Don’t buy Hermetix Doors – Use Sharoni Ceramics

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Design, designer, doors, Electricity, fireplace, Garden, Home, House, interior, interior designer, Israel, Kitchen, Ovens, property, renovation, Shopping, tiles

Hi all,

I have been meaning to write a post for a while but I have been brought low by a case of shingles and just haven’t felt up to it. I am unlucky to get it so young (40ish) but also very lucky that it was so mild – just extremely painful.

The last week has been a time of lots of quick changes and the house is now starting to come together. The update follows:

Hermetix Doors: They have been the bane of the last 2 weeks and we have decided that they are so bad that this post has been named for them. To start with, after originally confirming a price, admitting it was wrong (under-charged) but agreeing to go along with it – they suddenly decided that they were going to raise the price after all – by 1600NIS a door. Or to be more blunt over 18,000NIS (3,000 GBP or $5000). After being screamed at by Tamar our designer and Motti the owner of Sharoni’s that is the middle man for us (another great reason to use a designer) the price per door has only gone up by 325NIS. Motti at Sharoni has been great – as well as fighting for us – he is also taking on (without us requesting) 200NIS per door. Therefore we are paying 125NIS extra per door. We are not happy with this – but we are at a stage in the process where it would take us too much time to do anything else. Once again – do not buy doors from Hermetix – but do buy your tiles/bathroom suites etc from Motti at Sharoni.
Part 2 : The final measurement for the front door was taken by the kablan. Joelle chose the colour and added back the paneling. She agrees that the Hermetix aluminium paneling doesn’t look great – but it is a nicer finish than plain. Israeli external doors are all ugly as they have to be from metal as wood (apparently) does not stand up to the strong Israeli sun and has to be replaced every 2 or 3 years. With the price and hassle we have had with doors it is not feasible! They have promised us that the front door will be installed by the beginning of March when the tenants in the basement are planning to move in. They are also making another sample internal door for us to see before they start work on them.

Kablan: As well as the outside tiling, the Kablan has finished the vast majority of the walls. He just needs to sand them down before he can start painting them.

Mezzuzot: We collected the mezzuzot this week. They have been put away and we just have to find some appropriate cases for them.

Downstairs kitchen: This has been ordered from a kitchen shop. They have measured and will hopefully install it in about a fortnight. We forgot to order a splashback and so Tamar has ordered some tiles for us. We are not sure which ones but we trust her.

Carpentry: We decided on a carpenter (obviously the more expensive one as he does do better work), he has started measuring and will start work shortly on our kitchen and the bathrooms first – as we cannot move in to the house without them being finished. The rest of the work will be done afterwards.

Wardrobes: There were 3 wardrobes that we ordered separately to keep the price slightly lower. We did not get a discount even though I was not aware at the time of the additional delivery and installation charges. These will also be installed soon – before we move in.

Fireplace: We finally got the inserts for the fireplace. They were rusty and we complained. After two complaints from Tamar we finally have them agreeing to repair them (i.e. – repaint). Hopefully this will be enough as they are stored internally.

Electricity: The electricity company has come back to us and said that they cannot give us a 63×3 line as requested, but they will give us a 40×3 line. We are meeting them at the house in the middle of next week to finalise whatever is needed.

Garden: They have replaced the stairs from the pavement on the road up to the house, as well as completing the tiling in the front of our house and outside our bedroom. They have also started the tiling in the outside area next to the lounge.

Railings: The cheque that I gave was not accepted because I was still dating cheques in 2014. We wrote another one! The inside stair railings have been completely removed and the new ones will be ready in about 2 weeks time. In the meantime we have a very long and dangerous drop from the top of the house to the basement! The other work should be completed about 4 weeks later – they may or may not be done by the time we move in.

Large Hammock: The railings guy said he will probably be able to make for us the large hammock between the two play rooms.

Shopping:
Smoker: We have decided to buy ourselves the smoker from JJ Pits in the US after we showed the design to steel worker here and he suggested we would get a better product from someone who made these for a living.

Lights: All of our antique bronze lighting is now ready and is waiting for me to collect it once back in the office (They are based in Tel Aviv not far from Adam’s work)

Natanel’s Bed: We finally found an appropriate bed/desk combo by a company called Geza Ha-Etz. Natanel also approved it and it has been ordered.

Other Beds: Yesterday, we bought our bed, mattress and headboard as well as a Hi-Riser bed for guests (The one that we were planning on using has been usurped by a niece 🙂 ). We are using existing mattresses for the hi-riser and Natanel’s bed. Ya’akov will be using a small children’s bed that was Natanel’s when he was younger that we brought with from England.

Living Room: We have found a curved sofa and an Ottoman. We also found a couple of fancy dining chairs that we will be putting in the corner as extra seating. We have matched up the materials for all of these and ordered some extra material to be able to make a couple of small Ottomans as an integrated part of the sofa.

Dining Room: We will probably use the same material (as it is washable even with bleach!) to recover our existing dining room chairs that we wish to stain to match the American Walnut elsewhere in the house. We have found a few possible tables and we are waiting on prices as they come from the States (imported by the sofa guy).

