[Closed] Buying a new house from Bovis Homes, what extras should I ask to be thrown in?

Stamp duty
Legal fees
Moving costs

Bulbs?

Coke, hookers.

A decent standard of finish?
A garden without the sites rubble placed 2" beneath the "topsoil"
Sensible routing of plumbing pipework
Standard sized kitchen cupboards
a date to move in when the workmen have actually completed the house you've just bought and therefore avoiding the hassle of moving in whilst they are still 8 or 9 workmen trying to finish stuff off.

They are they things I wish I'd asked for from Waine Homes.

Turf
Fencing
Tiles in bathrooms
Showers
Doorbell

I can't believe that's not included !!

Extra plastering for the cracks to follow post sale?

Flood cover?

Both jokes. No idea.

A lifetime supply of sliced bread?

Seems unclear what is included, but we are assuming nothing so want a big list which the above it giving us...

Turf
Fencing
Tiles in bathrooms
Showers
Doorbell

Are definitely not from what I understand at this stage.

[img] [/img]

When you say "tiles in bathrooms"

Does that mean that they have installed bathrooms but not tiled them, or that you want the rooms tiled so you can install bathrooms.

Because neither of those options are the right way to do it.

Tuft is sometimes not included but I would expect a fence round the property, even if it's only at the back. I've never seen a new build without tiles in the bathroom, or a shower fitting for that matter. And do you know how cheap doorbells are ? If they are trying to save pennies by not supplying door bells (which I can't believe) I would worry about where else they've been trying to save pennies.

Ask to be allowed to have a £20K retention, payable when they have put right all the stuff that will be wrong with your house.
Ask them to pay you £30/hour for any time you need spend writing to them and chasing them up to get jobs redone to a reasonable standard after you have moved in.

If they won't agree to the above, walk away, as they can't be confident the house will be OK and/or sorted in any reasonable timescale - or you might be lucky.
[url= http://forum.snagging.org/bovis-homes/1845-bovis-homes-reviews.html ][/url]

Note: I have bought 3 'new builds' in the past 🙁

After seeing many many brand new homes I cannot for the life of me understand why anyone would buy one. Nasty cheap tacky builds and everything in them put in at minimum cost with maximum speed. Shoddy workmanship, cheap materials and so many things not even straight/level.

You think houses become better as they get older ?

The shoddy workmanship suddenly gets better, cheap materials are replaced, and things straighten out and become level ?

Electricity supply to garage
Gas/electric fire in living room (doubt they'll run to a woodburner 🙂 )
Non-exploding showers and plumbing that's actually plumbed in so that the bath doesn't empty straight into the kitchen 🙄

Houses, for the price you pay, should be built to a good standard and straight. They should start out good, and not need work doing to them to make them good.

My grandad was a foreman bricklayer and took pride in his work, as did the people he worked for. Unfortunately the greedy house builders all nowadays want to squeeze as many houses onto a small a plot of land as possible and erect their shoddy little boxes with no consideration to quality and longevity. There are exceptions of course, but given a choice of building better or taking more profit they'll choose the latter everytime.

The crazy thing is that the new houses attract a premium!!!! Why??

the greedy house builders all nowadays want to .....

When did "nowadays" start ?

A decent standard of finish?
A garden without the sites rubble placed 2" beneath the "topsoil"
Sensible routing of plumbing pipework
Standard sized kitchen cupboards
a date to move in when the workmen have actually completed the house you've just bought and therefore avoiding the hassle of moving in whilst they are still 8 or 9 workmen trying to finish stuff off.

They are they things I wish I'd asked for from Waine Homes.

Ha , sounds like my parents experience when they bought a new Bovis home in Bristol 29 years ago.l

 

When did "nowadays" start ?

Straight after the good ole days

I am still in an obviously gerrybuilt inter war semi I bought 10 years ago it is faux Bauhaus and suffers from a flat roof , rendered walls ,And a frankly eclectic selection of building materials including cinderblock that seems less structurally solid than weetabix. It is still better built than the new build I bought off plan 23 years ago.

