Bolero Flooring #2

22 DAYS TO HANDOVER

Swung by the house today and while there were some guys working on site, I managed to have a quick browse around and was surprised to see that our flooring as gone in so quickly! (partially) another PD WIN here! The flooring really adds greater contrast and colour to the entire house - blending the kitchen / carpeted areas quite well. The rangehood had also been installed, stairs stained and glossed, painting has been retouched, mirrors installed, shower screens  installed. When more of the appliances go in, like our toasters, our kettles, it'd add colour and life to the kitchen! 

When we were deciding on flooring, we weren't too sure whether the Bolero flooring was something we wanted to go for as there were not display homes installed with them. It was a new product then and was under a special promotion! We had Bolero as a standard feature as part of our promotion package. I had so much trouble trying to figure out how to match the flooring to the sofa set, to the dining table etc. But Im glad to say that the Rustic Coffee look is exactly the look we were going for! The floor is currently quite dusty, thus the final effect can't really be seen yet. I will update again when the house is cleaner.

Laminate flooring is one of the hardest wearing floor solutions on the market. No yukky grout so get discoloured as with tiles and no cold feet in winter. $4000 for Bolero Flooring AND evaporative cooling to the entire house. Apparently Bolero flooring is now a cat 2 upgrade! Consider us lucky! 

Bolero Laminate - Rustic Coffee

Kitchen with Bolero flooring

Family area

Rangehood - BRCG90BX 

We decided that we will go with this style rangehood because the slide out option (BRC90BX) would mean that we needed to have overhanging cabinets above our stove. I did some research and found out that this model issin't very strong in its suction power. Hence, having a slimline canopy rangehood would mean that if I ever get a replacement one in, I'd have to stick with a slimline one again. You want to keep your options open by going with something we have chosen, so that if you decide to upgrade the rangehood for whatever reason, you can install a stronger, much bigger unit to the enclosed space. Having overhead cabinets there will greatly reduce your options!

This model that we've chosen, does look quite small to me though....

Stained Glossed Stairs

Replaced glass panel due to chip on glass

The newly stained/glossed stairs really looks AMAZING! Worth every dollar spent on it! Anyone building a Sandringham 45 MUST have these stairs installed! The chipped glass on our stairs took almost 2 months to replace. I think it could have had a very long lead time. Good thing I pointed it out to my previous SS much earlier. I'm still sticking with not upgrading to have these panels at my void. Wasn't justified to spend almost $6000 on such a small area, where the stairs was almost $10000 and it a feature piece for the house. We are however well underway to have the exact same design at our void post-handover.
The paint work on the house has been touched up. Hopefully we won't find much defected from now onwards.

Garage wall cornices fixed 

Shower screens / mirrors installed 4-7 March 2013

Can anyone give me info about the model of showerscreens PD provide to its Prestige customers as a standard? We have Stegbar showerscreens, but are they the Grange series or the Softline series? This could be a prestige inclusion package as well. I just want to confirm that we are getting the right showerscreen installed.

Bathroom 1

Bathroom 1

Bathroom 2

Bathroom 2

Master Ensuite

Master Ensuite

All our bathrooms have been upgraded to have niches in the shower. 
If you notice carefully, you will see that the drainage pipes is a single metal grille that sits on top of the strip. Im not sure how this works, as there doesn't seem to be any slots cut into this metal grille. I don't know how we can clean them too. Its new to me as the display homes I've been to don't have this style of drainage for the showers. Hopefully it will turn out nice anyway.
We don't have any pop-up waste plugs to our Caroma Cube 500 undercounter basin. Strange as the other Kado Cirque Semi Inset Counter Basin and powder room Vallo Basin have them installed. Might need to buy some after handover. 

Shifted power points away from Tap - They were too close previously

Waterproofed concrete retainer wall on garage side

Samsung 65"

Leaning more towards a LED 65" TV at the moment. Did some intensive research and found out that there will be a NEWER model getting released sometime later this year. UN65F8000 - 2013. This will be released sometime in April in the US. Not sure when will it get to Australia. But I know that this model will have a quad core processor, much faster than its 2012 model dual core. In terms of pricing, the 2012 model sits around $4000 at the moment, but when it was released in Australia in July 2012, it was around $5600! It could be that when the 2013 model comes out in July 2013, it could stick to around the $5000 mark. I think I will settle for a 2012 model then. Also, Samsung has a new technology where you just plug in this device to the TV and it gets upgraded to the newest firmware AND hardware! Samsung evolution kit! 

A 2012 model tv can get the same hardware and firmware upgrades as the 2013 models, just by sticking in the Evolution Kit! 

Something none of the other brand/models promote.


I am happy with the build so far. Most of the things that had to be rectified have been. And generally the contractors that work on site know what they are doing. Only a few handful don't and they cause slight delays to the entire build. But I can't say that PD has done an absolute peace of mind job for us. I would say that there has been Ups and Down moments. But thats just with building your home. Many more Ups than Downs though.
But on a more serious note, I'm still waiting for contact from Team PD regarding my powder room tiles. One of the forum administrators from Homeone have apparently already escalated the matter to the appropriate manager and that I should be getting a call sometime soon. Still nothing... I really hope the tiles can be fixed...

Anyone else got a promise from the forums and haven't heard from them yet?