Bold Living

Our experience with Bold Living has been incredibly reassuring and rewarding from start to finish. At the beginning of our journey, we were honestly unsure about what our loan would realistically allow us to build, and whether we’d have to compromise heavily on quality or design. The Bold team took the time to guide us through our options and… Read more

showed us that we could still achieve a beautiful, modern home without stretching beyond what was financially comfortable.

What stood out most was how Bold Living helped us incorporate modern luxuries at a fair and transparent price. We never felt pressured, and every decision felt informed and tailored to our needs as a family. The communication throughout the build was clear, supportive, and professional, which made what can be a stressful process feel smooth and manageable.

Since moving in, we’ve received so many compliments on our home - from the layout and finishes to the overall feel of the space - and that’s been incredibly affirming. We’re truly grateful for the quality, care, and attention to detail that went into our build.

We’d like to sincerely thank the entire Bold Living team for helping turn our vision into a home we’re proud of. We wouldn’t hesitate to recommend Bold Living to anyone looking for a builder who genuinely cares and delivers exceptional value.

We had a great experience building with Bold Living. The whole process was smooth and professional, high-quality workmanship and excellent customer service throughout the entire process. Communication was clear and the team was professional and supportive from start to finish. Highly recommend! Show details

Very good builder very easy to deal with. The supervisor Terry was very helpful and kept me updated throughout the building process, definitely recommend Thank you ! Mohammed Kasem Mosa Al-halfi Show details

Overall, my partner and I are very happy with our experience building with Bold. Despite a few bumps during the early build stage, the end result has been well worth it. Our biggest drawcard was that we didn’t have to compromise on features or layout despite having a narrow block - as Bold was the ONLY builder with a floor plan that ticked all our… Read more

boxes (layout, positioning HWS/Ducted, orientation etc.), paired with a beautiful façade option. We even borrowed a few interior design ideas straight from their display home because we loved the style. Everyone comments on our huge north-facing windows when they walk in, and we've had two separate neighbours claim we have the "nicest house in the street".

Bold encouraged us to get our own independant inspector, and I think that says a lot about their faith in their own builds. The structural quality really stood out; where many builders around us used styrofoam waffle pods, Bold used strong, rigid black plastic pods on ours, and our Inspector even commented on the over-engineering on our frame tie-downs - saying it was rare to see this level with a volume builder.

As first home buyers, Bold reassured through our contract stage that the price we signed at would be the price we paid at handover and it stayed true - we did not spend a dollar more above our signed construction & variations documents, and finished two months prior to our contracted build date (that was with some significant weather delays, and a tropical cyclone).

We did have some significant concerns early on with the original supervisor who was removed, but once Ben took over, everything turned around. He was great to work with and quickly addressed any issues we identified or reported. He is genuienly an asset to Bold.

Overall, we’re thrilled with how everything came together and would definitely consider building with Bold again in the future (especially if we can get Ben as our SS and they continue with their unique façade options).

After a lot of research of building companies we settled on Bold to build our home. Initial consultations with the sales representative was positive with them running through the process and what was included in the cost. After initial plans were drawn up and before finalisation of the plans we had an opportunity to tour a previously built home of… Read more

the Portafino home we had chosen. This highlighted that there were issues in the design for what we wanted though the bones were there. We then had a colour and fitout selection day and after some discussion we discussed a custom build. After a bit of back and forth the designer was settled on and sent to council for approval. The approval process seemed very drawn out and the start of our build was pushed further and further out which was very frustrating. The build was finally started in February 2025 and was proceeding well to our site supervisor went on leave and the temporary supervisor was not very forthcoming when questions were asked. There were times we were told that particular things were being done at certain times but these didn’t happen and were pushed back without any explanation. We understand delays happen but we were not informed of these. Once Steve out supervisor returned things seem to get back on track. The build progressed quickly however we had a few issues with incorrect counter tops installed which were corrected pretty quickly. Also the installation of the stacker doors was incorrect and had to be corrected, after bringing it to their attention this was also corrected. We had a independent inspector for the vital stages which he picked up a few items which were addressed. The final handover was very lowkey which was a surprise as we thought Bold would of wanted photos to add to their portfolio. After handover issues have popped up and we have contacted Bold who have raised these with the particular contractor to fix. Overall a it has been a positive experience with minor issues which where corrected in the appropriate time frame and the build finished in a reasonably good time frame. On speaking to other people they have said that it can be normal for issues to come up but as long as your builder is on top it to get it rectified then that’s good.

I felt the Display home consultant was amazing. I was disappointed with the draft person and the contract consultant as I felt the relay of messages was not being relaid to what I wanted. There was a lot of backwards and forwards until it was right, which cost us time in getting the process to be past. The consultant failed to notify me that of… Read more

the new regulations for the certification of our plans which resulted in more delays for our house to be past and to be started. The construction foreman was great and he communicated regularly of what would happening and when. If I had any concerns I could always call him. I am very happy with the quality of my build of the house. The price was reasonable and did not exceed what I was quoted.

Do not use BOLD, it’s an absolute disaster. Their sales process is good, but after the whole building process turns into a nightmare. Site supervisors are keep changing, or simple don’t communicate with you at all. The building process is never as they promise from 8 month as they told us, now it’s 16 months and they still haven’t completed the… Read more

house fully. Their 5star reviews are fake, they should have only a one star review.

Before 2 days of handover date multiple problems - 24 (from 3rd party inspector) haven’t been fixed. - they won’t follow up the timeline at all. We still don’t have gas, door is on wrong side, walls scratches, gaps everywhere. - No communication and they keep lying to us about the handover date but it’s obvious we won’t be able to move in because they haven’t done anything at the past 2 weeks.

My advice is: Use Coral homes or another building companies, don’t waste your time and energy here

We have had multiple issues. - Multiple design mistakes with the structure of the house and the air conditioning system were made by Bold. These are major blunders. - We have numerous pending issues from the time of handover. We were promised these would be addressed and rectified ASAP, but they never bothered to return and fix them (despite us… Read more

following up numerous times).

- The gas stove controllers have never worked, and this is a major safety concern.

- We got a cracked driveway (entire length) within a month of moving in. We were promised it would be fixed. We even completed some paperwork. They gave the false impression that they would rectify the issue, they simply bluffed us. They have never shown up or fixed the issue, despite several follow-ups. (Attached is a picture)

- They didn’t install a hose to drain water from the ducted aircon plant. Water is running onto the floor and creating moisture – a perfect environment for termites. Our pest and termite company advised that the ducted AC plant must have a hose connected to drain away the water. Again, despite raising the concern, Bold never bothered to address the issue. (Check the videos attached)

- For the 12-month maintenance, we had to contact them multiple times before they finally sent us the paperwork. We filled it in and followed up repeatedly, but they never even bothered to respond. When they promise a 12-month warranty and we report defects, we expect them to fix the issues as part of that process. But what can we do if they don’t respond? We are totally helpless.

- There are a few other ongoing issues as well (cracks on the wall, TV signal never worked, cracked cornices, etc.)

This is an extremely unprofessional and unethical business that they are running.

Stay AWAY from Bold Living and save yourself.

Poor workmanship and incorrect installations – Experienced airconditioner installations that were not insulated correctly into the walls. This created sweating and significant water damages over time. The arrogance of the receptionist to assist in dealing with this matter is astonishing. They expect that if an issue with incorrect installation wasn’t identified within their 12 month… Read more

maintenance period, they have no further obligations. The installation company suddenly doesn’t exist anymore - in one instance I was referred to the installation company / contractor that do exist. Non-compliant installations don’t always show up within 12 months, especially if hidden inside wall cavities! Cost of rectification was over $5,000.

I’m very pleased with my new home and the experience working with bold living.The project was completed on time, the quality of the work was excellent, and the entire process was handled professionally. A special mention goes to the site manager, who was incredibly helpful, approachable, and always available to answer questions or resolve any… Read more

issues. Their attention to detail and commitment to keeping things on track made a big difference and gave me real peace of mind throughout the build.

We recently completed our build with Bold, which took just under 12 months. We were a Porter Davis affected customer and were grateful to Bold for taking our build on. Bold commenced our build from the frame onwards. From the beginning they were willing to help and adopt the design we had with PD. Bold’s standard inclusions and quality of build is… Read more

what attracted us to go with Bold. We found their standard inclusions to be more generous and of better value compared to other builders. During the build we had a slight hiccup with going through a few site supervisors (which is not uncommon for any builder). However, our last and final SS who completed our Build was exceptional. Their communication was amazing and they always addressed our questions/concerns. We love our house and are really happy with the end result.

