Owner Builder eductaion and resources just got a whole lot better, again! Now each of our owner builder students will have access to a website dedicated to Project Management. Keep an eye on this blog and the website for details as this is developed and launched over the next couple of weeks.

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You know, sometimes it just makes good sense to go against your gut.

Other times you simply need to listen to what everybody else is saying.

Well, I guess that is one of those times.

As much as I have resisted it, the demand and requests for a traditional hard copy correspondence version has overcome me.

We now offer the same great content and courseware in a hard copy format. I was against this because of the increase in our costs which I have to pass on to the end usre (student).

With the online course, almost everything you get is off the net and downloadable. We have no real costs in either time or materials to get the information to you.

The hard copy course is different, we have to compile and collate the manual content, print and bind the manuals, pay for postage and then mark the assessment when it comes back. All work we would rather not do, but hey, you asked for it.

So we now offer a correspondence course (printed versions) for $220.00.

You will still have access to the forums and the ability to join our owner builder community sharing resources (downloadable) and experiences.

The course content is the same and the assessment is simply undertaken in the traditional manner with you sending us back your completed works.

Anyway, more on this soon, don’t forget to visit us at www.ownerbuildercourses.com

Best Regards,

Rick

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Since I last posted, some very important changes have occured to both our organisation and the way in which the New South Wales Department of Fair Trading are processing owner builder applications.

Firstly, we are continuing to build our business to be the ultimate information portal for owner builders across the country.

We have acheived accrediation and approval in our own right as a Registered Training Organisation and offer the following nationally accredited courses:

• 39129QLD Course in preparation for owner builder permit, which is the recognised course for the issue of an owner builder permit by the Building Services Authority in Queensland
• 91498NSW Course in owner builder compliance, which is the new course developed by the Department of Fair Trading in New South Wales, for the issue of an owner builder lecense in New South Wales.
• CPCCOHS1001A Work safely in the construction industry, which for our Queensland students will allow us to issue the general safety induction card for the construction industry.

The changes to the New South Wales owner builder course come into affect on Septmeber 1st, 2010.

Our existing course will remain approved and be offered until this date, at which time we will transistion to the new course.

Anyone undertaking the course currently will have until the end of December to receive their permit based on the ‘old’ qualifiaction.

In moving to the new course, the format will change and we are at present developing new owner builder resources which are consistent with the new course content and satisfy the requirements under the Australian Quality Training Framework.

Two new videos have been posted to our owner builder course website, with three more to follow over the next three weeks. Keep an eye out for those.

If you have any questions on owner building in any state or territory in Australia, please do not hesitate to drop us an email or browse around our website.

Happy Building.

Rick

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It is extremely interesting and one of the minefields that you can run into if your builder ‘does a runner’.

Question:

We were undertaking a regular renovation job with a licensed builder.  The full value of the works was $240,000  but, with only the $12,000 Practical Completion stage left to go, the builder suddenly went AWOL.  1.5 years (of not being able to live in our house) later we have just finished up at the Tribunal and the builder (of course) ended up paying us a (paltry in comparison to legal fees) amount to cover the cost of defects and some amount towards completion of the project.

Now, in undertaking to complete the project under an owner-builder license, how do we estimate the cost of the project?  We will only be overseeing about $25,000 worth of work.  But we are, effectively, continuing the larger project.  On forms, is our estimate of the work to be undertaken the amount that WE will personally be overseeing under our OB license, or the full value of the renovation our original builder abandoned?

My Response:

Hi,

This will come down to an interpretation of what the Department of Fair Trading and your certifier consider is ‘fair’.

I would be only paying the fees on the actual amount you are going to oversee as an owner builder, that is your legal responsibility.

The sticking point will be the HOW insurance (Home Owner Warranty).

Without seeing the transcripts of the findings, it would be reasonable to assume that if the original builder was appropriately licenced and contracted, then he would have he HOW insurance on the full amount of the works.

HOW insurance is to cover exactly the situation you are in, so if it was insufficient to cover your costs, that is disappointing.

Another issue will arise if you sell the property within the 5 year period of the Owner Builder Permit or before all structural and statutory warranties expire.

I would seek the advice of the insurance provider who covered the original project.

I hope this helps.

Best Regards,

Rick Heaton

As you can see, it is a difficult uestion to answer but it reinforces the advice we give to owner builder that they ensure they understand the requirements of insurances and use correct and complete contractural processes when engaging any tradseperson.

