Our Dream Renovation: 02 Designing Our New Home

Designing your new home is exciting and fun, however can also be very daunting at the same time. Engaging a good drafts person can sometime be half the battle. At the same time, having a good idea of what you want to achieve is also beneficial.

For us, we spent sometime drawing draft floor plans of what we thought at the time was what we wanted. We knew the logistics of what needed and what we wanted. 

We needed:

• More space!
• Four bedrooms
• A garage and more storage
• bigger living spaces
• basically a more family friendly home

We wanted:

• A butlers pantry (settled for a walk in pantry)
• Large entertaining deck (downsized our entertaining deck to allow for more grass area)
• louvre windows (removed completely, except for one in the ensuite)

It turns out the time we spent drafting our own plans was a waste of time. Even though we did get ideas and some sort of picture from doing it, our drafts person changed it completely! We designed our home back to front. As a result we flipped the whole thing around. Firstly, this flip positioned our living rooms and bedrooms facing the right direction for the views, breezes, sun and shading. Secondly, areas were better positioned to open up more space and to flow better throughout the entire home. 

After sitting down with our draft person within a couple of weeks draft plans of our dream renovation were shown to us. After a few minor changes, we accepted the plans and specifications and our final set of plans were created, as well as the invoice to follow :/.

Other Trades We Engaged 

During the designing and planning stage of our dream renovation project we also engaged other trades that were necessary. These trades helped formulate a submittable set of plans and specifications for approval by our local council. Besides, this will also help during the construction of our home. 

Surveyor

We engaged a surveyor to check the levels of the existing house as well as to plot R.L’s on a plan at various points along our boundary and other areas of interest. We also asked him to draw a contour map of our land, this helps determine the slope of the site. A surveying plan also helped us fast track the council approval process, the more information they have the better.

Engineer

Due to the structural nature of our construction project, an engineer was bought in to draw up some plans and details. More specifically, he needed to draw up a structural plan for our suspended concrete garage slab, determine the depth of our footings and specify the type of beams needed over our living room.

What We Learnt

1. Engage a good drafts person
2. Spend time reading the plans before accepting them. Changes can cost more money, especially if plans have already been approved by council.
3. It is a slow and timely process, the sooner you start the better.
4. Design and build with the future in mind. For us, a family orientated home is how we future proofed our plans.
5. We may not of needed a surveyor, however his plans helped get our approval over the line. They will also be very useful during the construction stage.
   

Project Costs

Total project costs to date: $13,428.20