From Landed House To Condo: A Family’s $300k Renovation Journey To Create A Spacious Home

8 min read

For larger families, moving from the spaciousness of a landed property to a condo can be challenging; but it also brings new opportunities – and with the right kind of layout and design, a smaller condo unit can still feel quite spacious. This week, we look at a unit at The Nexus that manages to still be comfortable for an extended family who made the move from a landed home. Here’s how the project came together:

From renovation considerations to moving

The owner, S, says the plan was originally to renovate their semi-detached home. The idea was to do this over time in stages; however, the idea eventually changed to just moving house altogether:

“My family encountered an unforeseen event, which triggered our exploration of selling instead of renovating. Selling was always in the timeline, just a matter of when. Upon research, I thought that this was actually a good time to sell as my semi-d, which was around 20 years old, was still in a good state and did not look too dated. Whoever bought my house would only need to do a gut renovation instead of any extensive A&A works.”

S decided it was more likely to fetch a better price now than if he waited another 10 to 15 years, by which time it would look more dated to potential buyers. In addition, he estimated he would end up spending around $250,000 to renovate if held on for another decade or more. 

“The other main reason was for my elderly parents who co-owned the semi-d with me and my wife. We thought that right-sizing would free up some cash for their retirement.”

As such, S contacted his agents and was able to sell the semi-detached home in around four months. 

Deciding on The Nexus

The Nexus is a freehold condo located along Bukit Timah Road, which was completed in 2006. This 242-unit project is just a short walk to King Albert Park MRT (DTL, CRL), and is known for being close to Methodist Girls School (just across from Floridian and Maple Woods). 

For S, one of the considerations was a condo unit that was large enough for his family:

“The new home would need to house seven people; my parents, my family and my helper. I needed an apartment with a decent enough space. Consideration was also given to the fact that we would be moving from a much bigger landed home to a more cosy space, so the luxury of personal and storage space would be reduced by a lot. Hence, my new home criteria was that it had to be a minimum of 1,100 sq ft with at least 3 bedrooms.”

The Nexus being freehold was also important to S, as he doesn’t like to move frequently, and was considering a stay of at least around 15 years. Freehold properties are often preferred by buyers with longer holding periods, as they don’t suffer the lease decay issues of leasehold counterparts.

“The final criteria was that the location searched should not be too far from where my parents and my family are comfortable with: VivoCity, Clementi and West Coast.”

While S prefers not to disclose the budget, the dollar amount was also one of the main considerations – part of the plan was also to free up some cash for the parents’ retirement fund.

In light of these requirements, some of the condos S also considered included:

• Tessarina
• Maplewoods (next to The Nexus)
• Cascadia
• Sixth Avenue Residences

S also viewed a few condos in the River Valley area, which included Aspen Heights, The Imperial, and UE Square. But while he really liked Aspen Heights, the decision to keep to Bukit Timah was due to his family being most comfortable there, and school distances being practical. 

At this time though, S hadn’t yet considered The Nexus. In fact, some of his first offers were made for units at Cascadia and Sixth Avenue. However, the offers were rejected. S says that:

“My offers were by no means lowball offers, I offered more than the highest bank valuation obtained for the units. I was willing to pay Cash Over Valuation. Up until then, I didn’t know COVs existed outside of HDB sales. If the offers were accepted, they would have set the record price per square foot for their development. But the property climate in 2023 was pretty bonkers then, and the sellers who had holding power held out for more.”

S was concerned that he would end up settling for lesser backup choices, but that was when he came upon a listing at The Nexus:

“I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw that it ticked every single box in my criteria list. Chief of which was a junior master that had an ensuite bathroom, and could fit a king sized bed (albeit a tad squeezy). 

Comparatively, I saw a unit at Cascadia which had a junior master that had an ensuite bathroom also, but that room could just fit a super single.”

Unfortunately, the Nexus listing was almost $200,000 beyond the budget. Nonetheless, S felt strongly that this was the one to push for. 

This is, incidentally, one of the dangers of property portal filters. 

When you set a hard price limit, your search tends to leave out ideal units, but may be beyond the stated cap. While the Nexus listing was much higher than the stated budget, note that S might not have seen it at all had a filter blocked it. 

We’ve also heard of filters blocking out more suitable units, which are just a few thousand dollars above the cap. So sellers, beware of picking numbers like $1.501 million (as the filter may be set at a round number like $1.5 million), and buyers, consider filtering by requirements other than budget first.

Nonetheless, S got lucky and happened to find the listing. As if by divine providence, the agent of the Nexus listing was from the same agency as his own property agent, so they could organise a viewing as soon as the next day. 

