Juggling landscaping ideas..

This is one thing we definitely DID NOT budget for.. Landscaping! The surprises keep coming when you build... all part of the "fun" :/ As part of the deal building a house at Aurora is the "inclusion" of front landscaping, but to what extent we really don't know so we have to set aside a little bit of money for that as well as landscaping around the rest of the house which we will need to do ourselves. Anyhow, landscaping is a never ending money pit as you can spend close to nothing nothing and have just dirt and lawn as your landscape or as much as 30% of the home purchase price to have all the bells and whistles!! (Think massive water features)

Well, we decided we wanted practicality and contemparory, "low maintenance" landscaping but at what cost? We decided to set a budget and draw up something that we think we would like and see if we can fit it all in. What we saw at a display home earlier last year was something that we liked and would like to acheive if our budget allows. If not we can always break it down into a few stages. Look at the drawing and pictures below for a rough idea.

The look of the 1st outdoor living area we are after, minus water feature.

The look of the 2nd outdoor living area we are after, minus spa-bath.


















We may go with plain simple concrete with a small water feature and neat vegetation.


















Clean lines are what we are after and white pebbles+pavers look great.

A Balinese Thatch like this in the backyard will set us back approx $3000 without decking!

So there we go, some ideas of what we would like but it will all come down to cost.