Finally, one step closer: we have a....

Well we finally have council approval for our house DA. There are a few conditions attached to the permit (as always), but we have already met most of the conditions through the sub-division process.

The only thing of small concern is the colour scheme, which was not approved. Council did not like the Shale Grey colorbond for the roof. Too light they said, so it will be too visible. Given that our house is 100m up a hill from the nearest road, our roof is sloped upwards so it can't be seen from the road, we own the 4 hectares behind the house and it can't be subdivided, we only have one neighbour.....why are they worried about the colour of our roof.

"The colour scheme must propose exterior colours and finishes of muted, subdued tones that will blend in with the surrounding natural environment. Colorbond Shale Grey will not be permitted"

They didn't say anything about the proposed exterior cladding though, hmmmmm?

MC has suggested we use a product called alucobond, in Indiana copper, which is what that orangey colour in the rendered picture is meant to represent.

Tom and I are still not 100% sure about this, it's very hard to visualise and is a bit bolder than I am used to being!!

Anyway, back to the roof colour, I've been looking at the colorbond site and I really don't want to go much darker than Windspray or Bushland. They couldn't reject Bushland, could they, given their requirement that it blends into the bushland? I'll have to get some samples and see what looks OK with the Indiana Copper.

Things have been progressing on the sub-division front too. We put the drawings out for tender, despite them not yet being approved by council...don't ask!!! Well, tenders closed last Monday, and 3 out of the 4 contractors put in a tender, 4th was too busy, which is fair enough. The 1st one mustn't have wanted the job either as their tender was $90,000 more than the lowest one!!!!!

So we have chosen the contractor and they have said they can start Sept/Oct depending on when the drawings are approved by council. The tender documents stipulated a 12 week time frame, so we are hoping to have the driveway and services completed by February....please, please let it be so!!!

This would maybe allow us to start building by March, if they (the powers-that-be) are super fast and issue titles really quickly and then issue the building permit really quickly...I have my doubts. Strictly speaking they are not meant to issue a building permit until we have a title for our new block, and we won't get titles issued until the driveway and services are completed.

More to talk about regarding sale of the blocks, but I think I will leave that for another time :)