Snakes and Ladders

Tags

air conditioning, Alarm, Contractor, costs, Design, Electricity, fireplace, Garden, Home, Israel, Kitchen, Planning Permission, Shopping, Sound System

We were on holiday last week and came back to our rental apartment to find a dead snake in the back garden courtesy of our cat. We had a fairly positive week especially in the garden of the house – but with one major (time related) setback within the house – I felt like we were playing a large game of Snakes and Ladders. I am sure the symbolism came about due to the present our cat left us.

Let’s start with the garden and work our way inside. We played two gardeners off against each for the cleanup work (removal of 3 large trees, cleanup, pruning, rubbish removal etc) and got the price dropped by just over 20%.
The work started a week ago and was finished in the middle of last week. We now have fewer trees, a large pile of logs mainly for our fire and some dead peach for our smoker (to be). After this work the gardener, kablan and Tamar (designer) met up to discuss an overall basic plan for the garden and fences so that preparation work (more demolition for now by kablan) could be started. We met with the gardener Friday afternoon and went over the basic plan with him. Overall the plan sounds great but we will discuss it with Tamar to finalise it before the water and electricity parts are done in a few weeks time. The garden already looks so much better and that is without any work being done to improve the layout. The plan that we have will be executed in three parts. Part 1 will be pre-shmitta which was the cleanup, irrigation (to keep our trees alive) and preparation of areas so that we can add trees and our vegetable/herb garden straight after Shmitta. Part 2 will be done by the kablan whenever he gets to it (as it is not linked to shmitta). This includes laying out all the “Decking” areas although we will probably not be using decking but other materials (stone, tiles, fake grass etc). Part 3 is the planting of new trees, bushes once shmitta is over.
For our fences, we were hoping to do a netting with climbers on both sides. One neighbour has been very helpful – and has agreed to let us use the unused earth on his side to plant the plants with us paying for the watering. This will save us creating a new planting area and loss of space on our side of the fence. It will also be a lot cheaper. The other side (who was very happy with us for cutting down a large pine tree that was shedding needles into her garden) has said that she is not happy with this solution as it will create a mess when plants shed their leaves. We could build up the stone wall that already exists and put climbers on that. The problem is that being city born Londoners – stone just doesn’t look right as a fence. Fences should be wooden or hedges! We will find a solution that keeps our kids safely in our property and the neighbour happy.
One little story. The pine tree that our neighbour complained about was so difficult to remove that it alone took 3 days work and could not removed by crane as it broke the straps holding the tree. In the end it was removed slice by slice and the base (plus roots) have had to be left in the ground making our area slightly more complex to plan (as there are also 3 basement windows (called English Windows – even though there are very few basements in the UK as most of Southern England is clay!) that we cannot foul up.

Windows / Planning Permission. This was our “snake” for the week. The structural engineer has still not produced the paperwork that we need to apply for the planning permission to increase the size of many of the windows. This is despite him being nagged consistently for the last couple of weeks. Until we have this permission – the kablan cannot enlarge the current openings which prevents us from getting the window company to come and take the exact measurements so that they can order the windows. As the windows are coming from the States (Anderson Windows) they take up to 3 months to arrive. This is the one issue that may stop us moving in on time. We will be nagging the engineer tomorrow between the lunacy of being back at work after a week off.

Plumbing. Most of the waste pipes have now been replaced or put in for the first time. Most of the cold and hot water piping (including the toilets) have been laid. There is still another weeks work to do – but the majority of work has been done – the progress is slow and steady – but very clear.

Electricity. The plans have been finalised and the electrician will be starting within the next couple of days.

Lighting – Tamar was sending us photos of possible lights but we were not fully happy with them. Therefore we will be going shopping next week to make some decisions with the actual lights in front of us.

Kablan Extras. We still haven’t signed the contract – but it is slowly being added to as we make changes to the design (mainly the garden). We have also given Yaniv our English sockets, electrical backboxes and a catflap.

Multimedia – We have a new quotation from another supplier. The price is a lot better than the first one – but still too much. We need to get the price dropped – part of this will be done by not including our bedroom and that section of the garden. We also feel that the cost of the play room (surround sound etc) is more than is worth spending for a system that is just supporting a Wii and dvd’s – we will not even have standard tv channels or Blueray in this room.

Kitchen Electricals – we have ordered (but not yet paid for) our fridge freezer – and also added an extra freezer that will be used to store vegetables bought before shmitta year.

Air-conditioning. We have not yet signed the contract but we have paid for all the main units.

