It's coming together

Hi all,

Just a quick update to say that all is going well.

The Gib plastering was completed and the painters were in this week. They have also painted the bedrooms so we have a consistent look throughout the place. The painters did this for an additional cost to us of $600.

The Kitchen is progressing and should be ready for installation in approximately 10 days.

Finally the carpet has been sorted. Stephen asked about whether the colour (Sultana) might possibly fade in the sunlight. We had asked this question of Carpet Court and they said this would be the same whichever colour we chose.

We are also looking at some curtains which will replace the existing ones. These will be covered under our existing budget for 07/08.

Finally, the insurance company will only cover the cost of carpet replacement for the room downstairs and the stairs/landing. They will not cover the bedrooms. The carpets will therefore be quite mismatched given the different colours. Carpet Court have quoted us $1870.00 to complete the carpeting throughout the house. We'd like to be able to do this but feel this should be put to the vote.

Please let us know your preference by the end of this week - Sunday 19th August.

Thanks

An update

Hi all,

Things have been a little slow to progress over the last few weeks due to the weather - it's been a bit cold and people's frozen pipes have apparently been taking priority.

I travelled down to Queenstown last weekend to view progress and meet with a variety of tradespeople working on the house. Here's the update:

Plumbing:

• This work has now been completed and all pipes have been replaced
  
• They have also fixed the Hot Water Cylinder and the permit is currently with the Queenstown Lakes District Council for approval
  
• The guys did a great job

Builder:

• With the piping in, the gib has been put up on all walls


• The gib stopper was due there this week
  

Kitchen:

• The kitchen is all designed and the benchtop has been ordered (click here to see the details of the kitchen)


• The cost for the original finish on the cupboard doors (the country style with grooves) was too much and so we will be going with a plain finish to the doors


• This should be ready to install in about two weeks

Carpet:

• As we said, the carpet needs to be replaced and we have finally received the quote from Carpet Court


• Given I was in Queenstown, I also took the opportunity to visit Carpet Court and get more information


• The carpet is from Cavalier Bremworth's Knightsbridge range and we have chosen the colour Sultana


• This will be confirmed with Carpet Court this week but will take up to a month to go down due to their workload


• Here is a picture of the carpet

Lighting:

• While in Queenstown, I also met with the electrician
  
• With no ceiling in the Kitchen, he took the opportunity to re-wire the lights and as a result we will be having four halogen spots around the kitchen and two above the breakfast bar
  
• He is also providing a quote to replace the brass light fittings in the lounge

Paint:

• We are able to have two coats of paint right throughout the downstairs and up the stairs and into the landing (right to the high stud)


• We have asked for half spanish white on the walls and ceilings and quarter pearl lusta on the skirting boards


• Unfortunately, these images downloaded from the internet, do not do the colours justice. Suggest you check out a Resene colour chart to see the true colours

Half spanish white

Quarter pearl lusta

• The painter should be able to go in next week (after gib stopping completed)
  
• I met with him last week and he will give us a quote for doing the final three rooms (bedrooms and upstairs toilet)

Appliances:

• The fridge is also not working and the assessor is sending someone to see it to see whether both the fridge and oven need to be replaced
  

Finally, the house is still uninhabitable. We will let you know when it is available for visiting again.

That's about it...

Things are progressing

There has been some progress over the last couple of weeks:

Plumbing

• Donald Ward and Graeme (Master Plumber friend) managed to get down to Queenstown two weeks ago and remove all the piping from the house
• They also noticed that the Hot Water Cylinder is not compliant (never has been)
• They have found a solution and when they go back in the house to fit the pipes, they will correct this
• They couldn't get back to the house last weekend due to the extremely bad weather!
• They hoped to get there this weekend - we'll update you next week

Builder

• John Cameron, our builder, went in last week and did all the work to the internal walls that was required
• Once Donald has been back in to fit the pipes, they will do the gib work

