Exciting Times: Holding Deposit on Land

These are exciting times indeed. The market is quite hot, but we still opted to put a holding deposit on the piece of land that we were shown at Mulgoa Rise. 

I did try to ask for a bit of flexibility on price but I got shot down as they mentioned that they have not had to negotiate on a piece of land for the last 18 months. So I'm guessing that these pieces of land will move whether we like it or not. 

The land we have chosen is Lot 523 and it has been priced at $379000. We were asked for a refundable $1000 to take it off the market as we look to our preferred builders if they can fit a building on the plot of land. It is an awkward shaped piece of land but with a bit of magic, they can probably fit something narrow enough, but still spacious enough to fulfil our family's need, the need for space. 

So far we have gone to meet with the following builders: 

• Clarendon homes: We were told that they can possibly fit on first glance, Killara 24-26 and Kentville 26 model homes. They were going to email us but none have arrived yet so far (it is now 9:12 AM the next day). Not much indication on price was given. 
• Ichijo homes: Initially, we were told that with our house budget (which will now be stretched because of the lot price), most of their homes will be quite out of reach. We thought this was an honest answer as they are probably telling us that there will be more costs to follow apart from the base price, obviously. The salesperson has indicated to us a few of the add-ons which we have put into an Excel sheet for comparison. The options provided were the Serenity 22 (can expand out to double alfresco to become 26) and the Escape 26. 
• McDonald Jones: No prices were given, but we were told that the Havana Renwich was an ideal fit for the lot. We were impressed with how the building and design consultant was well prepared to get the drawing done right in front of us in about 5 minutes. The impression we got was that we will be pushing the upper limit of our house budget. We had a check of the display home in Kellyville Ridge. The space looks sufficient but we didn't quite like the flow of the rooms. It was a very tiny dislike so it is still an option. 

We will be meeting with Adenbrook Homes on Tuesday to see what options are available. Given the circumstances, the old $644k package is now a more viable option if we can do the settlement on the land ourselves and just leave Adenbrook to do the building. This way, we don't need to get slogged by the good old State Government with a bigger chunk of stamp duty if we buy the whole house and land package. We will also consider any options they might have for us in terms of Lot 523. 

We've kicked into gear and will have lots of work to do this week. We hope something fruitful will come from the two other builders we are waiting on.