Building with Bold Living – It took 2 years to build our high set on Bribie Island... Covid, trade shortages and material scarcity all added to an elongated build timeline. Frustrating as it was, we are delighted with the final product produced by Bold. We did a lot of research and attended nearly every display home north of Brisbane before deciding on Bold Living. The… Read more

initial consultation and design variations were all conducted over Zoom, as we were still living on the far south coast of NSW. The high levels of communication really gave us a high degree of reassurance before we signed the Contract.

There were as number of issues that were flagged both during and after handover. These issues were addressed by an exceptional couple of people from the Bold Maintenance Team. (They know who they are...) Under trying circumstances, both for them and us, we were able to get all the issues fixed.

The final product is a 5 bed, 3 bath, 3 garage home that came in on budget for us.

We have no hesitation on recommending Bold Living as a real candidate for consideration if you are intending to build.

Dave and Stacey

Don’t use BOLD. Nice design but not worth the extremely stressful process – SHORT STORY/SUMMARY ---------------------------- POSTIVES + Nice design + Structure: Good quality/well done NEUTRAL ± Sales process The sales process took a little over a month. The sales consultant was reasonably responsive and cooperative. It took quite a few iterations to get to a tender that was good enough to base a decision on. That was… Read more

partly due to us having additional/changed requirements and partly due to mistakes made by the sales team.

NEGATIVES Very stressful process once we agreed to build with them. Let's look at it per phase:

Pre-construction negatives: - Pre-construction took very long. From contract signing to start of construction was almost 6 ½ months. To be fair: It was COVID time, there was a building explosion due to the Home Builder grant and delivery times for frames were extremely long. BUT: From 1st preliminary deposit to contract signing was 4 months. That is way longer than it should be to get to agreed specifications, plans and contract. Reasons: see next bullets - Lack of internal quality control/reviews on documents that go out. We received so many versions of plans and specifications that had errors in them and that had changes/updates that were agreed verbally or via email incorrectly incorporated. - Waiting, waiting, waiting. Waiting for an appointment for the “color selection” (almost 2 months after paying 1st preliminary deposit) Waiting for responses to messages, waiting for new versions of plans, specifications, contract (adding up to weeks)

Construction negatives - Supervisor didn’t have enough time to supervise the build properly and he was very reactive instead of pro-active. He apparently had to supervise almost 20 builds at the same time. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out that -given a 50 hr. working week of which at least 20 hrs. consists of driving to and from build sites- he can only spend an hour and a half per week on each build. - Lot of sub-standard workmanship. Not in the structure of the house (the structure is sound and of good quality) but in the finishing. Quite a bit of it was detected early, even before partial completion inspection, but not fixed before handover.

Handover and post-handover negatives - Handover was rushed - It took ages to fix the items found during handover and quite a few issues were not fixed when we got to the 11-month mark where we engaged a professional inspector to go through the property and note down all defects. The inspector’s report was 45 pages of which 35 pages were actually describing the defects - It took even longer to fix all the items found during the maintenance inspection. It was 18 ½ months after handover when all issues were fixed. In those 18 ½ months BOLD was extremely unresponsive and every single thing required chasing, chasing, chasing. - To illustrate the process: the number of emails sent (BOLD to us + us to BOLD) was more than 400 and the number of messages sent via their messaging app Property Pro (BOLD to us + us to BOLD) was around 400. Of course communication has to take place and a couple of hundreds of messages back and forth are to be expected. But more than 800 in total, that should NOT be necessary.

Finishing: average to very poor: - High number of minor defects compared to builds of similar size houses, according to the private inspector we hired. - Reason for that high number: lot of dodgy work. Examples: Painter did an absolute lousy job; brickwork had a lot of defects, brick cleaner caused a lot of damage to bricks and mortar and did not clean properly.

Worst communication we have ever experienced from ANY business in ANY industry: - Calls are not returned - It takes ages and multiple reminder-emails to respond to emails - Favorite expression of BOLD staff: “Leave it with me”. That is exactly what it is: you leave it with the person and that is where it stays. Nothing happens. - It happened twice that our supervisor left BOLD and BOLD didn’t even have the courtesy to inform us. We had to find out via bounced emails and other people picking up when we called the supervisor’s mobile phone. - Poor communication is company culture. It happens in all layers of the organization, up to the highest level of management (general managers and CEO) - Their lack of communication and their lack of respect for their customers is shocking. We have never felt so neglected and disrespected in our life.

The stress that BOLD caused us during the build made us 10 years older over the course of a little over a year. If you ask us: - would you build with BOLD Living again? - would you recommend BOLD Living to others? you will get a loud and clear NO to both questions. We have a nice house but the process took a heavy toll, mentally and physically. We know that building a house is a challenging process and that no build is going to be stress free. There will always be some stress things along the road. But it shouldn’t be so stressful as ours was. We know plenty of people who had a new house built and none was as stressful as ours.

That was just the short story. Let's dive into the details. 

LONG STORY/DETAILS -------------------------

We spent quite a lot of time in selecting the builder. We looked at many designs of many builders and we eventually narrowed it down to 5, then to 3, then to 2, then we picked BOLD and their Samson 268 design, with a few tweaks (additional storage behind the garage, additional outdoor living space, custom kitchen layout) Why did we pick BOLD? Main reason is that we really liked the design. We of course looked at reviews / experiences that other people had and we noticed a few bad ones. But all other builders also had a few bad ones. BOLD is good in presenting themselves and there were not enough bad reviews to ring the alarm bells and the experience with them in the sales process was not too bad. (Note that if you look now, you see a LOT more bad reviews than back in 2021)

So, BOLD it was.

Let’s go through the process and review what happened:

Sales process ---------------

MAR 22, 2021: first contact via email. We visited a BOLD display home in South Ripley a few days later MAR 27, 2021: First preliminary tender: first price with TBA for larger alfresco and garage extension MAR 31, 2021: 2nd tender, 25K over first price with Alfresco and garage extensions priced and errors fixed APR 14, 2021: 3rd tender, 32.5K over first price with additional porch/verandah outdoor living space APR 20, 2021: 4th tender, 29.5K over first price after adding a few things but also getting additional discount. APR 24, 2021: 5th tender, 28K over fixed price after fixing errors. This was the one we based our decision to build with them on. APR 26, 2021: 1st preliminary deposit paid ($2550) There was quite a bit of back and forth between us and the sales consultant to get it right. That was partly due to us having additional/changed requirements and partly due to mistakes made by the sales consultant. All in all a sales process that -compared to what would follow- was quite OK.

Pre-construction process ----------------------------

Pre-construction process started APR 26, 2022 First steps in pre-construction are the soil test, and the “colour selection”, in which you do not just pick your paint colours, but also your bricks, your tiles, your appliances, your doors, handles, cabinetry, toilets, basins, sinks, baths, showerheads, taps, electrical (additional lights and power points, air conditioning zoning) etc.

Both soil test and colour selection are steps that are required to come to a list of specifications, a final plan and a contract.

The soil test was done straight away and the result came back on May 15, 2023. Unfortunately, with an E class (Extremely reactive) where in the sales tender we assumed H1 (highly reactive). That had financial consequences: almost 23K additional cost for piers and thicker slab.

JUN 21, 2021 Colour selection. A few days short of a 2 month wait before they had time for us to do our selections ☹ That was really a (too) long wait JUL 12, 2021: Tender V1 with all the extras from “colour selection” (30K) + additional cost due to E soil (31K) + some other unforeseen added by BOLD like additional earthworks, a rubble pit and additional yard gullies (7K): Total increase of 68K compared to sales tender and 96K over the first price.

Lesson learned and warning for readers who are considering building: If you have a certain budget, you have to find a design/plan with a price tag of at least 50K-75K under your budget as you WILL select upgrades and there WILL be additional costs that you didn’t foresee. If you do that then you will not go over your budget (best case) or go over it a little bit only (worst case). AUG 12, 2021: After a zillion back and forth messages, mainly due to mistakes from BOLD or BOLD sending us incomplete tenders, and going through tenders V1.1, V1.2, V1.3, V1.4, V1.5 we finally arrived at a version 2 that we all agreed with so BOLD could provide the draft HIA contract + Contract Specifications + Contract Tender + Marked up Plans.

We are talking about BOLD, who never gets anything first time right. All documents contained errors. E.g. previously agreed items disappeared, incorrect dimensions, incorrect Elevation drawn in the plan.

AUG 23, 2021: Next version of HIA contract + Contract Specifications + Contract Tender + Marked up Plans: Still containing errors (e.g. plan and specification not aligned, tender and specifications not aligned). Gave feedback to BOLD and since they had to rework anyway, we also requested some last-minute minor changes to plan and specs.

AUG 27, 2021: All documents now ok with a few textual mistakes. We marked those and then signed the documents on Aug 28, 2021 and paid the next deposit. Remember this was in the midst of COVID and there were supply issues. In our case the bottleneck was the frame. BOLD let us know on Sep 6, 2021 that our frame was “pencilled in for March 2022” So the waiting started…….