Alarm. We have said that we are going with this guy – but are waiting for bank details so that we can pay him some money to confirm we are taking him. He has provided us with a cheaper quote and is also looking into providing us with 3 (mains connected) smoke detectors and a Carbon Monoxide monitor to protect us from the fireplace. This is actually not a requirement in Israel which I assume is due to the fact that the standard trissim (blinds) are open to the outside of the property and therefore there is no issue with airflow and consequently no issue with incomplete combustion. We are all our trissim and this may cause us an airflow issue. We want to be safe (and alive).

Photos – We have been taking lots of photos throughout the process and after all the work has been completed I will be doing blog pages of each area in the house with photos showing the progress from start to finish.

We think that is all – so wish you a good night.

Adam & Joelle

Financially Speaking

Tags

air conditioning, Alarm, aquarium, bathroom, bedroom, Cameras, Contractor, costs, Design, doors, Electricity, fireplace, furniture, Garden, Home, Intercom, Israel, Kitchen, office, plumbing, Shopping, Sound System

Hi all,

I thought I would take a break from the detailed listing of all that we are doing and put the financial costs of this project down in a way that would be beneficial to you. I am obviously not going to tell you my exact costs – but I am going to break down each section into a percentage of the whole – and also calculate the cost of each section if the project cost 500,000NIS. This is not the cost – but it is a convenient number to work with!.

Before we get down to the nitty and gritty details there are a few points to notice:

• The cost of the Interior Designer probably brought our shopping costs down by close to the amount we paid for her work. She also got us good prices and appropriate suppliers for all parts of the project (so far). On top of that we couldn’t have done the work without her expertise
• We have some things on our list that you will think are pure luxury. But conversely we will have the same thoughts about your list
• I have only included items that I have prices for. I have put a list of unpriced items at the end of this article
• Remember that all preparation work is done by the contractor. So an example here would be that the total cost of the aquarium could actually be double the percentage written down – but the additional costs have been eaten by the contractor’s fee
• Where there is an (*) by the side of an item this is an estimated price. It means that we do not yet have a contract agreed as of the time of print.
• The quality of the items that we purchased are not the most expensive options – but we definitely didn’t go looking for cheapest options. We looked for what we liked and then made our decision based on what gave us the best value for money. We did not look at prices before making our short list
• I have almost definitely left something off the list of items to still be purchased. I am only human – but I will repeat this post when we move into the house and make sure that everything is included

Here is the expenses list…

… Are you ready for it?

Expense	% of whole cost	If 500,000NIS spent on project so far
Contractor/Kablan (including Garden Demolition, excluding interior demolition)	55.91	280,000.00
Tiles (*)	11.86	60,000.00
Air conditioning	6.51	32,500.00
Designer Costs (including Measuring)	6.37	31,500.00
House Demolition	5.08	25,000.00
Dudim + Underfloor Heating (plumbing done by kablan)	3.19	15,000.00
Doors	2.91	15,000.00
Plumbing Fixtures	2.37	11,500.00
Integrated Music (*)	1.69	8,500.00
Alarm (*)	1.22	6,000.00
Aquarium	0.81	4,000.00
Garden Floral Cleanup/Demolition	0.75	3,750.00
Structural Engineer	0.51	2,500.00
Video Intercom for front gate (*)	0.47	2,500.00
Camera System (4) to supplement Alarm (*)	0.34	1,500.00

The items that I have not included are:

BBQ, smoker and outdoor dining(outdoor entertainment)
Bedroom/office furniture
Carpentry
Fireplace
Garden fencing
Garden irrigation system plus planting
Garden landscaping
Kitchen costs
Moldings
Other surface and finishing materials (Caesar Stone)
Outdoor play equipment
Playroom equipment
Sofas & tables plus other furniture
Windows

As an aside, I have updated the Support Page with all our confirmed suppliers.
Hope this post is useful for you.

Adam & Joelle.

Shockingly planned

Tags

air conditioning, Alarm, aquarium, Contractor, costs, Design, doors, Electricity, fireplace, Garden, Home, Israel, Kitchen, Shopping, Sound System

Hi,

We have had a very busy couple of weeks. We will start with the plans. During the last couple of weeks Tamar has been working like crazy on the plans. Electricity, lighting, plumbing and tiling – as well as continuing with the carpentry. We went through the (very obvious) plumbing plans last week and approved them to be forwarded to Yaniv to start working on. We had 3 internet meetings (plus several phone calls) with Tamar covering tiling and electricity. These meetings took about 8 hours. The majority of the discussion was about socket placement, lighting, switches, TV, computer network and telephone points (even though we are not connecting a tv). This was complex and we want to get it right now. It took so much of our time last week that we named this blog after it. We have also been discussing moldings, cat flaps, doors, windows and curtains, kitchen cabinets, up-lighting, air-con, white boards for the kids to draw on, carpentry, drinks bar (between kitchen and lounge), stone fascia near the fireplace, the fireplace, the garden and sound systems. I am sure we have missed some – I will get to it on later blogs when we confirm / pay for it. Adam also walked through the house today with Tamar to confirm and try to visualise everything that we have discussed up until now.