That is all for now, we will put extra contact details (and remove Hermetix!) next week.

Shabbat Shalom,

Adam & Joelle.

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Much ado about nothing

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Contractor, Design, designer, doors, Electricity, fireplace, Garden, Home, House, interior, interior designer, Israel, Kitchen, property, renovation, renovation contract, Shopping, walls

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow……

This last week was filled with mass hysteria because there was a snowstorm coming.
In fact Wednesday and Thursday the workers did not come (they told me in advance) and they are not coming today either.
Joelle and I both agree that the workers did not come due to the roads being closed. The issue is that the roads did not need to be closed at all! Joelle worked on Thursday and Friday in Ramot. Ramot is the entrance to Jerusalem for two of the main roads – the 1 and the 443. Both of which were closed (on and off) from Wednesday until Friday. In Ramot on Thursday there was no snow at all – the rain had already melted it (if there was any). On Friday it did snow whilst she was at work – but hardly even managed to settle at all. All this caused the country a major headache – the kids lots of fun as there was no school and parents a nightmare as they somehow found themselves losing 2 days of holiday from work which nobody can afford! And all of this over absolutely nothing.

Moan completed, it doesn’t actually affect us that much as the Kablan doesn’t have too much more to do before the windows are installed. So we have plenty of time. Let’s continue:

Windows : The windows have been built and are on the ship. They are expecting to be at the warehouse in Israel on the 20th February and we will be the first customer to have them installed. We should therefore have our windows completed just after the beginning of March.

Doors : Almost all measurements were taken and we are ready for the work to be started. There is one more measurement for the front door (The door measurement was not taken as some changes were needed in the work done by the Kablan)- and we need to decide on the final colour. The colour is possibly going to be linked to the railings as well. We will get there with this.

Outside Lights : We liked the outside lights that we looked at last week. We still prefer the smaller one – but understand that it will not give enough light. We will be mixing and matching the two sizes. The Kablan is happy that they will be safe outside even though they are not completely closed in. The electrics are impossible to reach by rain.

Railings : We have finalised on three different types of railings. One to be used inside (on the stairs), An open railing to be used outside in almost all areas and a single closed railing for one area between us and the basement area. Everything we chose is as simple (to look at – at least) as can be as we did not want anything that just “shouted” out to be looked at. The colours of most of this will be antique bronze. The stairs will have a wooden railing that is varnished an American Walnut colour.

Smoker/BBQ : We have found a bbq/smoker that we are thinking of buying from “Pits from JJ” but it is expensive to buy, ship and import. We have a couple of people (including the company making my railings) that will make a smoker to order. I have to decide what to do.

Wood : I continued chopping the wood – but somehow I managed to break the extremely hardy axe that I had bought. I will need to buy another one.

Mezzuzot : We have paid for our Mezzozot – and will be receiving them on Wednesday.

Carpentry : We have received quotes for our carpentry. We just have to confirm who is doing the work. Whoever we choose – this is an expensive part of the project!

Downstairs Kitchen : We still haven’t received the extra quotes for this kitchen.

Wardrobes : We have asked for a discount due to the extremely expensive fitting costs. We are waiting to hear back.

Natanel’s bed : We have seen something that is already made, we need to make time to go and have a look at it. The manufacturers/shop is somewhere near Yavne – I think.

Kablan : The kablan has completed plastering the main living area of the house. It looks good! He still has to smooth down some of the areas though. He has also continued with the spot lights. We have also chosen the final grout colour for the wooden floors.

Fireplace : We still haven’t collected the inside of the fireplace. Joelle will do it soon when she has a break from work.

Moldings : We ordered, paid for and received the moldings. They are currently in storage (in the loft) awaiting installation.

Shopping : We started looking at more depth into bar stools, sofas, coffee tables and dining tables. We will soon be ready to start some directed shopping from the on-line research that we have done.

We have a deadline of 29th March to be in the house (even if not fully completed) as that is when we have lots of friends staying for Pesach. We have no space for even one person in our small apartment that we are staying in at the moment! We are praying that we will make it.

That’s all for the last week.

Adam & Joelle.

Adam.

A busy couple of weeks

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air conditioning, bathroom, Buy, Buy home, contract, Contractor, costs, Design, designer, doors, Electricity, fireplace, Garden, Home, House, interior, interior designer, Israel, Kitchen, Planning Permission, plumbing, property, renovation contract, Shopping, showers, tiles, walls

For both of us we are in the “busiest” time of work. For Joelle the kids are all sick now and yes it is urgent to see them 20 minutes after the end of the clinic as he/she has been ill for at least three days when we didn’t bother to bring them….. For me it is the end of the year and everyone is busy making sure that their departments have every bit of information required for their year-end reporting. If there are system issues then I wouldn’t have time to think. Luckily everything has gone smoothly – and yesterday was the quietest day I have had in the whole year. Everyone was too busy to bother me!