OCT 8, 2021: We received the Working Drawings. Of course, they were not “first time right” Some lowlights: Solor panels on the south facing roof instead of the north facing roof (we are sorry, but that is REALLY stupid), only half of the roof water to the tanks instead of agreed ALL, incorrect plumbing of water tanks to house, incorrect location of additional external tap, incorrect allocation of feature tiles, incorrect location of dishwasher. Other than those, multiple small errors. Sigh…

NOV 11, 2021: We finally received the updated drawings (after at least 20 messages going back and forth) and we approved them. Meanwhile we were still waiting for the final version of the Electrical plan, which was dragging for a few months already. This was “subcontracted” to Lucci, so technically not BOLD’s fault, but they should have chased them more. NOV 29, 2021: We finally received the updated electrical plan. Luckily this one was OK and didn’t need further rework.

FEB 8, 2022: We receive 2 messages that were NOT meant for us. They were for “Murray and Deanna,” and they were about their council approval. Eh… we are NOT Murray and Deanna!!!! That was a real shocker. They sent other people’s personal information to us. That means they could have sent our personal information to other people as well. NOT HAPPY! But it was even worse: before we could send an angry message to BOLD, they removed the 2 messages from our Property PRO account. (Property PRO is their customer messaging system). If they would have informed us that they accidentally sent 2 messages to us that were not meant for us and apologised for that it would have been a slightly different story. But they just removed the -hoping we hadn’t seen them we assume - without informing us of their mistake. Absolutely BAD communication. NO BUENO! When we sent them an angry email, they apologised, but in that email, they made a typo in our names. Very avoidable mistake if you just READ stuff -or better: let someone else read it- before you send out communication. That applies more general: They sent out a lot of emails and documents that contained a lot of errors that would have been easily spotted when a review was done. Hence these emails and documents were NOT reviewed/checked before they were sent out to us, their customers. Hard to comprehend that you can send out documents to customers without having them reviewed.

FEB 10, 2022: We received our own council approval (not Murray and Deanna’s....)

FEB 11, 2022: We sent BOLD the letter of commencement from our financer. Ready to start the construction!

Construction phase ----------------------

Construction took a bit over 9 months. Given the circumstances at the time (COVID, shortage of tradies, difficulties in material supply chains) that was kind of an average building time. We have seen homes going up faster, we have seen homes taking longer. During construction we lived in a rental 1 km down the road and we visited our land frequently as we already started landscaping work while the build was going on. So, we had a good view of the progress. Short summary of the timeline MAR 9, 2022: Earthworks MAR 15, 2022: Piering holes MAR 22, 2022: Piering concrete poured MAR 23, 2022: Power and water to the property, plumbing APR 4, 2022: Slab prep APR 5, 2022: Slab pour APR 28, 2022: Frame delivery MAY 5, 2022: Start of frame build MAY 20, 2022: Frame build finished MAY 23, 2022: HSTP installed MAY 28, 2022: Gutters and fascia’s JUN 5, 2022: Roof on JUN 14, 2022: Windows and doorframes, aircon ducting JUN 18, 2022: Solar JUN 25, 2022: Electrical wiring JUL 8, 2022: Internal walls JUL 30, 2022: Cabinetry AUG 16, 2022: Benchtops, basins, sinks SEP 16, 2022: Bricks delivered SEP 17, 2022: Tiling start SEP 25, 2022: Tiling done OCT 13, 2022: Start bricklaying OCT 21, 2022: Start internal painting NOV 2, 2022: Water tanks NOV 3, 2022: Electrical fixtures NOV 6, 2022: Appliances NOV 11, 2022: Toilets and baths NOV 18, 2022: Security screens & garage door NOV 19, 2022: Bricklaying finished NOV 21, 2022: Soffits and other external carpentry NOV 28, 2022: Concrete pathing around the house DEC 5, 2022: HSTP commissioning DEC 7, 2022: External painting DEC 7-19, 2022: Hectic last minute work, a. o. pantry, walk in and robe shelving, shower screens DEC 20, 2022: Handover.

There were not many highlights of the construction phase, although for the sake of fairness we should mention that BOLD handled a few construction-variations (additional dimmers, additional concrete path, adding insulation after the frame was already up) swiftly and correctly. They also managed (after a lot of rushing at the end) to do the handover just before Christmas = just before a period of 12 days where we had mandatory holidays from our jobs so we had the time to move in. We decided to do the flooring in the bedrooms and media room ourselves (read: buy the flooring ourselves and hire a contractor to lay the floor). BOLD was so kind to allow the contractor in the house in between pre completion inspection and handover. Hadn’t they allowed that that we would have had to wait until after the holidays which would be quite a problem.

There were quite a few lowlights though: - Interfering with our blessings. It is a tradition to do a blessing ceremony at the start of the build. During the ceremony, several items are put in the first hole that is dug for the build and blessing prayers are done. We agreed with the builder that we could do our ceremony on the day the first holes were dug, which were the piering holes. We informed the earth worker who was digging the holes and we did our ceremony around the first hole he dug while he was digging the other holes. The next day we were back on site and to our horror we found parts of the items that were blessed then put into the hole in a pile of dirt next to the house. Apparently the guy dug up the items after we left the site. Very shocking and disrespectful. We had to redo the ceremony. Not really a good start to the construction phase.

- Frame supply On APR 4 we were on site with the supervisor late afternoon to look at the slab prep. The frame was initially “pencilled in for March” and we were in April meanwhile. So we asked him when the frame was going to be delivered. He looked it up and it turned out to be on … APR 4. That same day. But no frame had shown up. He then checked with the frame supplier and it turned out that the delivery date had changed to mid-June. WE BEG YOUR PARDON????? It cannot be that it only became clear that the frame was delayed on the planned day of delivery. It MUST have been known for a longer time. Someone in BOLD must have known, but internal systems were not updated and we were not informed. One of the many examples of poor communication. We were also annoyed that the planning of the earthworks, slab prep and slab pouring was not adjusted to be closer to the frame delivery date as with this planning our slab would be unnecessarily exposed to the elements for 2 ½ months. After a lot of back and forth and “kicking and screaming”, involving BOLD general management, we got the message that (quoted literally) “We have been able to pull some strings and the frame company have said they can get a delivery date of about the 27/4”

Tip for people who are about to start building: Don’t take crap from your builder. “Kick and scream” where necessary. Don’t hesitate to involve general management or even the CEO of the building company. Once you have an email address of someone in the company, you know the “naming convention” of their email addresses. Say your supervisor is called John Doe and has email address j.doe@c.com.au. So their naming convention apparently is [First character of first name].[Last name]@YourBuilder.com.au. Google will help you finding out who the relevant managers and CEO are and then you can email them applying the company’s email naming convention.

- Site Start Notice This is the document that states the official start date of the construction. This is an important document as the “practical completion date” is derived from that, and the practical completion is important as there is a penalty for the builder for every day they are late. BOLD wasn’t even able to provide a correct version of this simple document first time right: • They took the date the slab was poured rather than the date the Pierings were poured which was 8 days before the slab. • They didn’t provide the notice within 10 days of commencement as required by the contract. • They didn’t sign the notice as required by the contract Very frustrating that they weren’t even able to provide a simple document as this one without mistakes. Oh, and we didn’t even mention that they spelled one of our names incorrectly and put an old address on the Notice, months after signing a contract where our names are correctly spelled (note: not in the draft, there they made a typo☹ but in the final version) and our address was correctly stated….

- Claim for Frame stage The claim for the Frame stage was sent before completion of the frame. After we received the claim we went to the site to check and we found that there were still tradies working on the frame. Response from BOLD: “Oh, the frame was planned to be finished today, we weren’t aware that it wasn’t” Sigh… really beyond comprehension. You don’t have to have an IQ of 152 to know that you need to VERIFY that a stage is complete before sending out the claim for that stage. After the frame was completed (according to BOLD) we received the claim again and passed it on to our financer. They sent an inspector and that inspector found that roof battens were missing, which according to him are part of the frame but according to BOLD are not. Then BOLD tried to use us as the messenger between them and the financer. Hey. the fact that a certified inspector and a builder do not agree on the definition of a frame is NOT our problem. So, we told BOLD to contact the financer directly to sort it out, which they eventually did after initial pushback.

- Notification of Delay After fixing the Site Start Notice they had the guts to send us a “Notification of Delay” for the frame supply delay, pushing out the “practical completion date” by 3 ½ weeks. According to the contract a delay related to supply of materials is claimable “IF those materials were selected by the owner". That definitely does not apply to the frame. Apart from that, they didn’t specify the exact extension time and they didn’t provide the notification within 10 days of “becoming aware of the cause and the extent of the delay” So we pushed back on that and they had to withdraw that notification. Again: “kicking and screaming” required and lots of frustration and multiple messages. And another tip for people who are about to start building: don’t accept anything the builder throws at you straight away. Always check the contract and its fine prints to make sure that what they do is correct/allowed.