Carpentry included kitchen cupboards screwed to walls with silicon sealant instead of rawplugs . the stairs and banisters were out of line so all the tongue and groove joints had been sawn off and the flush ends just glued . massive cracks developed in the cealing .One wrong kitchen unit painted to match the others in the hope we would not notice. Electrics wired so left switch worked right light fiting . neighboring property the electrics were for a right hand house but the property was a left so the circuit breaker was over the window in the living room instead of boxed in in the hall .

Get a snagging retention.

After seeing many many brand new homes I cannot for the life of me understand why anyone would buy one. Nasty cheap tacky builds and everything in them put in at minimum cost with maximum speed. Shoddy workmanship, cheap materials and so many things not even straight/level.

Friend of a friend bought a new build, they negotiated a fence around the garden, unfortunately instead of running a bulldozer across the rear gardens for 10 minutes, they dug a few trenches to put the fence at the correct height and left several tons of rubble/washed out cement/mortar piled between the fences.

I gather it took a lot of barrowing through the house to get rid of it all so they could turf it after moving in.

Housing development building sites are soul-less places; where re numeration is based on quantity, not quality.

And will probably continue to be so whilst people keep buying a new house. Unfortunately, in the UK, we have few affordable choices or alternatives.

We have friends who bought a 4 bed town house off plot about 3 years ago. Since moving in, they've had two years of grief, as have many many people on the same development. I'm taking £30k-£40k of snags; replastering of all walls in all rooms, new ceilings, flood damage, part replaced kitchen, new carpets, 2 complete replacements of walk-in shower units, replacement windows and more. Yet they love it. All the more weird because theirs, like all the other homes on the plot, have kitchens with fully glazed frontages onto the pavement literally inches away. And gardens the size of a dining table.

good luck with your 'demands' if our experience of redrow is anything to go buy you ll be told to go off and reproduce.

natural settlemet is there response to cracks, not our problem when the ridge tiles fell off every home on the estate. fences, not included, grass not included, doorbell not included.. the the serious stuff vertical walls, not included, square corners, not included. add to which purcahsers cannot have satalite dishes sheds caravans vans..

It's cheap foreign labour doing decent hard working Irish actors out of a job !

[img] [/img]

I wouldn't buy a new build if they paid me. But if I did I would want a contract that handed me their nuts on a plate if there was a single thing wrong.

whimbrel - Member
Ask to be allowed to have a £20K retention, payable when they have put right all the stuff that will be wrong with your house.
Ask them to pay you £30/hour for any time you need spend writing to them and chasing them up to get jobs redone to a reasonable standard after you have moved in.

If they won't agree to the above, walk away, as they can't be confident the house will be OK and/or sorted in any reasonable timescale - or you might be lucky.
[url= http://forum.snagging.org/bovis-homes/1845-bovis-homes-reviews.html ][/url]

Note: I have bought 3 'new builds' in the past

+ 100

What totalshell says.

We have a couple we are friends with who asked how we can be bothered to refurb and such like our 1950s farmers cottage.

They bought new build and were proud of how little work it was going to need when they moved in

Then they moved in and found only a thin basecoat on walls , no floor coverings , no turf/grass/topsoil and a single slab path round the house.

The only diference between us is they dont have to remove the old wallpaper and skim before painting.

A decent boiler cus chances are the one they've put in is shite.

Cavity trays
Weep holes
Right angles
Plumb brickwork

Best of luck 🙄

If it makes you feel any better, I've lived in some old houses that were shockingly badly made too. A Victorian terrace that had walls so thin you could follow conversations in the next house. By contrast, in this "shoddy" new build we hardly hear a sound from the neighbours.

Can't believe the stuff you mentioned in the first post isn't standard!
Recently bought a new build from Redrow and all was included.

