Over the last few months, I have been increasingly shocked at the severity of the new build snags I am finding during my inspections. Clearly, some housebuilders are happy to hand over to their customers their new home knowing that there are some major defects that should have been addressed before legal completion. There is clearly a severe lack of quality control on-site or systems in place for checking and signing off each stage of the build.

Unfortunately, warranty providers are not exempt from this either as they are happy to sign houses off with serious defects, which if not brought to the builder’s attention at an early stage will inevitably cost the homeowner a considerable amount of money to correct.

The defects range from missing DPC’s, fake weep holes to serious breaches in building regulations.

Most homeowners will not have the knowledge to identify some of these defects and the builder will be quite happy for them not to.

Some of these defects are going to be expensive to rectify and your builder will try to avoid them at all costs knowing the expense involved. This is disgraceful. Why should the new homeowner be expected to pay for their mistakes when the builder and warranty provider have failed in their responsibility? New build homeowners should expect and receive a quality house that will give them many years of enjoyment without having to worry if there are hidden defects within the house.

In some instances, these new build snags are extremely dangerous and could possibly put the new homeowners’ lives at risk.

Your builder should have processes and procedures in place ensuring all build stages of your new house are inspected by a competent person, such as the site manager or warranty providers inspector, giving the new homeowner some degree of comfort knowing it has been inspected.

Unfortunately, what I am seeing more and more is a failure to fully inspect what are serious breaches in building regulations which is shocking and disgraceful. To allow this to happen must raise some serious questions of the builder and warranty provider.

New build homeowners trust their builder to provide them with a safe and habitable home, not a time bomb waiting to go off. The importance of having a professional snagger inspect your new home is important, this will give you peace of mind that there are no surprises waiting for you once your builder has left the site.

Want to know more? Read about my new build snagging surveys here. For more information or if you have any question, please contact Ian at: Ian@livelyprofessionalservices.co.uk

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Ian Lively, Managing Director at Lively Professional Services. Housing and Snagging Survey Expert with over 40 years of experience.

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