How the dash to build is turning dream homes into nightmares
A £700,000 home whose garden has a sewage pumping station beneath it. Mysterious holes, nails poking up through carpets, even bouncing floors ...
WITH summer just around the corner, Mark Buller and his family should be looking forward to enjoying the sunshine in the garden of their newly-built £700,000 detached home.
Instead they anticipate spending the season doing the opposite — staying inside, shutting the windows and trying as hard as they can to keep the great outdoors, well, outdoors.
The reason? The developers of their estate in Frimley, Surrey, chose to site a sewage pumping station beneath their front garden — waste from eight neighbouring properties is channelled through a tank under their lawn.
‘It’s ridiculous — everything stinks,’ says 41-year-old sales manager Mr Buller who, with his wife and three children, moved into the property in June 2016.
‘Why should my family have to live in a house that smells like this? The kids can’t play outside in nice weather, because that’s when it’s worst. We can’t have people over for barbecues because it’s embarrassing. Who wants to sit outside in those conditions?’
A very good question and one that he has been putting to Linden Homes, the estate’s developer, for the past 18 months.
Mr Buller claims that when he bought the property he was never informed about what lurked beneath his lawn nor shown any drainage or sewage plans.
The property was still a ‘building site’ when he first viewed it, and he says he felt under pressure to rush the purchase.
‘We made an offer of £700,000 and it was accepted, but we were told we had to complete within two-and-a-half weeks if we wanted the deal at that price. The day I moved in, they were only just laying the grass as I pulled up.’
It was not until a month later that Mr Buller spotted manhole covers on his front lawn.
Linden Homes disputes his version of events and the two sides are now at loggerheads. Mr Buller has resorted to direct action, hanging banners outside his home to warn off potential buyers on the estate and threatening legal action against Linden Homes.
While his behaviour may seem extreme, Linden is not the only builder to come in for criticism. Pressure to fulfil targets for building new homes has resulted in floods of complaints from customers. Problems include bouncing floors, leaks, missing insulation, poor drainage and unfinished gardens — as well as some cases of appalling customer service.
THIS time last year one company, Bovis, was singled out for particular criticism. After it was forced to apologise, it set aside £10million to pay for repairs and promised to cut back from building 6,000 homes a year to 3,500.
The Home Builders Federation (HBF), the industry’s representative body, admitted that pressure to build new homes quickly had resulted in short-term problems. But it claims a corner has been turned and customer satisfaction is on the rise.
Others are far from convinced. Across social media, groups charting the complaints of buyers against major construction firms run to thousands of members.
They continue to highlight poor build quality and say that trying to get problems sorted is a constant battle, accusing builders of using delaying tactics and legal threats to keep them quiet.
The situation has prompted urgent calls for a dedicated ombudsman to be set up to give more protection to buyers.
‘We are very concerned,’ says Paula Higgins, chief executive of campaign group the HomeOwners Alliance. ‘Problems with newbuilds are one of our top issues — and things aren’t getting better.
‘People think that, like buying a car or a toaster, everything is going to be perfect but the reality can be quite different. The UK Government knows there’s a significant housing shortage and is imploring developers to build quickly. Quality, it seems, has taken a back seat.’
Housebuilding has certainly spiked. Output last year, stimulated by the official Help To Buy schemes, was up 74per cent compared with four years ago. A target of 300,000 new-build properties a year in England and Wales is now within the housebuilders’ sights.
But with this rush to build has come an increase in complaints.
While the industry points to the fact that the latest survey of new buyers shows that 86 per cent ‘would recommend their builder to a friend’, others highlight the significant minority who would not. Again, the industry insists it is inevitable there will be faults, but that these get quickly sorted.
‘When building something as complex as a new house, using multiple tradespeople, in all weathers, it’s inevitable there are some, usually minor, flaws, such as paint drips or an uneven door,’ says a spokesman for the HBF.
‘Builders typically encourage new buyers to produce a list of snags in order to ensure homeowners are fully satisfied with the property once they have had a chance to experience it more thoroughly.’
Virtually all new homes are sold with a ten-year warranty. Most of these are covered by the National House Building Council (NHBC), the standard-setting body and main home construction warranty provider for new-builds in the UK.
If faults emerge in the first two years, the builder is responsible for fixing them. If there is a dispute, the warranty company adjudicates between the two parties.
As Bovis has discovered, failure to deal with these complaints can quickly tarnish a reputation.
It was the only national builder awarded two stars out of five in the HBF annual customer satisfaction survey for the year ending September 2017. A two-star rating means that between 30 and 40 per cent of customers would not recommend the builder to a friend. Since then it claims to have turned things around.
‘We have made huge changes to our build quality and customer service and have transformed Bovis Homes,’ a spokesman says.
But, over on the Facebook page of the Bovis Homes ‘victims’ group, a different picture emerges.
Dave Howard, the administrator for the 2,500-strong group, says new people join every week. Many tell him they have given up complaining because of the number of times they have been fobbed off.
‘Dealing with Bovis customer service is like hitting your head against a brick wall,’ he says.
One dissatisfied customer is 48-year-old Phil Hutchinson, a lecturer in philosophy at Manchester Metropolitan University.
At the end of November 2016, he and his partner purchased a £229,000 three-bed townhouse on a development in Sandbach, Cheshire. After moving in, a long list of faults quickly emerged.
These included problems with the shower’s drain; hot and cold taps wrongly connected; a faulty washing machine; an oven without a seal that caused the adjoining kitchen units to become scorched; and faulty French doors.