Other extras I got them to add we're outside tap, outside power sockets, security light on garage at end of the drive.
Upgraded to a halogen hob instead of gas and extra tv aerial points.

worked in many new houses, one with a laminated floor kitchen,somebody had kicked the side off a kitchen unit where the washing machine would fit,screw sticking out,huge groove accross the floor,guttering running away from the downspout,and a loft hatch above the bed in the main bedrom as well as one above the staircase.

another house had 3 seperate staricases fitted,customer requested varnished wood, so they put in a painted one,customer went to work after long argument, builders cameback and replaced staircase with new varnished staircase, new carpets fitted, then a few weeks later painters came in and painted staircase white, lots of fluff from new carpet on newly painted staircase.

another house, plastic manhole cover on drive,drive unfinished till estate was completed,so sticking above the ground level, i accidently fellover it carrying a door, and my mate following nearly fell down hole.

New bathroom put in, the plumber forgot to connect the waste to the bath, customer had bath and pulled plug,entire contents of bath ended up in the kitchen.

New house you flushed the toilet and cistern filled with hot water from the boiler.

New estate master keys copied and given to resident, they got broken into , keys stolen and 6 houses got into with master key.

Some snags are obvious and some come to light weeks latter.Either way they have your cash

All the stuff already mentioned...

But even more importantly

Hot and cold outside taps for Bike washing!

New house you flushed the toilet and cistern filled with hot water from the boiler.

That is amazing 😯

I would be asking for what some have mentioned above regarding a snagging retention.
Pretty much everyone I have known who bought a new build have all said the amount of snagging needed was ridiculous.

Bovis you say? A soul, a conscience.

Well if you're going to ask for unrealistic things you might as well think big.

Hot and cold outside taps for Bike washing!

Funnily enough, some friends of ours have just bought a new build and called round today as they're now quite nearby. We've not seen them since they've moved in.'

He was showing me the garden. It's actually just a piece of building site that they've run a bulldozer over before fencing it off. I'd say it will take half a year of weekends spent trying to get it free of rubble and somewhere approaching level.

They're still building the remaining houses on the estate, and it borders right onto the path along which I often walk the dog, so this evening I had a nosey past the barriers to see what's going on. On the basis of what I saw, I'll not be buying a new build any time soon, and by soon, I mean whilst I'm alive.

I forgot one one of our neighbours bought a tree when he went to plant it he discovered a full pallet of bricks under his ”garden."

Just make sure it's got a Buck Rogers toilet, an "extender" and a 24hr mini-mart round the corner.

Ah-Haaaaa

Actual LOL at Aracer 😆

A spare boiler in shrink wrap in the loft.
Some decorators caulk to fill the gaps between the walls and ceiling when they appear.
Screws to hold the staircase together rather than the paslode creaky nails they'll inevitably use.
A garage capable of holding something other than an austin7
Somewhere for a visitor to park.
A crate of replacement gu10 LEDs for when the cheapo first fix ones go yellow and die.

+1 on hiring a consultant to rip the place apart and do the snagging properly. My mate is in construction and when he moved into his place (as second owner, three years after it was built), it was filled with little red circular stickers where stuff that was due to be snagged hadn't actually been done!

Document everything...ask around for a good lawyer in case they get too arsey...

Recently lived in a new(ish) build for a year (rented).

On that basis.

Plumbing (particularly the primary circuit) that doesn't leak.
Kitchen appliances that work and aren't *the* cheapest that money can buy.
Carpet. And by carpet I mean something thicker and more durable than paper.
Laminate floors, see carpet.
Doors that (a) fit (b) shut (c) have functional handles and latches.
A front door that locks.

Sewage pipes that don't deposit their contents right under the house & front lawn, and are instead connected to the main drains.

sorry, can we rewind a bit here?

OP, you're thinking of buying a new house, and they're not tiling he bathroom for you, or including a doorbell?

is that standard for new builds?