Kitchen

• Designs for the new kitchen have been recieved (much the same as the previous kitchen)
• We haven't heard what any costs involved will be
• I will update soon

Carpet

• Jae's Carpet Services have advised that the carpet is unable to be cleaned and will therefore be replaced
• The Insurance Assessor has asked Carpet Court in Queenstown to measure the place up, look at the existing carpet and provide a quote to replace
• They will only replace up to the front door - not the stairs etc
• We'd like to propose that we continue the carpeting up to at least the bedrooms and if not too expensive, replace the bedroom carpet also
• We'll be in touch once we have any costs
• Once we have the quote from Carpet Court, we are free to investigate if we could get better value for money from a different carpet store

That's all for now...will be in touch soon

This week's update

Hi all,

Here's this week's update:

• We had asked for a breakdown of the costs from the plumber but had not heard anything. Donald Ward's friend, a master plumber, has offered to do the job for $3000 plus GST and they have started that work yesterday.
• That means that the builder can go in and start on the interior from Thursday.
• We are still waiting to hear from the joiner on the additional costs of using the kitchen joinery we have requested.
• The carpet is sitting rolled up in the cleaner's garage - apparently it's dry but we don't know if it's able to be cleaned. We have asked the builder (who is acting as the project manager) to get him to clean so we can see if it needs to be replaced.
• We have received a quote from the builder for the work required to get the house up to legal requirements
• The interior work will cost us $4462 (incl GST) and can be done straight away (they start Thursday)
• The exterior work will require major heavy landscaping work and leaving the walls exposed so the builder will not be able to do this until the Spring. He has told us it will cost approximately $14,175 but they won't know how much it will cost exactly until they dig it out and see the damage.
• These additional (non-insurance) costs are due directly to previous work not being completed correctly which is very frustrating

That's pretty much it for this week. We'll update you again next week.

Cheers

It gets better

So things have gone a bit pear shaped this week. Have decided to break down the updates via the following:

• Plumbing
• Kitchen
• Bathroom
• Carpet
• Insurance
• Engineer
• Other

So updates will come one at a time. We'll try to update more regularly.

OK here goes...

The plumber

We have received a quote from Plumber. Costs will be $3671 excl GST
This includes:

• all new hot and cold pipes
• lagging new connections to sink, toilet basins and bath etc
• new valve set to hot water heater
• new stop tap to unit
• labour

I have asked for a full breakdown of costs but have not received it

This is the first job that needs to be done so work can't commence until we have this

The kitchen

• The choices we have made on the kitchen are outside the insurance allocation
• We have asked for the additional price before downgrading as we may look at adding funds to get this joinery
• The kitchen joinery will be made offsite and moved in once the plumbing, lining etc is done

The bathroom

• The joinery will be the same as the kitchen
• There is no further update at this stage

The carpet

The carpet is currently still with Jae's Cleaning Services and we don't know if it is salvagable.

If it is, it will be cleaned and put back in the house. The underlay was beyond repair and will be replaced. Details of what will happen should it need to be replaced can be found under the 'insurance' post below.

We hope to get an update tomorrow and will let you know

Insurance

At this stage, the insurance appears to be in hand for all the damage as a result of this flood but does not include:

• Fixing the plumbing
• Damage as a result of faulty remedial work
• If the carpet requires replacement, they will only pay for the affected room (the ground floor) and may not cover the stairs and bedrooms.
• We will question this as it would be good to do the same as the paint work and cover the entire stairwell etc

They have said they will also paint the walls in all rooms except bedrooms and upstairs bathroom (ie. including the stairwell). We have asked them to paint it a Resene colour called Quarter Pearl Lusta.

We'll keep you updated on insurance.

The engineer's report

As mentioned in our first post, John The Builder, noticed that there was considerable damage to the outside cladding that looked like it was long term damage and not caused by our flood. He suggested we get an engineers to look at it.