It also highlight the fact that anyone building a new dwelling or renovating their existing home should undertake a course like ours to  increase their awareness of the potential pitfalls and areas they should carefully consider.

Doing a course such as our owner builder courses will not stop these things happening, but they will make you all that better prepared to handle and resolve these issues.

Best Regards and Happy Building

Rick Heaton

Abacus Training

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Over the last couple of weeks, wwe have had a name change and would like to introduce Abacus Training.

The name change has occured due to a change in business direction.

The nationall recognised Queensland Owner Builder Course 39219QLD will remain and continue to be provided through our parent company Owner Building Solutions Australia Pty Ltd.

Abacus will provide the approved NSW Owner Builder Course and the ACT approved Owner Builder Course.

Abacus will now povide all non accredited courses and support for the remaining states and territories.

Over time, all courseware and delivery will be handled solely through Abacus Training.

There is no change to the management structure or the company in terms of commttment and quality of services provided to our owner builders, just a need for a change and a refocus on our most important clients.

The owner builders of Australia.

Stay tuned for more exciting roll outs and news over the comming weeks.

Best Regards and Happy Building

Rick

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Over the last couple of months, we have been working with the Australian Capital Territory Planning Authourity to have our online and correspondence courses approved for delivery in the ACT.

The online owner builder course is $117.00, with the correspondence course costing just $177.00 (the additional is to cover our printing and postage cost of course reading and resources plus manual marking of assessments)

As one of only 4 recognised course providers in the ACT, we have already had three satisfied students successfully undertake the course and gain their Certificate of Completion.

So if you are thinking of building your own home as an owner builder, in the ACT then consider our course.

Like all our products, we offer full support via email during the course and throughout the construction of your owner builder project.

Keep watching for more news and innovations from our owner builder website.

Best Regards and Happy Building

Rick

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There is not a simple answer and of course it depends on how disciplined, organised and prepared the owner builder is.

Just last week, I got a call from one of my students who is doing an owner builder project on the Gold Coast. The block is quite steep and there are substantial earthworks and concrete foundations required to accomodate the design.

She told me she had three quotes from concrete suppliers ranging from $260.00 per cubic meter (delivered) to $176.00 per cubic meter delivered. Thats an eighty four dollar difference, by simply making three phone calls.

Lets use these figures and consider an average home of standard design at around 280 square meters floor area including the garage. We could assume a minimum of 6 cubic meters required for the strip footings and 28 cubic meters for the slab.

A total of 34 cubic meters.

An owner builder saving $84.00 a cubic meter can potentially put $2856.00 in their pocket or borrow that much less.

Now I know, a well organised builder will probably pay the lower of the prices, but if his mark up to cover profit, overheads and administration is a modest 15% you will still effectively pay $202.00 a cubic meter.

At that figure the saving is $26.00 a cubic meter or $884.00.

Now this is only one item of the hundreds of opportunites that owner builders have to save money, and this is a commodity item where the prices between suppliers is reasonably constant.

The big money is saved on one off or designer type fittings and fitments that with a bit of shopping around can realise huge savings.

I recently purchased a front door on behalf of an owner builder client and foud prices ranging from $4200.00 to $1800.00 for the same quality and design. We ultimately purchased the door for $2720.00 from the supplier who originally quoted $4200.00, saving the owner builder $1480.00.

So yes, owner builders can and shohuld save money when building their own home.

Owner builders should save between 15% and 30% when building a custom home, however it is very difficult to compete with project builders who have their prices and margins trimmed to the bone.

A final note for anyine thinking of becoming an owner builder and building their own home;

On a standard home loan of $300,000 over 25 years at 7% interest, every dollar you save in the building of your own home will save you roughly the same amount in interest payments over the term of the loan, effectively doubling the savings.

Not bad hey?

Don’t forget to visit our website at www.ownerbuildercourses.com

Happy Building

Rick

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The first of these videos “What Will I Learn” takes an indepth look at the contents of our owner builder courses.

This owner builder video will outline the basic legal requirements that exist for each of the states and territories in Australia and discuss general responsibilites that an owner builder must assume when building or rennovating their own home.

In the second section of the video, we discuss each of the topics that the owner builder course covers and provides basic instructional information to help anyone thinking of becoming an owner builder to  better realise the importance of choosing the correct owner builder course.