With our new build (2007) we got a load of money to spend on 'options' as an incentive - didn't really have to haggle. Could have had it as a discount instead.

There was no turf in the back garden by default (we landscaped it before turfing so that suited us) this is normal afaik, it was the same in 1980 when my parents bought our new build house, and I think also in 1977 when they bought the previous one. We got loads of great topsoil though - stuff grows really well in there. 6ft fencing was an extra we paid for, because whilst you did get a free fence it was only 4ft high chainlink.

We specced up the kitchen and bathrooms with the rest of the money, and had a few extra sockets and lighting points etc. With hindsight I'd have gone for extra paving in the back garden instead of the token 8ftx8ft section, as doing it myself was a ballache. Likewise full tiled bathroom - we got shower and bath surrounds free, but all walls tiled was extra. Showers were not included in the bathroom, but we also had a shower room which obviously had one in.

We also did not get a doorbell, likewise in any of the new builds I can remember.

As for why do people buy new builds - because they're new, and it's quite nice to have a completely clean new house that no-one else has lived in. There were snags in ours, of course, but nothing major - and there were no rotten/broken/leaking/scruffy bits and no dodgy DIY disasters either! Nor are the boiler/heating/oven/electrics near the end of their lives or in any kind of bad condition. It's also very well insulated.

Old is not necessarily better.

PS this was Wimpey, for the record.

Ask for a pot of the paint they have used. It'll be like a magnolia chalk board in there. You only have to look at the walls for them to mark. And you cant wipe off the marks, as they only put 0.001nm of paint on the walls.

Our Bovis home came with tiles and door handles and all the while goods. It also came with plaster dust everywhere. Hairline cracks on the stairs, smallest garage ever and a lovely rubble garden.
Bovis do give you a 2 yr warrantee on everything, including white goods, then a 10 yr guarantee on the building.

...... and door handles

No expense spared eh ?

"Old is not necessarily better"

Nor is new.

At least with old you dont mind fixing a few issues , if it was new id expect it to be perfect. The only new house ive been in that was perfect was when i rented off a couple who had refurbed their steading into two houses , they clearly spent money and kept on top of the builder. It was a great place to be.

My dad was foreman on a large housing companies site and actually walked off the job when he snagged a street of newly completed houses and his area manager told him " just see if the customer complains about it and we will sort it out eventually"

Nor is new.

Of course. The thing is, the way they have to work, snags are inevitable. The stuff that was wrong in our house was all fairly minor and what I'd expect given it had just been a building site full of builders. It would be nice to have someone go over every detail carefully finishing everything off perfectly, but I'm not sure it's realistic in a bog standard property. There was a development of luxury houses nearby around the same time, to a much higher spec, and I'd have expected them to be much better finished cos they cost far more.

We did rent a brand new flat once that was in a block advertised as luxury, and to be fair that was spot on, very nicely finished.

After buying a couple of new houses in the past the only experience I'd put forward is to just plan on getting stuff fixed yourself rather than getting involved in the whole snagging 'proceedure'.

Easier, less hassle and at least it's your money therefore you can demand the quality you want.

I have a similar opinion to new builds as the negative people here but wonder if that's mostly just the lower price ones? Once you get to 4 bed detached things are they generally OK?

BTW, often wondered how 'Executive Homes' got their name - do executives really live in them? The just seem to be fairly dull 4/5 bed places though with a bit more to them than the average estate box I suppose.

My brother is a quantity surveyor for the civil part of housing estates, and he comments that the building companies only allow 27 days including laying the foundations to make a house ready to be moved into........

He's worked on sites where you can only dig foundations when the tide is out as its so wet, and they have to have life rings due to the flooding. Also most houses are also going up before the concrete in foundations has cured.

Personally I would avoid new builds, but you can have this wonderful wish list of what conditions they will have to accept for you to buy a house, however they are plenty of people who will buy the house without the list, so they will just sell it to them.

