make sure you have plenty of power points. - get some installed in the garage too and a light.
My wife loves to move everything in out lounge room every 6 months.
Think about best entertaining area outside and shade etc. its nice to have a good outdoors spot, most houses these days dont have any yard at all.
Try and get standard size windows so its easier for window blind purchases 
if you ever change the window furnishings.
Moving ■■■■ every 6months is ■■■■. What if it’s better? IT’S NOT.
Sound insulation.
Modern homes are friggen noisy due to lots of hard surfaces and thin walls and loud TVs and loud people trying to talk over the loud TVs. Pay extra for sound insulation for the walls between living areas, between living areas and bedrooms, between bedrooms.
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Consider putting double glazed windows in. Reduces outside noise and also helps lower heating and cooling costs.
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I’m surprised no one is questioning the type of build.
Is double brick on a slab the only way to go?
In the tropics at least, steel frame, colorbond cladding & roofing, heaps of insulation etc is the most cost effective way to go.
Don’t just follow what all your neighbours/family have done is what I’m suggesting, as there are newer materials to work with nowadays
All mass produced new homes are single brick/pre-fab frames on a slab. It’s the quickest and cheapest way to build a house.
Rarely,if ever, will you see anything made any other way in an estate. You may see foam boards if most of the property is rendered. No one uses steal frames. To dear and slow.
What about timber frames? We use steel in the tropics because of the termites.
Living in an estate full of identical houses is not my idea of paradise.
I got my 3 bedroom house built on my steep block in Cairns for $350k, but I do agree it was slow build
But it’s a one-off, bespoke place that fits in well with the environment (on a 3 acre bush block).
What about pre-cast concrete panels then? What I’m suggesting is looking outside the square, rather than following the norm
Yeah timber frames are what is used. The always come pre fabricated (pre-fab)for quick installation.
Whilst your ideas are great if you are building your own place ( ie your design etc ) it wont be the case with Craze. The only things volume builders let you chose are the colours, facade finish and bathroom/kitchen finishes. Even the slight less change in the house costs a ■■■■ load.
Funny story when we built our place. The plans just had a basic laundry trough and cab in the laundry. As I wanted to add some cabinets to the laundry I wanted it left off and some of the water points installed at a different point during rough in. They said they’d work out the pricing and get back to me.
So in short I wanted the laundry trough taken off the build and 2 less water connections( for the washing machine as I would just tee off the cold). They came back and said it would be an EXTRA $500. Yes $500 more for less stuff.
So i got them to install as per the plans, ripped the trough out and sold it for $150 at work!!
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We built with Burbank 10 years ago and had no real complaints. Biggest issue we had was that the phone line was not connected and we moved in on 22/12 so could not be done for a couple of weeks. So they gave us a phone that worked off the satelite and was hanging from the window. We insisted on something from Telstra as my wife is a chronic asthmatic and it was about the time that a lady died from an asthmatic reaction somewhere around Albury/Wodonga because she could not get through to emergency services as I remember. Plus at the time our grass had not taken hold and it was basically a dustbowl around our house at the time.
Was not really stressed out by the process despite hearing heaps of people say it is one of the most stressing times of your life. I loved the process (I am wanting to start looking to build a new place) I was so excited I used to detour to the block a few times a week to take photos of the progress.
Got the flyscreens done and it was a great move because it was a hot summer and our neighbours told us that they did not have flyscreens installed and as a result they could not really open their windows to use their evaporative cooling.
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I should add, if your stuck on colour use the display homes as examples. They have pros. Feature walls and such are to be avoided and if you pick a good neutral like white it’s easy to do later.
If possible I also like the paint to be rolled rather than sprayed. Smoother finish and more durable and easier to clean.
Just a general house thing. Cathedral ceilings are absolutely ■■■■ if you don’t have an under the house cavity for future wiring needs. You want to burn the house down feeding cat6 up into the roof then removing tiles/ tin roof to get it past obstacles.
Higher ceilings and doors. If double storey and your putting in ducted heating and cooling, allow for the returns. I didn’t and it took up half my robes.
I guess it’s the luck of the draw.
We went to consumer affairs twice.
Had to get an independent engineer out to force them to do some fixes.
Had the place repainted twice, solar panels replaced, oven fixed, heater fixed, front yard redone, backyard redone, front door replaced, window screens replaced, bench replaced, some carpet relaid, im sure there’s more but yeah now i love my place 
I recommend owner builder. But then I can understand that not everyone is as talented as I am 
Twenty years ago, I’d recommend this.
But nowadays, I wouldn’t recommend owner builder unless you’ve had experience with sub-contractors in the past and can deal with the insurances / warranties.
If anything happens on site (i.e. equipment gets stolen, damage to adjoining properties, etc.) the owner builder takes the role of the builder and has to deal with insurance / liability. An insurance company will charge a higher premium during construction if you don’t have a site foreman either. If you get through the building process and you’re looking to live in the house for greater than 15 years, then you’re fine, but if you sell the house and there are problems, you are also taking on the warranty requirements of the house regardless of who the sub-contractor was who installed the item.
How times change, our first phone went in in 1974, 9 months wait and we only got that because we agreed to a shared line.
And you lot think Telstra is crap now.
I built my house 7 years ago. No issue with anything you mentioned.
we built with Carlisle back in 2011ish. the quality seemed ok for a volume builder and they were usually very helpful and reasonable to deal with.
i’m not sure how big your block is going to be, but i would suggest not going overboard on the size of the house. we built a 4 bed, 3 lounge 32sq place when there was only 2 of us. when we moved to our next place, we had so much ■■■■ that was just unnecessary. looking back i wished we’d gone smaller and had a bigger backyard space.
Surprised that front yard and backyard are their responsibilities. I thought it was house only.
I had some minor issues but the guy came out a month later and they were all fixed. Doors needed to be adjusted, rolling jobby under the rear sliding door was broken and needed to be redone but everything fixed cheerfully, plus a dent i’d put in a wall.
Only issue I had was that the rock removal bill for $14k came just before final settlement, without them mentioning it earlier. I’d paid a grand or two earlier, and despite there being a LOT of bluestone to be removed, I was hoping I’d got away cheaply. Four truckloads (or more) costs more than a grand.
I had to get all the water tank stuff done afterwards, but that’s OK.
No issues with Telstra, gas, council, Foxtel or anything. All done in a timely fashion.
Atlantique?