“I went to view it and was really satisfied with everything I saw, from the development, to the state and size of the apartment, and also the sellers were very nice people (rather than seeing the grouchy faces of tenants who are forced to open their homes for viewing haha).” 

S put in an offer the same night and it was accepted. It had been a long road though, taking around three months and 30 viewings; and yet the Nexus listing had been settled in a single day.

Picking Modern Luxe as a vibe

S started doing a deep dive on design styles, after securing his unit. He noticed the prevalence of Scandinavian and Japanese styles: these tend to be quite minimalist, combining wood tones with simple shapes and surfaces. However, S favours stone over wood textures and didn’t find many of these designs to his taste.

“I personally thought that the Modern Luxe theme, which included plush velvet textures aside from marble and stone, was more comfortable than the hardwood and rough cotton materials ubiquitous to Japandi/Scandi you would see at Muji and Ikea. And thus I decided that the modern luxe theme was what I was looking for.”

As inspiration, S watched many interior design videos of Taiwanese origin and noted how a lot of their work exudes a five or six-star hotel vibe. He also liked how there was no need to have white walls, instead leaning toward some kind of textured or patterned surface (laminate, stone, or wallpaper). 

Having settled on a theme, S then found A Blue Cube Design (ABCD) to execute these ideas. To avoid the risks posed by unknown IDs, S opted to go by personal recommendation – he reached out to ABCD when they were referred by a close friend, who had engaged them for a Sixth Avenue Residences project.

S had also visited the Sixth Avenue unit a few times, so he had a good sense of the style and quality. He also liked that they specialised in the Modern Luxe theme, which provided some confidence in their ability to execute.

Managing the renovations

S has the advantage of being able to work from home. This allowed him to work at the condo’s clubhouse while checking on progress during his lunch breaks. S also did anticipate the time needed, and had saved up almost all of his off days for 2023 – these would be used to handle issues of renovating and moving in. This was also necessary as his wife had just started a new job, and her limited leave days were needed for the children. 

Throughout the process, there were a few unexpected changes. One of the renovation goals was to “futureproof” the home:

“To be ready for 10 Gbps internet connection, I installed CAT6A cables throughout, and planned where on the ceiling to put my access points. However, I severely underestimated the space needed in my DB cabinet for a network switch and gateway. After much research, I settled for a different and more expensive device than what was planned, to accommodate the tighter space in my DB cabinet.” 

S also found that his first choices of tiles and stone were either out of stock or found to be sub-par after quality checks, and this led to changes in some of the materials needed. S also noted that spaces can seem quite different when physically viewed instead of on paper, with some spaces looking too narrow or squeezed on a floor plan but being tolerable in reality.

As is common with most renovation projects, the budget also changed. S had estimated a cost of around $240,000, but the eventual price (inclusive of accessories) was closer to $300,000. This was due to S adding on to the project, after consideration:

“I had thought of keeping the common toilet untouched in its original form. But after looking at it a few times, I realised that the previous owner’s design and theme would not match my theme, and the toilet would stick out like a sore thumb. So I added one more fully gutted and renovated toilet into the equation.”

Other changes included hacking away a wall and some door frames, and repairs to the 10-year-old windows. A lot of the cost increments came from the accrued fees of small things, like simple changes to light switches. However, S was expecting such changes when it came to renovations.

Some small regrets in hindsight 

S says there are some minor things he would change; he feels he wasn’t fussy enough with some of the work done. While ABCD did do high-quality work, S says he might have asked for things like thicker epoxy grouting; and he also regrets not changing his room doors and putting on too many window restrictors.

“I’m not sure about my clothes dryer purchase as well,” he says, “because I’m planning to get the ceiling-hanging drying rack blower also. I feel I rushed into buying some electrical accessories, which in hindsight, I might not need.” 

Some advice for homeowners doing their renovations

S advises an estimate of 20 to 40 per cent above the given budget. Otherwise, you might feel you’ve “downgraded” or regret certain choices later, which you made to keep the costs down. In addition, he suggests setting aside a budget to rent a storage space, especially if you’re right-sizing from a bigger home:

“Trust me, right-sizing WILL require you to not only dispose of half of your stuff but also require you to store the other third of your stuff, which you just cannot bring yourself to throw –  and there’s really no space in your smaller new home to accommodate them.”

Finally, S says it’s a good idea to engage professional post-renovation cleaners. Some of these now have services like anti-formaldehyde treatment packages; S used Mop Squad for this. 

In our experience, families with very young children and pets are most likely to need these services, given their close contact with floor and wall surfaces. 

For more homeowners experiences, and reviews of new and resale condos alike, follow us on Stacked.