood,As soon as they got involved beachwood backed down and did everything they should have done from the start cheers.

Um...... you might want to check the spelling on your blog page.




Matt.

nah, its meant to be like that. i cant defame calraedon homes, they dont exist.

Just had a 1/2 hour conversation with manager. Surprised to get a phone call at this hour. Very apologetic about their customer service and if they can get to site before the end of month I wont have to pay anything. Which is great, thats all I was asking. She will personally see to it that the plans and BASIX are fixed. So for now at least, I am happy again. I wont be recommending them to anyone though. Mind you, I've got an email from someone who has had a shitfight with just about every builder there is. Must be par for the industry.

Huh......... so who put the add at the bottom of your page Chris?? :P:P:P


ooops too small

[ Edited on 11-5-2007 by Bizarre ]

just so happens i'm building wth said housebuilder,i am now 3 months behind on build,i would not want to be in a sinking boat with these twats as i would have drowned long ago waiting for some thick idiot to make a decision.
sorry but i come from a can do ,will do society,they would have gone bust years ago if they operated this way in the uk ,
these prats are just a joke....not happy!..

sorry ....rant over......

Update:

I got a letter 2 weeks ago asking me to finish everything I needed to do. There was 11 points on it. It was obviously a standard letter that they didnt even read. None of the amounts had been filled in. It had things about demolishing the existing house, removing trees.... its a bare block, never been built on. Although frustrating that was easy to sort out. I paid the balance of the deposit that I DO owe them, and sent in technical details of a retaining wall that I dont need to do until later(says so in the DA, and it was always going to be my responsibilty) I just thought at that point it would be easier to take a no cost no argument route out of that one. I did all that within a few hours.

Lo and behold my final plans arrived today, they were posted on July 1, the day the extended tender expired. I havent as yet been asked to pay up any more money. They havent credited the $1400 they owe me, though i did get an email last week saying it would happen. So not sure if they will be harrassing me again, but I still wont be paying as I can still only find a few days where I can be held responible for any delays.


[ Edited on 4-6-2007 by amazeer ]

Sounds good just keep onto them. Good Luck.
When they start to build if possible go check on them every few days to make sure they are doing the correct thing. As you don't know what you will get if you don't keep an eye on it.
We had heaps of wrong thinks delivered to the site that the contractors where just going to install until I rang the site supervisor to sort it out.

Rest assured I will be doing a trip to the site every single day, taking a photo of the progress and counting how many people are on site.

The cover letter for the plans had sme bullshit paragraph about how they are happy to have my business and how they would do everything to make it an existing enjoyable experience. I think I may frame it. Comic genius.

Well well well. On friday they surveyed the block and pegged it out. I guess that means in 33 weeks (+ weather delays) i'll be walking through the front door of my new house. Amaaaaaaaazing stuff. And its only been 7 months since I sat down and said this is what I want. :duh

being in construction we HAVE to sign up with Liquidated Damages.
Substantial amounts.

Mention these to a domestic builder and see what he says.

What "penalty" is there if he doesnt finish in 33 weeks??

FA :cussing

You will be rolling on the floor laughing aboout all this in years to come.

Enjoy :beer

I think the penalty is $50/week. Not a lot. That doesnt really bother me too much. So long as I see they are working in good weather, I'll be happy.

Well things are about to heat up in the ongoing saga of my house project. Yes it is still going, yes thats about 16 months so far, no their form hasnt improved.

In the beginning I thought everything would be fine once it got out of the castle hill office into the hands of tradesmen. I couldnt have been more wrong. If I knew then what I know now, I would have laughed at the $4000 deposit and thrown it away. The workmanship on my house is absolute rubbish. Any home handyman could have done an equally bodgy job.

The main issues of contention at this point are:
*The earthworks at the back of the house arent to plan. I told them on July 30 when it would have been an easy fix. Still no progress on fixing it up.

*The downpipe at the front centre of the house is supposed to go through the slab hidden inside the brick column. Somewhere between me signing the tender and them drawing construction plans, this moved. Its ugly I hate it. It was brought to their attention before Christmas, its still there.