‘One of the first things we noticed was the stairs,’ he says. ‘We had nails coming through the carpet so we were all bleeding from our feet as we walked up and down.’
Complaints to Bovis led to a steady stream of workmen coming to the house. They were all sub-contractors.
‘They told us how it worked. People who fit the stairs, that’s all they do. People who do the plastering, that’s all they do.
‘So the only person who has responsibility from beginning to end is the site manager.’
As more problems emerged, Mr Hutchinson engaged the services of a ‘snagging’ company. It identified more than 180 items that needed rectifying.
Ever since, he has been battling with Bovis to get them fixed. As with the original work, the repairs are contracted out. Workmen often leave without achieving anything.
‘The children can’t play outside due to the smell’
He explains: ‘Three damaged internal doors were identified. A year on, only one door has been replaced and that was last week. Every time they come, either the doors earmarked for our house have disappeared, or the doors are more damaged than those they are replacing, or the doors aren’t the right specification. That has happened on seven occasions.’
There are also ‘discussions’ about fixing the bouncing floors. These flex, says Mr Hutchinson, because Bovis used joists spaced at 600mm rather than 400mm.
‘You walk across the front room and the TV will rock backwards and forwards. In the bedroom, toiletries rattle on the bedside table.’ Most recently, workmen visited the house to replace a damaged kitchen worksurface. When they removed it they discovered a huge hole in the plasterwork in the wall behind from which the upstairs plumbing and pipework emerged.
Not only is it ‘shoddy workmanship’ but Mr Hutchinson is concerned that it could be a fire risk, funnelling any fire upstairs.
‘It’s been appalling,’ he says. ‘I can’t believe in the UK, where we have all these checks and balances, that you have no protection when it comes to the most expensive purchase of your life.’
A spokesman for Bovis says it is committed to improving its business and is focusing on its subcontractors — ‘working only with the very best and boosting our engagement with them’.
He adds: ‘We apologise to any customer who, like Mr Hutchinson, did not move into the home they deserved in the past, but we are committed to putting things right.
‘In those rare instances where things might be disputed, we welcome the involvement of external agencies, such as the NHBC, to objectively assess the issues. We are committed to meeting our obligations in these instances.’
One of those forced to involve the NHBC is 43-year-old Victoria Sheader from Stone, Staffordshire. She and her partner purchased a new four-bedroom home from Taylor Wimpey last December.
They were particularly taken by the fact that it had a sunny southfacing garden.
According to the plans they were shown, a drainage system had been installed beneath it.
‘Within weeks we noticed that wherever you trod in the back garden, it filled up with water,’ says Miss Sheader, who works in the financial industry.
After digging exploratory holes in the garden, she claims they found a problem with the drainage.
But attempts to get Taylor Wimpey to fix the problem — including more than 60 emails and phone calls — have failed. In the end, it was agreed that the NHBC should investigate.
After a site visit last week, it concluded that it was up to the builder to carry out drainage works to prevent waterlogging.
Miss Sheader is still waiting for a response from Taylor Wimpey.
‘It is a beautiful house in a really nice area, but you can hardly ever go outside — it is so disheartening,’ she says. ‘I expected that buying a new-build house would be exciting. Instead, I wish I’d never bought it. It has been a nightmare.’
A Taylor Wimpey spokesman says: ‘We deliver thousands of high-quality homes across the UK, but there are occasions where we do not meet the high standards that we set ourselves. We apologise for the issues that Ms Sheader has experienced and we are fully committed to resolving these.
‘Drainage issues with the garden will be fixed as soon as the scope of works have been agreed with the NHBC and Miss Sheader.’
OTHEr examples of continuing problems with quality and customer service are not difficult to find. Three days before Christmas, Bryan Don paid £340,000 to Morris Homes for a new-build home in Garston, Liverpool.
But on the day he moved in with his partner and their son he says he found 154 faults.
Issues identified by the 42-yearold project manager included a water leak and no grass laid in the back garden. The wardrobe doors wouldn’t shut once clothes were inside — a niggle, yes, but a deeply frustrating one.
Mr Don says: ‘It was meant to be a dream home. We walked in and our dreams were spoiled.’
A spokesperson for Morris Homes says: ‘As a private housebuilder of more than 70 years’ standing we take the quality of our homes very seriously and we consistently achieve high approval ratings.
‘On this occasion we relaxed our strict inspection procedures to accommodate our purchaser’s desire to move in for Christmas. It was accepted that there would be minor post-completion remedials which the purchaser accepted. The images recently reported in no way reflect the property on the day of occupation.’
As for Mr Buller’s issues with his sewage plant, a satisfactory resolution looks some way off.
A spokesperson for Linden Homes says that when the Bullers purchased their home it was in a ‘virtually finished state’ and that they had requested an early legal completion. She says the price they paid ‘reflects the overall amenity of the plot’.
She adds that the manhole covers on the plot would have been ‘clearly visible’ at the time the property was reserved.
She says: ‘Mr and Mrs Buller have complained of a “sewage odour” to the rear of their property. There are no foul sewers to the rear associated with the Heathlands development.
‘There are however existing foul and surface water sewers, which are the subject of imminent upgrade works, following complaints of unpleasant smells from residents. We have offered to commission an air quality assessment to establish the source of any odours.
‘In the unlikely event that the survey indicates that odours from the pump station exceed acceptable levels, we will undertake any necessary works required.’