Doors – Hermetix have confirmed that they can do the design we preferred as a single layer rather than stuck on to the door. This will remove the risk that any paint on the door will crack.

Air-conditioning – We have basically decided on everything we want, we just have to add one more air conditioning unit in the basement and try to lower the price as it is still a little too high. We are using a centralised Toshiba system in the house, but with the ability to turn on each of the units separately. In the basement we are using Gree units which are cheap but pretty high quality. They are supposed to be better than companies like Tadiran / Electra but slightly below Toshiba / Fujitsu / Mitsubishi.

Alarm – We have a design for the alarm and intercom systems. The video intercom will be for the front gate and will have video screens by the stairs near the kitchen and in the hall by the study upstairs. Generally the prices are ok, but a few areas of it are too high. We are receiving another quote from someone who has seen our quote. He has basically said that some of the prices will stay the same but others will drop, maybe significantly.

Sound system – We received a quote for an integrated sound system in the games room, the downstairs (lounge, dining and kitchen areas) and our bedroom and garden area. This was unbelievably expensive. We are getting another quote from someone else who is also good – but doesn’t have such market saturation at the moment. Once we get this we will decide whether we will stick with such a system – or just do something in the games room.

Contractor – Yaniv sent us a new quote (about 3 days ago) and we haven’t looked through it yet. It is nice to trust your contractor this much. So what has Yaniv done over the last week or so? He has built the platform for both of the fish tanks (one will have fish and the other will hold the pump, heater, filtration etc). I was very impressed with the quality of this base – considering it will NEVER be seen by anyone when it is completed. He has done lots of other little jobs like strengthening the areas around the windows prior to changing the sizes, closing in an area by the stairs, shrinking the fireplace, creating the space for the electricity cupboard and many other small preparations that I may not even be noticing. He has also started with the plumbing. This means that his plumber has entered the house and starting deciding where the pipes will be going as well as where the air conditioning drains will go as well. They have also started putting up the tanks for the toilets and opening up the main entry to the drains.

Shopping – we paid for the plumbing stuff (same shop as the tiles) and the toilets and other water points (showers, taps etc) have been delivered without us even knowing about it. I also took an American Express card to pay for all the shopping. I assumed that they would give me a reasonable limit, but as I have no history with them – they have given me the vast limit of 4000NIS – just over $1000! This is an American Express card. When I had an AMEX card in the UK it was literally limitless. I assume there was a limit but I had one month where I spent close to a whole year’s salary (from savings). I also planned to buy our oven and hood last week – but didn’t manage to. I am hoping to do this in the next few days.

Kitchen – we have done nothing for the kitchen except that we took delivery of our Tami4 today. This was such a pain. We arranged for them to deliver it between 4 and 6pm. So they came at 2.30. For Israel this is unheard of. They then asked me for my wife’s credit card and ID so they could deliver and install the Tami4, but she was out with the kids about an hour away in Jerusalem with her ID and credit cards and we had specifically told them when ordering that we didn’t need it installed as we were buying it for our new house early due to the great price we got through Joelle’s work. They were saying they couldn’t deliver it and I was saying that I couldn’t care less as it was purely their issue as they did not tell us that Joelle’s ID/card had to be shown at delivery. I told them that they could arrange another delivery at our convenience rather than theirs. In the end, they phoned my wife and talked her into coming home early which was a shame for the kids as they did not get to do all that they wished. At least they enjoyed the trenches at Ammunition Hill and making soaps at David’s Citadel. Unfortunately they did not get to the kotel – and it has been close to 3 years since they last went – the curse of living so close (but yet so far).

Gardening – We got the quote from the gardener. Tamar thought that it was too high so she has arranged for another gardener to come next week. When she realised that we are removing 3 large trees she changed her mind and decided that although the price was high – it wasn’t so bad. As an aside, I managed to make our new neighbour very happy by happenstance. She showed me today that our pine tree drops lots of needles into her garden and that she finds it very difficult to keep up with the mess. She asked me if I could think of a solution. I told her that we are getting quotes from gardeners to do work and that the work included removing that tree!

Will update with next week’s story soon,

Adam & Joelle.