Even though we are both busy at work – the house is coming along in leaps and bounds. I hardly know where to start. Let’s start with the thing nearest my heart – food 🙂

The smoker – I just could not get in touch with Lang, the more that I looked the more that I saw they had a name for very poor customer service and also for poor looking (but effective) welds on the less important areas of the smoker. So I decided to look further afield and at the moment I am in touch with a company called “Pits by JJ” and am hoping that I can work something out with them. Talking of smokers – I smoked ribs for the first time yesterday and it was one of the nicest and messiest meals that I have ever started a fast on! I even have left overs for supper tonight!

The garden – moving slowly inward. This is the area that has made the most movement over the last two weeks. All the outside tiling and stone areas have been prepared. This includes whitewashing plus the creation of concrete bases etc The two flower beds for the climbing plants in the social area have been built – and look great. We have decided on the stone that we wish to use for the natural stone we are using for the stairs and the area near to the entrance of the house. We have designed how we are doing the stairs. We have also started to speak about lighting of the garden stairs and also about fences and handrails for safety. This week we also took home 10 tangerines (many more left on tree) and have to pick the pomelos as well to promote extra growth. It can be a shabbat treat.

Outside lighting – I have samples of the two possible lights (they are identical but different sizes) and we need to look at them and confirm if they work for us. They are technically not waterproof – but the only way they will get wet by the electrics is through someone spraying them with water from underneath. The kablan is happy with them from a water perspective as well.

Wood – I have started to chop up the wood in a way that will be more useful to us. It is hard work as it hasn’t really dried out enough yet. I am also starting to move it into a place that is out of the way.

Railings / Fencing – Two different suppliers came to the house yesterday to show off the options that they have as well as measure to quote for the work we need. Outside we need some kind of front fence which will also be used as a separation of two different garden areas. This really is an issue as we do not like any of the options that we have been shown in either steel or aluminium. In Israel, wood is really not an ideal but we may need to use it as that is all we really like. If we do go for wood I am not looking forward to the maintenance. We also have railings on the stairs and by any drops. We will need a grill to cover an “English Window” as well as one patio window as well.

Garage – We do not wish to have a garage door and we do not have planning permission for it, so we have ordered an automatic parking barrier which will stop others using our garage. It is a small thing that will drop on the to the floor whenever we wish to park – and will stay up when the garage is empty.

Outside doors – the space for the outside French door has been finished. We started looking at doors (more about this later) and we are really struggling with the main front door. We just do not like the outside doors that are available. All the aluminium ones are as ugly as hell – and the wooden ones just will not last due to the heat.

Inside doors – We had a meeting with Hermetix at the beginning of the week where we confirmed everything that we ordered. We confirmed the door designs, chose the colours and locking mechanisms. We also selected a door handle but do not like the handles they have on option – we are going to look for a different option from the shops. All the Hermetix doors will be measured next week.

Inside railings – the guys that are doing the quote for the outside fences/railings will also be giving us a quote for the stair railings. These are going to be the simplest possible. We do not want anything that looks too fancy.

Wardrobes – We ordered the boys and our wardrobes last week. When I got home I realised that I am supposed to pay an additional payment for delivery/installation of over 10% of the build cost. Considering we are buying fitted cupboards I was not happy with this and I complained. I am awaiting a response through Tamar about this.

Interior design – talking of Tamar, she is keeping everything moving, arranging meetings and specialists to come, nagging us to make decisions and look at different options. We still do not know where she finds enough hours in the day to do everything.

Natanel’s bed – we went to one store in Talpiot but their beds were too low and looked so babyish. We wish to put a desk underneath and so it will need to have a reasonable height.

Carpentry – quotes have gone out to a couple of carpenters. We have a partial quote back from one, but we are still waiting on this – one of the most important (read expensive) areas of the project.

Kitchen – we now have a quote for a kitchen in the basement. We are waiting on another two so we have not seen it yet. We want this (and the other carpentry) to be in before the windows.

Bathroom glass – our glass person came yesterday and we realised that the glass door in our en-suite will actually hit the shower head if it is opened inwards. As we have rain showers we are not worried about water spraying too high and so we have dropped the height of the glass slightly. We had a big discussion about the shower in the kids bathroom and I said that we are staying with a double door for the boys. We do not think there is enough space if we have a single door as it is being used on a bath and not a shower.

Bathroom – There is an access panel for the air conditioning unit that was included in our bathroom that I never even knew was needed. It looks really cool and has been nicely done.

Kablan – The kablan has continued with all the tasks. Finishing off the window spaces, testing grout with our tiles (we still have to make one choice), preparing the walls for painting, electricity, completion of interior tiling and the tiling of the front upper mirpeset (balcony) amongst other things that I may not have even noticed.

Fireplace – The base that we will be using for building our fire on has been completed – I need to go and collect that early next week.

Shopping – Some extra meaty crockery has just come in that I need to collect which will allow us to take our every day numbers up to 10 place sittings. We have ordered and received some bedding, rugs, cushion, pillowcases and a clock from the Man City football team website shop to decorate Natanel’s room. The actual items were reasonably priced, but the delivery and import duties/tax doubled the price.

That’s all for now,

Adam.