Mind you my dad worked on houses post war, and he remembers houses being built on ash blocks on there sides are there wasn't enough concrete around for the foundations, so those are ones to avoid as well...

Foundations.

....and they have to have life rings due to the flooding.

So keep away from a house if it comes with life rings/buoys......is that what you're saying ?

So keep away from a house if it comes with life rings/buoys......is that what you're saying ?

No, buy a boat instead...... or don't buy a house built in marshlands

No, buy a boat instead....

That sounds suspiciously like saying 'keep away from a house if it comes with life rings/buoys'.

Although you're claiming no.

How confusing !

I have a similar opinion to new builds as the negative people here but wonder if that's mostly just the lower price ones?

Hard to say - shoddy small local builders perhaps?

We went around the completed houses (and not-quite completed) in our development and I had a good look around for evidence of shoddy workmanship.

It would be nice to have someone go over every detail carefully finishing everything off perfectly, but I'm not sure it's realistic in a bog standard property. There was a development of luxury houses nearby around the same time, to a much higher spec, and I'd have expected them to be much better finished cos they cost far more.

It's this lack of expectation and further willingness to accept poor workmanship/service which has blighted not just the construction industry in this country.

What choice do I have? Hassle the builders when on-site? We did that.

The reason it's cheaper to do it less well is that it takes less time, and you can employ less people do finish the houses, of course.

I lived in a new build once, was a small developer who used a small local builder (Who is now, unsurprisingly, bust). Everything about the build was bad - plumbing, insulation, drains collapsed... and on and on. I remember being out front one day, and one of the new builds across the road was being inspected by the clerk of works (or whatever they're called now) As far as I could see, he was snagging the path down to the pavement from the front door for being too steep for wheelchair access.

Up came the ground workers, after he had gone, and they proceeded to lift the turf on the lawn, and dump down the slabs straight on the topsoil, so that it ran at an angle across the lawn, and was hence not as steep. No footings or anything, just slabs onto dirt.

I lasted 7 whole months in that house before getting rid.

Just for balance, my best man bought a new build from Stewart Milne homes, one of the biggest developers in Scotland, when he put a socket checker in it failed. It failed on all the sockets. Turns out there wasn't any earthing in the entire house, only live and neutral.

Anyway, back to the OP. Why do you need extras? Is the house not worth what you are paying?.

...willingness to accept poor workmanship/service which has blighted not just the construction industry in this country.

So what else do you think has been "blighted" in this country ?

I'm sure you can figure that out for yourself Ernest. You're a clever lad after all.

Sewage pipes that don't deposit their contents right under the house & front lawn, and are instead connected to the main drains.

My folks moved with Dad's job when I was a teenager and had the above. 2-3 days in, Mum emptied the bath and the ground floor loo exploded. New hall carpets and skirtings...

Concrete mix was splattered all over the back windows so asked for it to be cleaned before we moved in. All rear windows were scratched and had to be replaced.

Mum put a picture up in the middle of a wall and the hammer was blown out of her hand and a live nail left sticking out, they had used diagonal cable runs off the sockets to the wall lights to save a bit of cable.

The 'snagging' list run to several sides of A4. My current 1870 house had nearly as bad when we moved in but these are supposed to be the Pro's, not DIY SOS!

I'm sure you can figure that out for yourself Ernest. You're a clever lad after all.

I can't imagine that I'm as clever as you.

So what else according to you has poor workmanship/service "blighted" in this country, apart from the construction industry ?

You're making the claim - explain it.

Or can't you ?

What choice do I have? Hassle the builders when on-site? We did that.

The reason it's cheaper to do it less well is that it takes less time, and you can employ less people do finish the houses, of course.

haha nobeer

mr milne has previous up here..... having a party and your kitchen floor colapses....i know...ill put up signs saying maximum occupancy.....

"What choice do I have?" Really?

Yes, really. What choice do *I* have, when buying houses? Shall I only look for perfectly finished houses? That'll discount 80% of what's out there, even if I could afford the 20%.