We did this and his news is not good. This is the quote from his Summary Opinion

Summary Opinion

• The construction works both original and repair, have not been carried out in accordance with the New Zealand Standard 3604, the Building Act and its regulations.
• Past remediation works have been carried out without compliance to the Building Code Regulations, and/or competent trade practice.
• Reconstruction shall require compliance with the current Building Code Regulations E2 and B2 which shall mean a complete reconstruction down to the ground floor level slab from the bathroom position to the north east dining room corner.
• The extent of decay viewed including the mould and mould spore deposits within the cavity and to the back sections of kitchen joinery are sufficient to be of a health concern.

He goes on to say:

"As detailed, it is my view that both the original construction and all the remediation work able to be viewed has been quite inappropriate and not at all in accord with either the New Zealand Standards or Building Code requirements or of an appropriate trade standard.

There has been clearly a knowledge that major weathertightness and decay failure has been occurring for some time and the remediation works have neither gone anywhere far enough to appropriately correct and/or remove decayed and damaged timbers. Both the original construction and the subsequent remedial works are in my view well outside the Code and New Zealand standards of the time and I would describe both the original construction and the subsequent remedial works as unbelievable and well outside an appropriate trade standard."

This is very upsetting to us and we are up for considerable cost to fix this. The engineers has advised that we can fix most of this from the inside so the house is liveable but once Spring has come we will need to dig out the path on the east of the house and probably the area outside the kitchen window again to ensure this is fixed correctly.

We have asked for a quote from John Chapman for the completion of this work and we'll let you know when this has arrived. We would also like some information about the remedial work done. If you know, the answers to these questions, please contact us:

• Date of the previous work
• The builder who completed the work
• Any builders consent/permits that were obtained at the time.

We'll let you know when we have more information.

Other

Donald Ward visited the house last weekend and saw that work has progressed. He took these photos. They do a good job of showing the additional long term damage.

We have also put together the video that Geoff took on the first weekend.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kI0L1KIGvZE

A new kitchen...

John the Builder, has asked us to look at cabinets and bench top for the new Kitchen. The joiner is going in Thursday (tomorrow) so he didn't give us much time. As a result we have chosen the following:

We would like to match up the black tiles on the floor and so are recommending the benchtop is done in Laminex (recommended by store) in a colour called Vulcan Stone in a natural finish (not glossy - apparently you can't put hot things on the glossy).

The cupboards we would like to do in Melteca - a colour called Cream in a natural finish. We would like this to be done in the Country style. Which means the doors have a groove down them.

The door handles are from the windsor range

Finally, we would like to paint the walls in Resene Quarter Pearl Lusta to match the cabinets. Should we be able to paint the lounge also (under insurance), we'd like this colour to go throughout.

Donald Ward will be passing through Queenstown this weekend so he will check through the place and provide an update next week.

We'll keep you posted.

40 days and 40 nights

Well not quite that long but a fare wee while!


We decided that this Blog might be the best way to update everyone with progress on the house.


For those of you that don't know...


Sunday 20 May

• Last Sunday, we asked Rex Chapman (the new owner of Don Nicholson's two weeks in 7A and 7B Willow Place), to take a look inside the house to make sure everything was OK


• He discovered that water was flowing from a light socket in the ceiling of the kitchen and that most of the bottom floor was flooded


• He phoned us and we started sorting things out


• Rex organised a plumber for us to turn the water off at the street (thanks Rex!)


• We phoned State Insurance and started the claim process


• State put us touch with a builder (John Cameron) who started the process of clean up
  
• State Insurance also contacted Jae Cleaning Services who a couple of hours later were in the property and starting to clean up and dry the carpet
  

Monday 21 May

• I flew down to Queenstown to check on the damage. We felt it was important that someone was there for the insurance assessor etc


• By the time I got down there the carpet had dried out significantly


• I spoke to Jae's and the builder and organised for them to come in on Tuesday to look at the damage
  

Tuesday 22 May

• After a very loud and damp night from the blowers downstairs and the humidity of the water in the air, I woke to a very damp house


• The builder, John, arrived at 9.00 and assessed the damage
  
• Significant!