*There is a 2 inch gap between the edge of the slab and a wall in the foyer. This will be covered over with tiles so its not such a big deal. But they were supposed to fill the gap with a peice of timber. But they have since put the skirting on and painted. Its going to have to get ripped off to fix it. I can tile over a gap, but chances are the tiles will break if anything heavy gets put on it, and there's nothing there to grout against. no doubt it will fall out over time.

*There are dozens of sheets of gyprock in there that arent fixed to the wall properly. Stuck on the edges but the middle is loose. These were going to be fixed with screws, but of course its all fully painted now.

*What I dub the picasso patio. Its ridiculous. I would be embarrassed to leave it like that let alone a tradesperson. Thats without mentioning the chunks that have broken out of it.

*The garage floor... this one makes me cry, its the only reason I built this house. The concrete was thrown in, spread out and the helicopter rush over it. But it was never finished. They forgot. In January when I first discovered it, it would have been an easy grinding fix. But now they have lined and painted the garage.

*And finally, the time it has taken to build. They were late starting. When they did start the construction period was 33 weeks. That means approx feb 7 was handover day. Now they say its 30 weeks, + 75 rain days that they wont tell me what days they were, + 5 weeks off for christmas (they only had 2-3) the finish date was April 4, now April 11, but not looking promising. Every week is costing me $260/week rent. They seem happy to bankrupt me, so I have made it my lifelong goal to see them bankrupt. Whenever I ask them about getting some compensation they just tell me to wait till its finished.

I've put pics up on myspace. http://www.myspace.com/i_hate_smurfs 

If you intend to build with any builder dont. I've swapped too many stories with customers of all of them.
If you intend to owner build dont.
If you have to do either, choose owner builder. Organise your own tradesmen. You'll have full access to the site and they wont get paid until each step is finished.
If you disregard this advice and go with a project builder, push extremely hard to get full access, or at least once a month inspections. Go past as often as possible and keep a diary of when they are on site, or get friendly with the neighbours. Keep a diary of the weather. Withhold payments if something isnt right. Dont accept any word that "yep, we'll fix that". It seems they just go by the construction schedule and leave problems till the end when it takes more time. And time will cost you big money.

yeah our house is still on going,clarendon seem to have an excuse for everything,we are so behind it aint funny,being in the building game myself as a project manager i just have to stand back & shake my head at what a dogs breakfast they are making of the build...pathetic!...
your problem with the gyproc seems to happen in all there houses....take a look at ours....,spot the fixing...








i have told them i am not making gyproc progress payment till more fixings go in....& told them i will defect it on handover....
right back to vee dubs pleeze...rant over...

We had the same problem with beechwood,Told them we would hold payments back,They told us if we hold progess up by not paying the instalments we could be back charged for time losed,Wich after speaking to people in the know they said they can and will do that so all you can do is fight them at the end,The whole building a house thing is something i will never do again

Wow! I am so glad I bought an old 1952 weatherboard. I refloored, replumbed, replastered, insulated, reclad weatherboards, painted, tiled, etc. everything myself. None of it required building permits = no bureaucracy, and none of it required external tradesmen except for restumping and full electrical rewire. Yeah ok it has taken 2 years, but I can tell you now, I have looked at a lot of 'trade' jobs, and some of them shock me. Best thing is, I know the building frame is solid, it has lasted 56 years so far.

I see the same in the panel beating industry. So called tradesmen being lazy, or just getting the dollars with no quality provided.

My brother works for Reece Plumbign as a Manager and supplies a lot of the larger building companies like Clarendon/Coral homes etc. He said after what he has seen and heard about these large building companies he wouldn't even let them erect a garden shed from a set of plans!!!!

Hence why I bought a Post war home and am renovating it. It's all hardwood which is good in one way but not good when you try to drive nails into it!!! A lot of semi pre drilling first!!

Jeez fellas, can't believe what I am reading here, as a builder myself and having been employed by other large project builders in the past i can tell you that there are a few employees who would be out on their respective arses if this happened on my sites or for the companies I have been employed by, last time I checked, the Gong was in NSW and in the past I have had to deal with fair trading (builders licencing board back then) and I can tell you that they made the builder sit up and take notice, on a couple of occasions they told the client where to get off too, so I don't understand why you hav'nt approached them, if what you post here is even half true they should be bought to the table. One last thing, most building contracts say that inclement wheather delays must be noted and claimed as they occure otherwise there is no claim, end of story, might pay to check it out.