Les expensive materials don't come with instructions to fit with less care.

The same forces that require less expensive materials also require less expensive labour, which means more rushed. I'd have thought this was fairly obvious.

The same forces that require less expensive materials also require less expensive labour, which means more rushed.

So what else according to you has poor workmanship/service "blighted" in this country, apart from the construction industry ?

That's not what I said.

It's exactly what you said :

...willingness to accept poor workmanship/service which has blighted not just the construction industry in this country.

So according to you poor workmanship and service has blighted "not just" the construction industry in this country.

OK you don't want to give me examples of other areas where poor workmanship and service has blighted this country, so you're now back-tracking and suggesting that you didn't mean what you said. Fair enough.

What's obvious is you're already defeated.

I chased up the builders, I got most of the big stuff fixed, but some small stuff remained and I had to fix it myself. There comes a point when the reward doesn't justify the expenditure.

As you're struggling to read it Ernest. I'll do it for you.

It's this lack of expectation and further willingness to accept poor workmanship/service

Yeah you're back-tracking alright.

You claim there is a willingness to accept poor workmanship in "not just" the construction industry and that it has "blighted" this country.

But you can't back up that claim. As I said, fair enough.

We had, from memory:

Drains in the street blocked, bubbles coming out of the downstairs toilet. When we told the builders they looked shocked and literally dropped (well, put down) what they were doing and ran down to unblock it - it'd filled with rubble.

A kitchen cabinet had a chip in it. They tried to spray it (white cupboards) but it a crap effort, so they got some guy in a day later who did it flawlessy

The cooker was fitted slightly too low - fixed

Boiler control unit failed (common according to Google, design flaw). They had a stash of new units and fitted a new one

Something happened to the bath, I forget what - the guy came round and fixed it but fitted the side panel badly. I complained and they came round and fixed it

Patch of insufficient grout in the shower, top corner - complained, never fixed.

There were quite a few other little things.. can't remember now tho.

Ernest. Your pettiness is tedious and I can't imagine why you think I need to explain myself to you. What are you, the post police?
I made the point I wanted to make, but Christ, I'm hoping this will shut you up.
I'm old enough to have experienced the crap products that have been offered to English consumers and ultimately faded away. (Yes some have returned years later but not in their original guise.)
BSA
Norton
Aerial
Triumph
Rover
Austin
Hillman
Lucas electric
These are just some of the manufacturers that produced items so poorly designed and assembled that as soon as alternatives became available, consumers quickly forgot their loyalties.
The managements arrogance and belief that they had the market stitched was reflected in particular within the motorcycle makers ranks. They couldn't accept people would purchase Japanese machines and refused to develop technologically to keep up.
However, what I was saying in my post is that [b]a willingness to accept mediocrity fuels apathy in service.[/b]
Edit: What I'm referring to has been quite effectively described in the latest advert for Plusnet broadband.

However, what I was saying in my post is that a willingness to accept mediocrity fuels apathy in service.

I disagree, actually. This is a rather interesting economic topic.

People shop on quality and price. Some people will go for quality but more will go for price. The market for cheaper things is far greater than that for quality items, so companies try as hard as they can to make stuff cheap. As long as it's acceptable to enough people it's worth their while.

It's nothing to with being ripped off or conned - it's just market forces at work.

If you need two cars, would you rather have two Fiestas or one Mercedes? Woudl you rather have a 4 bed Wimpey home or a 2 bed luxury flat, when you have 3 kids?

We would all rather have better quality, but in many cases that exists - we just can't afford it.

I understand your argument molgrips and it's a valid one for sure. I can't argue that you're wrong. But I honestly think it's a double edged sword.
Consumers are a very complex species... Don't you think that maybe it's because the market is swamped with similar products. Some are about the same price but not the same quality.
Companies rely on the unwillingness of a lot of consumers to follow through with complaints and use that to make extra profit from inferior products.