[Tips.015] The more you research the more you could save

During the "APEC" long weekend, we visited a few shops to get some quotes on mirrors and shower screens. Those hard working shops who are willing to stay open during the long weekend definitely will get more business!

When we spoke to our builder earlier this year, they want to charge us $100 for "upgrading" each mirror from "framed" to "Bevelled edge". We visited a few shops and found that you can get a bevelled edge mirror for less than $80! For your reference, different edge type of mirror edges from Stegbar web site.



When we asked our builder how much it would cost to upgrade the framed shower glass to frame-less style, they charge $1600 each and we decided to remove it and do it ourselves after handover. We got a few quotes and so far the best price we can get is around $1200 including installation.

We found a supplier during the weekend who only supply materials, as long as our shower is using "standard" size, the cost will be around $450-$600. They don't do installation but can recommend someone who can do it for around $250. Shower screens that are not standard would cost double as it has to be specially made. And their "standard" sizes are: 800, 900, 1000 and 1100 mm. We quickly checked our drawings and it says "1050 mm", what the *%^%#$%$!$@#!

After some discussion, we decided to ignore the drawing and visit the showroom at Kellyville again to measure the the exact dimension of the shower area ourselves. It's a long drive but would definitely worth the effort... We found that the internal shower area inside the hob is 1000 mm, but the hob itself is 100 mm wide! This means we can actually take either 1000 or 1100 mm shower screens thanks to the wide hob. Problem solved, yeah!

Technically, I think you can say that our builder is right by marking the shower size as 1050 mm with half of the hob width is included. But when looking from "all builders are greedy and evil" point of view, I would say they did it that way purposely so that whoever tried to install shower screens after handover might change their mind as that's not a standard size and would cost a lot more...

Anyway, the more you research the more you could save. Back in June, I mentioned in this post
"Tips.004 Always do your homework" about a few options. Building a house involves lot of money, we all need to do more research to save!