• The pipes in the ceiling of the kitchen had split and water began leaking into the ceiling cavity


• The only way out was through the light socket


• Water had also gone through the wall cavities in the kitchen causing irreprable damage to the gib board


• Water also ran down the outside of the walls and into the kitchen cabinets causing them to swell
  
• The water ran over the floor causing the bottom cabinets to swell including the Pantry


• Most of the items in the Pantry were mouldy


• Water also flooded into the lounge and stained the carpet right to the bottom of the stairs


• The dampness in the carpet led to the skirting boards swelling and eventually all skirting boards in the lounge became mouldy

• The wall adjoining the laundry also was damaged causing swelling in the bathroom vanity unit and the laundry cupboard plus the gib board and skirting boards in the downstairs toilet


• You'll be pleased to know the upstairs is OK apart from humidity causing water to run down the walls in the stairwell and upstairs toilet


• John assessed the damage as we said and decided that everything in the kitchen had to go, walls, cabinets, pantry everything


• He then asked a plumber to come and look at the pipes...


• Apparently when the house was built in the 80s, a certain type of piping was used all over Queenstown that is now starting to cause issues


• Most houses in the area that are still standing are having to have all the pipes replaced


• We will too unless we want to face insurance problems in the future


• So...all pipes in the kitchen, bathroom and upstairs will need to be replaced at some time and given the walls are now missing it seems a good time to do it


• This will mean an outlay of approximately $3000

The good news...

• The damage in the walls and to the kitchen cabinets will be covered under insurance - yay!


• The damage to the carpet is currently being assessed


• The carpet was taken away and is being dried in at Jae's


• It will then be cleaned and if the stains are able to be removed, the carpet will be reinstalled


• If they are unable to be cleaned they will be replaced but only in the room affected and only if the carpet is less than 10 years old
  
• Alison and Andrew have confirmed that the carpet was installed in 2000 so we should be okay there should they need to be replaced


• We will know in the next couple of days if they have to be replaced

The bad news...

• When the builders (a nice bunch of chaps by the way) removed the gib behind the pantry, they noticed a lot of rot in the external wooden cladding


• They believe this had been happening for some time and could be due to a crack in the stucco outside that has caused a leak into the wall


• Upon further investigation, John advises that this continues along this entire wall


• It could be due to the flood back in 99


• Back then, they had to dig out the parking pad and added a trough along the wall (you can see the black drain outside the kitchen window)


• Unfortunately this did not continue along the side of the house and we are now paying for this oversight


• They require an engineer to come out and look at the property and it could be that we will have to dig out the path and garden on the side of the house to be able to install a similar trough


• Hopefully we won't have to do this but even if we don't we will be up for a repair bill of approximately $3000 to repair this unrelated water damage


• We also need to have an electrician look at the oven (this was filled with water) as this may need replacing

So the upshot is:

Under insurance we will get:

a new kitchen cabinets and bench

a new bathroom vanity cabinet

a new laundry cupboard

either cleaned carpet or new carpet in the lounge only (not the stairs)

possibly a replacement oven

We will have to pay for:

• Replacement plumbing for most of the house - $3,000-$3,500
• An engineer to look at the damage to the side of the house and for this to be fixed - $3,000
• Possibly the retaining wall, path and garden dub up - cost unknown

Isn't this fun! I think the painting of exterior of the property will have to go on hold.

Next steps:

• The builder to get an engineer out to look at the side of the house
• The plumber to replace the pipes
• The electrician to check the oven
• Jae's to confirm the carpet situation
• Confirmation from the Insurance Assessor as to the extent of insurance cover

We'll keep you posted...

Geoff and Bridge