- Water tanks On the plan the water tanks were in a location that became infeasible after the building pad was cut. The building pad was not cut exactly to plan leaving the water tanks in a position that would go over the edge of the building pad. Again, It took lots of back and forth to agree on a new position of the tanks AND to agree that repositioning would be a no cost for us (BOLD didn’t want to take the costs of the additional pipe length required). Pretty frustrating process. Then the big surprise came when the tanks were delivered in colour “Surfmist” where “Deep Ocean” was the agreed colour in the specifications. Turned out that someone in the BOLD office had ordered the wrong colour. Another example of things done that were not reviewed/checked. Luckily it was Surfmist and not some green or red colour, so we decided to accept the tanks.

- Alcohol on the job Tradies doing the work consumed A LOT of alcohol on the job. We collected large amounts of cans and bottles of beer and mix-drinks. In particular vodka-cola mix drinks are very popular among tradies. We also noticed that in particular bricklayers love their alcohol on the job as we would always find quite a few cans and bottles after a day they were on site. Not surprising that we had A LOT of issues with the brickwork. The brickies mentioned to us that “they don’t like the supervisors on site”. Wonder why……….?

- Heaps of smaller and larger frustrations There were too many frustrations to put in this review, so we will just give a few examples: • Tradies leaving doors of the house open allowing the feral peacocks that we have in the area to get into the house and leave their nasty sticky poo everywhere. • We had 2 colours of bricks: Silver and Bronze. As the area around the house was muddy, brickies threw quite a lot of bricks in the mud as “stepping stones”. They decided to use the Silver bricks for that. Had they done a bit of simple maths they would have found that the amount of Silver bricks that were delivered was not very generous but just enough to complete the job whereas there was a generous amount of Bronze bricks, more than enough for the job. Due to wasting a lot of Silver bricks they didn’t have enough of them to finish the job and BOLD had to order an additional lot. That cost BOLD $$ (not our problem) but also caused a delay in finishing the brickwork while that was on the critical path. • In particular during the construction phase, BOLD’s response to messages/questions/concerns was extremely slow. They earlier told us that it is reasonable to expect a response within 2 working days but in many cases, we had to send multiple “can you please respond” messages to get a response. Calling them was also a frustrating experience. Most of the times the person we wanted to speak was “out for lunch” (at 2 PM?? Or 10:30 AM??) or “not at his/her desk” or “in a meeting” or “talking to another customer”). The receptionist would then “leave a message so the person can call you back” but most of the times we never got the call back and we had to send angry messages again. And they had the guts to suggest that we were too impatient and they told us multiple times “please put yourself in our shoes”. That’s turning the world upside down. They are the builder. We are the customer and we pay big bucks for the house. They need to put themselves in OUR shoes. Not the other way around. We were not asking for difficult things. We wanted to be kept up to date, which is a 5 minutes per week job to summarize progress for the week and plan for next week in a few lines in a message. It was all very frustrating. In fact, during most of the construction phase were in an angry/frustrated mood. And in several occasions they had the guts to lecture us, like: • “I would appreciate it if you did not send me text messages on a Sunday evening at 7:30 notifying me that you have sent a message in property pro. We will address the property pro messages when we are back at work on Monday. I monitor my mobile phone over the weekend in case there is an emergency. This is not an emergency and has happened a few times.” Sorry, but you are a supervisor and you made the decision to leave your phone on 24/7. Then don’t complain about getting messages. And if BOLD would respect their own rule that they respond within 2 business days, we would never send a text message to tell someone we sent a Property Pro message. But since BOLD always took ages to respond we decided to use this mechanism to make them aware there is a message to attend to. • After the 2nd time our supervisor left BOLD and BOLD didn’t have the courtesy to inform us, we sent an email to the general manager that was rightfully angry and that a.o. contained the following words:

“RC leaves BOLD without BOLD having the courtesy to inform us. Then our case is transferred to RD, who now apparently also left BOLD AGAIN WITHOUT BOLD HAVING THE COURTESY TO INFORM US. WTF is going on at BOLD? And WHY TF is it so hard to communicate to your customers???”

One would expect an apology, but instead of that we got a lecture!

“Acronymising a swear word is still swearing and that level of communication is not tolerated or well received. Caps lock is implying you are yelling and again not well received”

No apology at all. Hence our response:

“Let's respond to these 2 in one go. CV, you are the General Manager, how BOLD treats their customers is YOUR responsibility. Therefore: How DARE you to lecture us. You are in NO position to lecture us. Your lecture is NOT tolerated, nor well received. It is shocking to read these 2 responses. It is shocking to see your total lack of empathy. ZERO attempt to put yourself in your customer's shoes. YES WE WERE YELLING and yes we were swearing and if you had put yourself in our shoes you would understand why. The whole engagement with BOLD is one of extremely poor communication, of neglecting and ignoring us, of promises not kept. We have told you a zillion times how we appreciate communication, but we had to find out that the people who handled our case left via bounced emails, via "I don't work here anymore" auto-responses and via getting a different person when trying to call them. Even the simplest form of courtesy = informing your customer that their point of contact left BOLD has proven to be too difficult. BOLD has shown us NO respect, NO courtesy on many occasions. Anyone with a little bit of empathy would understand that that frustrates us to the bone and that recurring lack of respect and courtesy eventually leads to levels of frustration that are so high that we start yelling and cursing. Anyone with a little bit of empathy would understand that and would APOLOGISE. But not you, you are offended and you start lecturing us. "Not well received”. don't ever use that term again. The whole engagement with BOLD is one litany of things that are "not well received" by us. Something you should care about but you don't.”

Of course we got no response to this.

• Further lecture in the same email: “It is unfortunate you have been impacted by BOLD staff changes, but in the interest of completing your outstanding items I ask that we remain civil as we complete for you.”

which prompted us to respond

"It is unfortunate"....... not "we are sorry" or "we apologise”, :( And it is a pretty offending statement by the way... "I ask that we remain civil" Take a mirror, have a good look. And realise that to better the world, you have to start with yourself. You seem to think that being civil has to do with words only. WRONG it has as much -or even more- to do with ACTIONS. Being civil means showing respect, being courteous, having empathy, We have seen VERY VERY LITTLE of that. What goes around comes around. If your actions are not civil, don't expect a civil response. We actually tried to be civil for a long long time, even while we were totally fed up. But we can't keep that up forever. So yes, we yelled and we sweared, and no, we don't apologise for that. Try to understand where that comes from instead of taking offense.”

- Pre completion inspection Pre completion inspection took place 3 weeks before handover and was done while there was a lot of work still outstanding. • Water tanks electrical connection not done yet • HSTP connection not done yet • Sliding doors and shelving in robes and linen not done yet • Shelving in pantry not done yet • Shower screens not installed • Garage door installation not finished • Dimmers not installed The decision was made to do the PCI in spite of a lot of work not finished in order to be able to do the handover before Christmas. In addition to that 60 genuine defects were found: large amount of paint defects (mostly poor covering, but also quite some missing painting and even wrong colour used), multiple cases of missing or poorly installed silicone, scratches on cabinets, lots of chipped bricks, poor brick cleaning, expansion joints in brickwork filled with mortar, lots of mortar missing, missing weephole covers, leaking pipe to water tank, downpipes exposed below slab level due to no soil pushed up against the slab (which should have been done during the cleanup of the site before handover. That never happened and in the end our landscaper did BOLD’s job)

Note: we hired a private inspector to do the inspection. We strongly recommend to do so. They see things you don’t see. If you want a real good one: handoverhero.com.au. We didn’t use them for the PCI, but for the 11-month post-handover inspection and they came up with a really comprehensive report.

- Missing lock on the door between house and garage. Not a big thing, but still very annoying: there was no lock on the door between the garage and the house. According to BOLD this door is an internal door and there is no standard or rule that states that that needs to have a lock. Which is nonsense obviously. This door is a de factor external door. For a bad boy it is easy to get into the garage by forcing the roller door. Hence the door from the garage to the house needs a proper lock. Which is the case in all houses that we have seen. And we have seen many as we initially tried to find an existing house and we inspected at least 50. Only after missing out every time due to people from VIC and NSW offering up to 35% over the asking price we decided to build. BOLD didn’t bend on this one so we had to fork out $235 for a proper lock.