Yes it is a promotional video and it will be available to anyone visiting our website, but it does provided vital information for anyone considering building a new home or rennovating an existing dwelling.

The next few videos we will release over the coming weeks will be more in depth and specific to each of the topics covered in our owner builder courses, including demonstrations on how to get the most from the free resources we offer each of our owner builder students.

These will of course be available to our owner builder students and client and controlled/accessed through a password protected page on our website.

Keep an eye out for them.

Oh and I forgot to mention, we are about to relaunch the student forum, sorry about the delay, but the forum hosts had a ferw server issues,we are hoping to get old posts and topics back up online but this may take a few weks.

Best Regards and Happy Owner Building

Rick Heaton

www.ownerbuildercourses.com

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We have been working on several areas and now offer each of our owner builder courses both on lin and in the more traditional hard copy version.

The price for our online courses will remain the same throughout 2010, with $117.00 in our opinioin being the best value owner builder course offered anywhere in Australia.

That is not to say we are the cheapest, we have never claimed to be, we know of one course out there that is available for about $85.00, but when you look at the additional content, resources and support we offer, we still believe our course to be the best value.

There is a lot of confusion out there at the moment about who needs to do a course and who does not.

The need to complete a recognised owner builder course depends basically on two things:

1) Which State or Territory you are building in, and

2) The value of the proposed work that will be covered by the owner builder permit.

At this time, there are only three states or territories where you need to complete a mandatory approved course, they are New South Wales, Queensland and the Australian Capital Territory.

Our owner builder courses are approved in Queensland and New South Wales by the relevant authority and we are at present working with the Land and Planning Authority in the ACT to get approval to provide an approved course that will be recognised by them.

This new owner builder course for the ACT will be submitted for approval mid January so wach this space if you are considering owner building in our capital.

Hard copy correspondence courses are now available for all states at $177.00, the additional $60.00 over the online course proce covers our production and administrative fees such as, printing, postage and hand marking of the assessment once it is submitted.

Correspondence students have access to all the online materials, resources and support, but we have been asked to make the hard copy version available for those of you who are not that comfortable learnining on a computer.

Why do an owner builder course if you are building in a state or territory where it is not mandatory?

Simply because our courses are more thatn just tick box exercises to get you through the owner builder application.

Each of our courses is designed and delivered in two parts:

1) Covering the legal aspects and responsibilities of owner building in you particular state or territory.

2) Giving you skills, knowledge and resources to manage you owner builder project effectively, covering the important areas of:

• Contract Administration
• Working with Consultants/Professionals
• Workplace Health and Safety
• Plan Reading and Baasic Estimating
• Design
• On Site and Off Site Administration
• Tendering and
• Scheduling

Each of these area is covered and you are introduced to the basics to provide an awareness of your roles and responsibilities as an owner builder.

We give you access to tools such as forms, letters, registers and schedules to assist you to keep track of your project and to help you have the best owner builder experience.

I hope this has answered some of the questions that many of you are asking and I would like to take this opportunity to wish each and everyone of you a Happy New Year.

Best Regards and Happy Building

Rick

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Owner Building permits issued nationwide were at the lowest level for many years with an average 20% drop experienced in most states.

Good news is, the outlook is for an improving economy, higher levels of activity in the residential building sector and an anticipated return to higher numbers of people taking on projects as owner builders.

What have we got in store for you in 2010?

Glad you asked, we have been qorking behind the scenes to develop even more owner building resources to assist our students and our clients to get the most from their projects.

In the first couple of weeks of February we will roll out a new website which will give online access to our Owner Builder Project and Safety Management Systems. This will stop you having to download an .exe file and will gie you the opportunity to print the resource right off the screen.

More video tutorials are under development with the first due for release in a couple of weeks, it will focus on the general application process for obtaining an owner builder permit and will consider the differing requirements of each of the states and territories.

Look out for some great offers and deals that we are putting together with suppliers that will provide access to a range of building materials, goods and services at discounted prices.

Another focue will be on the continued growth of our Owner Builder Forum and the associated community. This has been disappointing slow, but we will try to get more involved over the coming months, so please if you are an existing student check it out.

Anyway, thanks for taking the time to stop by and check out the latest post, we wish you a very succesful year and all the best in your owner builder endeavours.

As always, our primary goal is to provide the very best in owner builder courses and resources.

Happy Building,

Rick Heaton

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