Post Construction phase ---------------------------

After a lot of last minute (rushed) work to complete the build and to fix some (but definitely not all) of the defects that were noted during pre-completion inspection, handover took place on December 20, 2022, just before Christmas. Handover was rushed but we were happy to be in before Christmas. Those things that were not complete at the time of PCI were now complete but most of the defects that were noted during PCI were NOT fixed at handover.

Post construction, the highlights: - None

Post construction, the lowlights: (pfff …where to start) - The stinky portaloo was not picked up before handover and prevented us from doing some of the landscaping we wanted to do. BOLD refused to chase the portaloo hiring company and only after many calls and emails by us it was picked up, 3 weeks after handover. - As you can read from the construction experience, the BOLD culture/attitude is “Contract signed, we care a lot less about the customer” but once handover is done and the last claim is paid, it changes to “Money in the pocket, we don’t care about the customer anymore AT ALL” - 4 weeks after handover, access to PropertyPro was revoked where we were told that “appr 6 weeks after handover, messages would be archived and access would be restricted.” Restricted access in our opinion means: Still access but with restrictions (E.g. can’t send messages anymore). However, BOLD’s interpretation is Restricted access = No Access at all. They don’t give you a heads up, you simply can’t get in anymore. Which means that you can’t download messages and attachments. We had downloaded the attachments along the way, but not all the messages so we had to beg them to download all the messages and send them to us - More than 200 emails have been exchanged (and numerous phone calls) since handover. Emails from us: • Chasing BOLD to get things done • Requesting a response to earlier messages as the response times were even worse than during constructions. Emails from BOLD: • Very brief messages acknowledging our message and saying they will chase tradies etc. which then most of the time doesn’t happen.

- Same as during Construction: frustrations where high due to bad communication and we included General management and the CEO in some emails. The CEO never had the courtesy to respond. - 1 month after handover we got a message from BOLD Maintenance: “On behalf of the entire team at BOLD Living, we’d like to thank you for choosing BOLD to build your new home. We understand that building a home is a very important milestone and are pleased that we were able be a part of creating your dream home. Our maintenance team will be in contact again in the eleventh month after handover for a list of any maintenance items that arise (our standard procedure is attached for your reference).” In other words: we are expected to shut up for 10 months and only then they will start working on our issues? Don’t think so! Any issues that were found during PCI and handover need to be fixed a.s.a.p. Issues that are found after handover are a different story. Not a problem to wait until the 11th month mark, unless they are urgent of course, like the gas bottle related issue below. So we kept on pushing them to fix the PCI and handover issues, with limited success.

- After handover we found MANY MANY additional issues (additional to the 70+ ones found during PCI and handover) Some examples: • Just a few hours after handover we had our first gas bottles delivered. Unfortunately, there was a flood light (potential ignition source) installed too close to the gas regulator vent and the gas supplier could not install the bottles. Was fixed by the sparky 3 days later but the first 3 days we didn’t have gas (and hence no hot water) so we couldn’t cook and couldn’t have a hot shower. Luckily, we still had access to the rental we lived in and we had to go there to shower. • Soon after handover a very nasty smell occurred in the kitchen, a sewer kind of smell. We had to nag and nag to get a plumber out to check, which happened only after a few weeks. Turned out that during construction the plumber put in 2 waste points for the sink: 1 in the location according to the standard Samson 268 plan and 1 in the location of the actual sink (relocated due to kitchen redesign). Obviously that first waste point shouldn’t have been there. It was NOT on the approved plans. But even worse, they did not only put a useless waste point in, they did NOT CAP IT. So that is where the nasty smell came from. Plumber had to make a hole in the cabinetry above it and cap it. • First time the water tanks were completely full, it turned out that the overflow leaked, causing water to run along the side of the tanks, washing away the road base the tanks are on. • First time we wanted to use the alarm system it turned out that the sensors were incorrectly linked to the control unit and that we -as owners! - did not have access to all the functions of the control unit. • Screws sticking out of shower frames, ripping our hands open • Toilet roll holders installed in incorrect position (not as per plan) • Lots of more missing silicone found • Multiple door hinges missing screws • Damaged floor tile • Leaking aircon unit • Aircon unit should have been wall mounted (we actually paid $97 for that) but was standing on the ground • More chipped bricks, more missing mortar • Rust on brand new rangehood • Tearing mesh in security screens on windows and doors that we hardly or even never used. • Hole in garage wall near solar inverter • One of the leaf eaters had the fine mesh inset (to keep debris out) missing. Plumber had pushed in a piece of loose mesh instead • We upgraded to “invisiguard” security doors for the front door and the sliding doors to the patio at the back. The installed doors were very floppy, not nice and firm as we see them everywhere else. The supplier for those doors took the doors back to the factory 4 times. Every time they would be gone for a week. They could not fix the issue completely. They even installed additional horizontal bars (which takes away the “invisi” effect), but the result is still not really good. Doors are still floppy but not as bad as they were. In the end we were so sick of it that we accepted the doors as they are.

In the first 6 months after handover almost nothing happened and most of the PCI and handover items were still waiting to be fixed. We exchanged many emails with BOLD where they kept us telling things like “The plumber will call you within 10 days”, “The bricky will contact you a.s.a.p. to arrange a date” and we never got those calls. So frustrating and demotivating and energy-draining. In the first 10 months after handover only very little was done. Only after 10 months they started to work more seriously on fixing issues. On Oct 11 we got an email “I am pleased to advise that we have reached out to our relevant trades and engaged them to complete the remaining works. They will contact you to arrange a suitable date and time to attend your property. If you have not heard from them all in the next 10 business days, please let me know so that I may follow this up for you.””

Note that they don’t say what tradies to fix which defects. Of course after 3 weeks we only were contacted by part of the relevant tradies, not by all.

On November 9, 2023 David from HandoverHero.com.au did the end-of-warranty maintenance inspection. He found additional issues that the other inspector hadn’t found or that appeared after handover: • Brickwork and eave not level in a wall at the back of the house Brickwork (12 mm fall per m) and eave (9mm per m) were not level. The 12 and 9 mm were outside QBCC tolerances. Since it was in a wall at the back of the house that you can’t see from the patio we decided to leave it. But there is a bit more to that story, see below. • Silicone missing to bath perimeter of bath in ensuite. That bath is a free-standing bath but as the area under the bath is not accessible to clean, perimeter should have been siliconed. • Sagging shelves in the pantry due to insufficient support, more details below. • Several additional silicone defects • ALL locations where you can’t easily see it, e.g. top and bottom edges of doors, were not painted. • Other than that, very HIGH amount of other paint defects • Shower niche fall too big, causing bottles to fall off all the time • Cracks and nail/screw popping in plaster • More brick and mortar defects • More fascia and gutter scratches • Several chipped tiles and several locations with excess grout • Leaking shower screen • Seam between 2 parts of the kitchen benchtop was not level/even and you could clearly feel it. One part was almost 0.5mm higher than the other. Turned out that it was poorly installed and that the 2 parts were individually resting on the cabinetry without being connected on the under-side. • And lots more. That was 11 months after handover. Note that at that stage there were also a lot of items from the handover list that still needed fixing. We were hoping (WHY???? We should have known better!) that BOLD would have all these items fixed in a few weeks. But of course they did not. It took them more than 7 months after that report to get all the outstanding items fixed.

BOLD works with a few maintenance companies and 3 of them were involved in fixing most of the items. It took SIXTEEN man days to correct all the paint, plaster, mortar, silicone, grout and tiling issues. Large part of the interior walls, almost all interior doors and a lot of internal architraves had to be repainted. And no, those 16 man days were not done by a small team in just a few days. It took MONTHS (and more than 100 emails, text messages, phone calls) before all was done. We had a few days where we had more than 1 person on site, but mostly it was 1 person working on his own. And very often we agreed on a date with those maintenance companies and then the person(s) didn’t show up, because they “called in sick”, or their “car broke down”, or -very often- “they were sent to a more urgent job instead”. We learned from one of the guys that more urgent in most cases meant “a customer about to sue BOLD or go to the QBCC unless some works were completed before some date”.

The last issue fixed was the pantry. The pantry installation was absolutely poor. Pantry had shelves installed in a U shape: 2 shorter sides and a long side. The pantry shelves were supported by - a bar on the wall that was glued and nailed to the wall (NOT screwed into the frame) - 1 post in the middle of the long side. On either side of the post in the middle there was more than 2 lineal metres of shelf that had no further support on the front. And of course that is going to sag. Even while you put heavy stuff either at the back, close to the wall, or on the floor or not even in the pantry at all. Why do you have a pantry if you can’t put stuff on the shelves… In places the sagging was more than 100mm. Unfortunately there are not standards and no tolerances for pantry shelving, so BOLD refused to fix them. And that is where we gave them the choice: Either you have the pantry redone and we will accept the non-level brickwork and eaves at the back OR you keep on refusing to fix the pantry and we will demand you to redo the brickwork and the eaves at the back in order for those to meet QBCC standards and tolerances. BOLD sent out their maintenance manager to check the brickwork and the eaves and then decided to fix the pantry. Fixing the pantry was easier said than done. When removing the old pantry shelving (remember, that was glued and nailed to the wall), the walls were severely damaged. Only after filling the holes and re-plastering, sanding and re-painting the walls, the new pantry could be installed. New pantry was installed by CIVIC and not by Jeldwen -who installed the old one- and THEY did a decent job. Wall supports where screwed into the frame and there are now 5 supports at the front instead of 1. We have another internal store room in the house that has the same dodgy Jeldwen installation, but that room is only half the size of the pantry, so shelves are shorter and the problem is not that big there. We will nevertheless install 2 support posts there as well to avoid it becoming a problem in the future.

Those were the lowlights of the post-handover period. Lots of issues, taking ages to fix, massive communication frustration, total lack of attention from all levels in BOLD. We really aged 10 years in a 1 1/2-year period of time.

We would like to end our review with a random selection of other annoying things that happened • Our first supervisor resigned but BOLD did not have the courtesy to inform us and nor did he. We sent him an email and the email came back as undeliverable. Then we called him but someone else answered the phone and told us that he left BOLD. Unbelievable. We made it very clear to BOLD that that was unacceptable and disrespectful. Then we got another supervisor and guess what? The story repeated itself. Supervisor left and we had to find out by getting an autoreply on an email stating that our supervisor concluded employment with BOLD. So rude and disgraceful ☹

• BOLD tried to blame us for some defects: The tearing mesh in some security screens was “occupancy wear and tear”. What? Those windows never opened and that door is hardly used. You can see that the mesh is floppy in one place and very tight (and tearing) in another. That is not “Occupancy wear and tear”. Then they suggested that our pets could have done the damage while our 2 cats and the dog never get anywhere near this mesh. It was just poorly manufactured and only after a zillion emails and getting angry they finally sent the manufacturer to fix them

• They changed the location of the aircon after we signed the plan. Without telling us of course. We signed a version of the plan where the aircon unit was located immediately next to an external door in the garage. The approved construction issue of the plan had the unit moved away from the door, partially under a window sill. We found out when the aircon guys finally came to mount the unit on the wall and their plan and our plan were different. So due to this we had to go through the 2 versions of the plans to check if BOLD did not make any other changes without telling us. Valuable time wasted again.

• Fascia was dented by the bobcat that did the site clean up before handover. After handover that piece of fascia was replaced. That was a battle in itself as BOLD tried to blame our landscaper who was installing retaining walls at the time. However, our landscaper had a walk around the house before he started and he pointed out the existing damages to fascia’s and gutters as he had been blamed by builders in the past. Even then it took a few back and forth and getting angry to get BOLD to agree to fix it. The tradies who did that fix had to unscrew 16 screws in the roof to lift a piece of roof to be able to replace the fascia. They forgot to screw the 16 screws back in. We found out about 2 months later when cleaning the gutters. We had gone through a few storms already and we were lucky that the roof wasn’t blown off.

• Plumber that we hired to connect the outdoor kitchen shook his head when he saw some of the plumbing work done during the build. E.g. the mains water pipe is coming up from the ground 170mm away from the house instead of a lot closer to the house, forming almost a tripping hazard.

• Sparky that we hired to connect power to the shed also was not impressed by how the electrical work was done. There is an excessive amount of wire in the switchboard cabinet and it is very hard to add new breakers. During the build the preparations were done for connecting 3-phase power to the shed: A breaker was installed and a conduit with a 3 phase cable in it from the switch board through the wall to a location 2 meter off the external wall. The sparky didn’t want to use that cable, as he would have to install a junction box buried at 600 mm. He preferred to run 1 cable from switch board all the way to the shed. Unfortunately he couldn’t do that. Something was blocking the conduit. To him it felt like somehow mortar ended up in the pipe. So, in the end he had to install the junction box. It is all not a major issue, but there was clearly lack of attention to ensure the conduit was open and to do the wiring in the cabinet neatly.

Underwhelming & forever will remain a traumatic experience!!!! – Standby for full review, we are holding off on review as we are still waiting for just over 20 defects (1 year later) to be corrected! Internal stairs started squeaking within the first three months of moving in, plaster bulging (putting shelves up now realising how uneven walls are, it’s actually laughable, see images of shelving) - the shelves… Read more

are dead straight without any curvature) garage entry slab unfinished,, unfinished painting to eaves… the list goes on!

The supervisor, at handover, back on the 05/04/2023 (will never forget that date cause it took 2 years to complete a 3 bedroom home), he said, “Guys, looking forward to your review, putting the past behind us and giving us your feedback”!

“Putting the past behind us”!?! Are you kidding me lol #hysterical !!!!!!

Now, 1 year later and only 1.5 correction made over the past two weeks with just over 20 pending, why are they not taking trades off their current projects and getting them to finish homes that are still , 12 months later. having UNFINISHED details …. 1 YEAR LATER!!!!!

Well, as an Autistic adult, I can tell you without any doubt in my mind, when it comes to the past and recalling it, it’s actually one of my strengths. In our FULL REVIEW I will be articulating my unforgettable experience with Bold Living and the underwhelming experience it was, the trauma that it caused and how their lack of attention to detail, follow up and follow through impacted our lives, not to mention the incompetence of their trades!!!!

I have been looking forward to it and have plenty of time to reflect and re-reflect and then reflect on that re-reflection

Standby

Constant lies, no progress, made me homeless – Myself and wife, seeking to build our first home. Preamble: Our land experienced heavy delays at the hands of our developer. The timeline below and the majority of delays are due to our developer (possibly purposefully) being 1.5 years behind their expected delivery date. While Bold has had minor delays in only a few stages of our journey, the… Read more

majority of the delays were NOT at the fault of Bold. Almost all builders were/are experiencing delays, due to the current climate of the building industry. I seek to present a truthful and detailed review, which will be updated into the post-construction stage. While Bold have asked for a review, they have in no way swayed my opinions, nor offered any sort of incentive for doing so.

Sales Consult - 13/01/21 After doing some light searching for a builder, Bold was one of a few builders recommended to us by our Real Estate Agent. We submitted an initial query and lined up a phone call with Bold's sales consultant ("New Home Consultant"). Spoke with AH on the phone, who was knowledgable and courteous, and answered all our questions and was able to customise a few things and soon provide an initial quote, site plan and floor plan that suited our needs and land. We had viewed a few different display homes and quotes from different builders and overall, Bold gave us the most confidence and quality for price.

First Preliminary Deposit - 19/01/21 This lets the builder know you are interested in moving forward, so that they are able to invest more time with you. With Bold, it pays for the initial paperwork sorting, drafting of the site, and the "Colour meeting" (see below), as it's colloquially termed.

Prelim Tender - 19/03/21 The First Prelim Deposit (above) also gives you access to "PropertyPro" - the online portal where the majority of your comms will take place, along with an area for all the files you will get; each tender, variation, plan, and signed contract will be uploaded here and you have access for the duration of your build. We got access to this 28/1/21, though contact is fairly basic with the Contracts Assistant until the Interior Design team book you in for the Colour meeting...

Pre-Construction and Colour meeting - Due to COVID, moved from initial 30/03/21 to 15/04/21 Met with Customer Support Specialist/Client Liaison Officer (CLO), TW, and Interior Design Consultant, JM. Signed Owners Consent, Amenities Letter and Pre-Construction Milestone docs. JM seemed very knowledgable when it came to what options and accessories were possible and even gave her opinions on styling when asked. We had already been to the showroom a couple of times prior to the appointment, so we had a decent idea from the items on display, but the options and customisation is actually far more complex. One small negative that does not help the confusion, is that there are no prices or tiering shown for the different options. Prices is probably due to fluctuating market rates for materials, but it would be good to know what options are standard and what are second tier, third tier, etc. Note: this appointment is not your last chance to get everything right. It gives you the opportunity to spend the day (incl lunch) talking to a stylist that knows the common products Bold uses and the customisations that are possible past that. They take notes on all your selections, go over your plans, incase you want to move a door or customise a facade, and provide advice. The next day, JM uploaded all the notes she took, plus any draft plan changes she made.

Electrical Meeting (Lucci Design) - 15/04/21 While at the showroom and interior design consult, we met with MC from Lucci Design, to do our electrical plan. MC had been in the industry a while and could give good basic advice around how many lights per room, what to do with fans, etc. I had a few more complex ideas which we fleshed out via email later on. I did have to draw my own custom wiring plan for camera networking, as it was specific and I would be doing the camera install later on. After about 4 emails back and forth over the next couple of months, we settled on our plan and fixed up any mistakes. To note: other than the custom network wiring, our electrical plan is not very fancy. A few neat placement ideas, but we were trying to keep costs down. We were allowed to source a few of our own lights, but they have to be up to AU standards and come with specs.

The Colour + Electrical meetings were held at Bold's head office and included coffee, morning tea and lunch. We met at about 9am and finished late afternoon. Double-story builds were given 2 days consult at the time, though we felt the single day was enough, being that we had visited the showroom earlier and were confident we could change anything else via online correspondence.

Prelim Tender v1 - 15/5/21 Comms back and forth with TW (CLO) for a few weeks, asking questions, doubting your selections, and ultimately the Tender V1 comes. This gives you a pricing of changes captured during the Colours Appointment. Bold don't draw up a new blueprint until further down the track, though we hadn't really made any huge interior changes.

Tender v2 - 27/05/21 Comms are made with TW, asking plenty of questions about what different notes on the tender mean, until we got familiar with how it's all displayed. Finding out that because you chose option 2 of a certain item, it means there's added costs to a different item, etc. So a few changes are reverted, others added. Tender 2 arrives. Comms and changes back and forth. In hindsight, our comms make urgency, and as time goes on, with our land being delayed further and further, we are starting to feel like idiots. We spent time asking about next steps and what timeline we will need for our broker, etc. Didn't know our land would still be 15 months off (you won't believe the stories I have of this developer). Bold always making us feel understood, though.

CLO #2 - 12/10/21 TW steps back as LS takes over. We make further changes to our tender.

20/01/22 Some items Bold refuses to do, even though I know of others that have had certain items done. Some of it is miscommunication within Bold of what's standard (floor transitions on ground floor), other's is Bold purely not wanting to offer items/services that others have received previously. After a couple of phone calls - and a shock at current pricing of some items - we come to an agreement. From here till about Feb/March, it's Bold asking for updates on our land. The reason is that the land (at this stage) was pretty much ready, but due to developer "delays" it still hadn't gone to titles or settlement. So we kept thinking we weren't far off. How embarrassing.

29/03/22 - 27/05/22 A complete facade change of mind and a change to the outdoor slab. Gates come off the development so the CLO orders the soil tests and they come back

CLO #3 25/05/22 LS is promoted to the construction side within Bold. New CLO MM.

27/05/22 Soil test results come back. We help Bold with some documents re engineering. MM suggests moving forward with updating the plans and the draft contract documents. Some minor corrections, questions and changes. MM picks up on a couple of mistakes we had made.

14/06/22 - 20/06/22 New price increase ~30% extra. This is due to the industry, the struggle for trades, trades wanting more money, COVID and other supply chain issues, and the uptake of similar supplies. To note that while it is unfortunately a lot of money, other builders were also increasing their prices a similar amount.

Second Preliminary Deposit - 29/06/22

Land is titled - 31/08/22 Some back and forth comms up to this point, with corrections, missing info, finalising options now that the site has been surveyed and we can look at our placement options and costs. Some negotiations on prices. Land is finally titled so contracts can be finalised

Land settled. Finally ours, 2 years late! - 22/09/22 Minor amendments, tidying up of the contract

HIA Contract Signed - 07/10/22

Further issues with our developer - 10/10/22 Developer is wanting a bond from all the lots, before they sign the covenant docs, in case the builder damages the retaining wall, gutter, etc.

Working drawings scheduled - 11/10/22

Developer drops bond requirement - 17/10/22 After a few phone calls and assessing my legal options, I persuade the developer to drop bond requirements for lots.

CLO #4 - 20/10/22 MM also transitions to construction side. JP takes over for the remaining few weeks.

Working drawings signed. Submitted to Council - 15/11/22 JP hands us over to Contracts Admin, SN.

Council Approval! - 19/12/22 Good little Christmas present. You get a few emails from different certifiers and such along the way.

Site Supervisor appointed - 19/01/23 Commencement dates with weather permitting: Site cut 03/02, Set out 09/02, Piers 13/02, Drains 22/02, Slab prep 28/02, Slab pour 01/03. SS assigned is ES - have heard promising things about her on some online communities.

Transition to construction - 20/01/23 Message from the Pre Construction team, handing us over to the Construction side, saying thanks and gently asking for a review - not incentivised.

I must say at this point, thank you so much to the CLO's, that have basically hand-held us through the entire process, explained each step, captured our numerous changes extremely well (only a few minor errors), and been professional and polite in every message they send. They are an asset to Bold Living, as any upset we have had at the pricing, or Bold's refusal to do certain requests, has stemmed from further up the chain. These CLOs do their best to be the middle-man between the extremely busy/stretched business, and the confused/stressed/emotional customers, over one of the most important and expensive purchases of their time. It cannot be an easy task to capture every change and question and answer it within 1-2 business days, multiplied by the number of customers each CLO deals with. Although I have only put 4/5 stars for "transparency" so far, that relates more to the decisions and pricing made by Bold Management, which at many times I argued to get it reviewed. A further example of this is when our contract was being drawn up, and Bold only then realised that the siting of the build was not to code, and that additional costs would need to be incurred once it was moved to a different location. Something Bold would have known from the early stages, due to their experience building within Brisbane City Council.

= Update: Here's where things start to go south. =

Site scrape/set-out- 13/02/23 Site scrape and set-out happened over the prior 2 weeks and piers went in this day. There was a huge amount of spoil left on my neighbours property. Turns out that the contract didn't have spoil removal in it, but it also wasn't proposed to us (to the best of my memory), so we had to organise to get that moved. Bold quoted 20k through their contractor. I got it done for 3k.

Piers and drains - 24/02/23 Piers and drains went in. Pour was supposed to happen around this time but had to be delayed. Independent inspector rocked up to do the pre-pour inspection and called me to say there's no way it was ready. No one at Bold actually let me know till I called them to find out what was going on.

Pre-pour inspection - 08/03/23 Pour had to be moved to this date. Inspection found reo not tied, reo touching the formwork, holes around drains not sealed in the vapour barrier, dirty trenches, missing re-entrant bars, reo without chairs (sitting on ground), and huge gaps in the formwork. I called our SS and told her I need reassurance these issues will get fixed before the concrete is poured, as it's not to code. SS kept saying "It will be. It has to be." and I kept asking "how would I be assured of this?" We eventually settled that concreters would take photos of all their rectifications before they poured.

Slab pour and follow up on inspection - 09/03/23 Slab was poured. It was a mess. The form work was not fixed up and therefore there was huge concrete over-pour which Bold will have to pay a labourer to jackhammer/cut out. It makes me wonder what else wasn't fixed. To continue this topic, I ended up chasing the SS for 2 weeks (till 22/3/23) to get the photos of the "rectifications". What I got was 2 blurry, tiny photos of some reo. I wouldn't even be able to see if it was my house, let alone any fixes. They were literally useless images. I doubt my slab is to code. I later noticed the laundry waste was completely missed. We had paid extra for this and it was missed. We had to settle for cutting a trench out of the slab and running a dry waste to a frog-flap out the side of the slab.

Frame - 24/03/23 to 20/04/23 Frame completed over this time period.

Hang-on platform delay to complete roof - 02/04/23 Formal notice of delays to roof and construction, due to delays with getting the hang-on platform. One positive is that Bold seems to take safety into account, whereas other builders around us are progressing faster, as they have workers on weekends and have completed large sections of upper levels without any safety barriers/scaff.

Steel Frame Inspection - 04/05/23 Findings: Termite barrier system broken, dry floor waste unfinished and requires form 12, frame overhanging slab rebate by over 40mm in some places, screw fasteners missing, bottom plate not fixed in some areas, swarf metal filings causing rust, damaged frame sections, screws missing from studs, giant gaps to load-bearing posts, loose nuts, 1x tie-down bolt broken out of slab.

Notice that SS left - 09/05/23 Yep.

Gutter/fascia/roof - 25/05/23 Promised certifier would attend site for Form 16 regarding rectifications this week. Didn't happen.

New SS - 05/06/23 GT is the new SS. Seems friendly and honest. We will see how it goes.

Plumbing/electrical rough-in, windows fitted and a site meeting - 13/06/23 Met SS & electricians on site, to go over the plans and upcoming works. A few things actually managed to happen around this time: Plumbing and electrical rough-in, wrap, windows and doors fitted.

Carpet discontinued - 10/07/23 Bold didn't know. 18/07/23 new choice confirmed and variation signed.

Bricks FINALLY started - 04/08/23 We've been told each week, for 5 weeks, that the bricks would be started "this week". They finally did a few lousy courses of bricks by 04/08. We were also told every week that the following things would happen, and they still haven't: Bricklaying Completion, Issue of Form 16 Frame inspection, Brick Cap Flashing Measures/ Install, Cladding commencement.

Can't contact SS - 14/08/23 As of this date, the bricks still are not completed. It's been 6 or so weeks waiting for bricks to be laid to a bottom level. We got a short update on PropertyPro last night, to say this week would include: Scaffold install, Brickwork to be completed, Upper Wrap to be completed, Brick Cap lashings to be measured. Worth noting I can see from the outside that the insulation is in, but the top wrapping also isn't completed. Apart from that, the fence is basically useless, as there's giant gaps missing, tradies from another site were using our power box, alcohol cans found onsite (illegal), and private property stolen from up the back of the site. The fence has gaps in it of 5 or so meters. Not sure what the point of it is - could have just saved money and not bothered to hire it, or perhaps saved money by actually locking it up and not having things stolen/damaged. I have sent the SS a text this morning, with some images and to ask him to call when available, and I have called this afternoon with no answer. Strange when an SS tells you to always give them a text and they'll get back to you. Must be under the pump.

Really disappointing to have the build side of things come across such delays and broken promises, when houses that started months after ours are now well ahead of ours. Not a raving review for Bold. To be continued.

= Update #2: Becoming a running joke. =

Third SS - 18/08/23 Changed our SS to CB. Supposedly so all lots in our estate are now with the one new SS. Makes sense.

Meet SS on site - 11/09/23 (Called 5/9/23 to organise as had only got some short updates online) Met CB on site. He seems like an honest bloke, promises to get things done. Took a tour through the build. Within 1 second I could see the waterproofing was an absolute joke (or disgrace, depending on your take). Told SS it needs to be fixed (I would think they should be checking these things themselves at each visit). I also pointed out the temporary down-pipes have been missing the entire build so far, and some other smaller concerns.

Stairs - 14/09/23 SS sent some photos of the installed stairs. Was a nice surprise - didn't know they were going in. They look good. Can finally see how the void/staircase/lighting/hallway space will be.

Alcohol on site - 18/09/23 Visited the outside of the site. 7 beer bottles and alcohol cans can be seen in the skip bin and along the scaffolding. Highly illegal to have alcohol on site. This is the second time I've brought this to Bold's attention and it was shrugged off. Not sure if work is being done or tradies are just having a drinking session. Doesn't give me hope about the quality of our house with that much alcohol being drunk on site. Also brought to SS's attention: broken yard drainage pipes, and the temporary down-pipe that has been installed is flapping in the wind, because they didn't tape it to the pipe in the earth. Someone literally hung it at the top and said to themselves "that'll do".

Bricks still not complete, garage door in - 26/09/23 Bricky had promised to finish the bricks on Saturday. Visited site on Sunday - bricks not done, but cladding started in the places the bricks were finished. Messaged SS and left voicemail Monday. Had to give him another call Tuesday to get in contact. When I got a hold of SS, I asked when will Bold get rid of this complete joke of a contractor? SS says bricky promised the work finished 23rd, then 26th, now 27th. Don't know why Bold won't just remove the bricky and give the job to someone else. Should have been done weeks/months ago. SS says he gave our neighbour's brick job to a different bricky because they couldn't trust this one, but why haven't they don't the same with ours? We started our build months before the neighbour, so if Bold had of listened to our complaint about the bricks, we'd have lock-up stage complete, another payment to Bold, inspection done, and tiling and fit-out could have been done. We could honestly be months ahead of where we are. Currently in week 11 of bricks while Bold gives my neighbour someone reliable instead. Definitely won't be in by the time our lease runs out in February (12 months from site start). Hoping we can extend for 6 months. On a lighter note, our garage door went in and SS says kitchen cabinetry should be in this week.

= Update 3: Will be homeless =

25/01/24 - New year, no change Over the past 4 months, the cabinetry was completed, external cladding installed, flooring in, plumbing and electrical fit-off completed. That's about it. Bricks still not complete, with many defects still to be rectified. Multiple times since October '23, we have raised concerns with the SS and the Construction Manager, about the amount of work still to be done, and questioned if we should be looking at renewing our rental lease. The SS had maintained "It's 1.5 weeks worth of work. You definitely don't have to worry about that". We are now very worried and will be homeless.

My solar install was booked to be done in 2023, yet needed the electrical fit-off completed. Every week - even multiple times a week - the promised date for electrical fit-off was broken. It was eventually done on the second-last working week of '23, leaving no time for the installer to fit it in, and thus we would get less solar credits (rebate) next year.

The first PCI date we had, was set for 20 December - still with brick finishes/rectifications, balustrade, external window moulding, external rendering + painting, final patch and paint, and (at the time) flooring and electrical fit-off to go. This date was maintained (and questioned) up until 2 days before - the 18 December - when we were told that the date wouldn't be made and would have to be moved to Jan. The Construction Manager's answer was "If the SS believes PCI will be on the 20th, then I believe it". This was after weeks of no reply from the SS, after voicemails and texts were sent. The chat with the Construction Manager was just continuous excuses for the SS/trades.

Come January, the PC date was then moved to early Feb, and now late Feb. Our lease will be up, new tenants have been found, we will be homeless due to Bold's consistent lies and lack of progress. We are waiting on a balustrade to at least get a temp OC. Apparently there was only 2 suppliers, and now only 1. Meanwhile our neighbour Bold build has had their balustrade for a few months, while we have been ready for a balustrade since mid 2023. Carpet and flooring went in. It's supposed to be the last thing done. Now we have mud marks on the carpet, and the bedroom carpet has a lump in the underlay. Oh, and the flooring guys smashed the laundry door, so that hasn't had the glass cleaned up in weeks now, and instead it'll get scratched into our tiles, while the Brisbane summer rain pours in.

In the 3 weeks Bold have been back, only temp scaffolding has gone up, and then more had to be added, as apparently the first wasn't enough. That's it. My own driveway booking has had to be pushed back twice, as this temp scaffold is still up because the window moulding and render have not yet been done. I write this at the end of a week with dry weather. I'm also certain I will have to rebook it again.

Regarding one of the brick rectifications - the lack of expansion/articulation joints beside the windows - Bold have opted to order new windows with an outer frame 5mm less wide, so that the gap can be placed without having to move the bricks. This means ripping off the internal window mouldings (which we have already measured and ordered shutters for), to access the window frames. Elsewhere, we are missing brick infills, have giant gaps in brick around a frog-flap, even brick depths, columns started with different brick course heights, loose bricks under the front entry, etc. Of course Bold will ignore these if they are within tolerances or not specifically stated in the codes. And at this point, we could not deal with having the entire wall knocked down and redone by someone professional (and hopefully qualified).

So here we are, with still a two-page list of items to complete or rectify. 3 working weeks since we were told we would have PC, with nothing but some temporary scaffolding erected since. Next door is getting their bricks rendered. I hope, if ours ever gets done, that the render can hold together all the loose bricks in high-traffic areas, and not instantly crack. The CM has promised us an update by the SS this week. It's the last working day of the week and we are waiting.

Cheers Bold, thanks for helping us "live our dream" of being homeless in February. Thanks for the lies, the bottom-barrel trades, and the lack of organisation. Would I build again? Probably not. Would I choose Bold Living? Not even if it was free.

Any after construction defects or repairs are terrible – All started great and the construction process was good but as soon as we took ownership bold just keeps palming us off. Now after more than 2 years we still don't have original defects fixed and infact have new defects due to flashing repairs causing plaster to fall from our skylights. Bold response was we don't know how to fix it !!!!!. Bloody… Read more

terrible. Our stacker doors are unsupported and dropping, even after more than 5 visits the only repair was to knock 5 bricks out wedge in plastic packers and replace bricks with different colour grout. Leaving us with protruding door tracks above our tiles inside and not fixing the issues. Looks like qbcc here we come.

We love our house – We had a great experience throughout our build. Our sales consultants really went the extra mile in helping us choose the right block, steering us away from potentially problematic blocks and ended up being bang on the money on how much it would cost to complete the home we wanted. Both our sales consultant and sales manager were brilliant… Read more

throughout.

Colour selection: the team at evolve really know what they are doing and gave us great advice. Having that facility available to visit any time really helped us get an idea of what we wanted.

Contract signing and management: Bolds management were very knowledgeable and helpful with a few situations that arose around government grants. Bolds management went over our contract with us and we’re very professional.

Build: we built during the worst time the construction industry has faced. We knew what we were getting into but bold were always very upfront as well. We faced La Niña weather, Covid and material shortages but our supervisor Mick was always able to keep the build progressing, he’d schedule weekly calls to keep us informed, worked with suppliers to source alternatives in our favour of our selections couldn’t be sourced in time and always made sure we got the right outcome. Our build was finished before our agreed contractual timeline even with all the construction pressures for which we are very grateful for

5 months in to our new home and we couldn’t be happier with our build!