Brick issue on new house:(

[clp]

I rang Target in Canberra Civic the other day

Actually now you mention it they usually are pretty good at service in there - they don't leave you waiting at the checkouts for ages either.

[JoanieG]

Re: the gap in between your cabinet doors. Perhaps an adjustment of the hinges may fix this problem.

Re: the brickwork - simply not acceptable. Stick to your guns and don't pay them unless it is rectified. If you have a mortgage, talk to your bank and ask them to withhold the progress payment until the brickwork is fixed. I think they have their own inspectors who inspect the house before payments are made.

Surely the builder/bricklayer would have insurance that would cover the situation and if they have to pull the brickwork down, make them do it.

When we built 2 years ago (in Qld) we installed expensive eco glass windows which have a fine metallic coating on the inside. When our painter was painting he was in the habit of putting a dab of paint on the window glass (as a marker) if he saw a spot which needed some extra attention and when he finished, used a scraper to scrape the paint off the glass. Apparently he had been doing this his whole painting career without any bother but had never come across these eco glass windows before which you cannot use a scraper on. After scraping, it left metallic grey scratch marks about the size of a dinner plate on each of the spots. His insurance company had to pay to replace just about every window in the house, but they did it anyway without any argument.

Good luck with it all. It is stressful enough building a house when everything goes right without all the trouble you are experiencing. And I know what you mean, a group of men confronting one woman is very intimidating so try to get some backup.

Fortunately with the exception of the painter who was just so apologetic and didn't hesitate in having the glass replaced, we had a fantastic builder and no faults to report at the end of our build.

Your house is costing you a lot of money and is probably your greatest asset so hang in there and stick to your guns.

[Heytherek]

Hi guys, thank you. I so agree when you get good customer service it really does make you feel great.

However, our builder, well mainly the site managers, just argue against everything we raise and stick up for the tradies regardless.

The site manager gets quite bullish in manner too and I will not be meeting with him on site again without my hubby there.

With the cabinets, I suggested that a small adjustment would satisfy me, then they were going on about how it would void the warranty to have them tighter - basically there is no room on the other side, they have been cut a bit short I think.

They were virtually laughing at me saying what is there is standard practice. Well even if it is which I doubt, surely a little adjustment could have been done to make me happy with them. No, they just keep going on about how right they are.

They just really have a go at everything we say we are not happy with or come up with some hard to believe reason why it is like it is, it is like they are so offended that we would even question anything. The cabinet and benchtop issue was ridiculous, they just said you won't notice this or that.

The so called brick rep told me that there were up to 100 houses with the same brick in the area he lives and they would all be the same. Well I know people get upset about just a few chips so I would be thinking they would be out of business if everyone's bricks ended up like ours.

According to the brick standards manual, there can be up to 5 per cent of chipping. I would say we would have chips on one in maybe five or so bricks. Think we will go and count them to see what percentage are chipped.

I think that I have been appalled by our site supervisor and builder ever since he told me how they make their money on houses like ours, ie a single storey normal house. It sums them up to a tee, they just don't want to fix or change anything on our house as it will cut into their margains.

We have paid our second to last progress payment but won't be paying the final payment until the bricks are fixed to our satisfaction, along with whatever else we find along the way. We definitely won't be settling on the house until everything is done. There will be no signing of anything to say it will be done later.

I am certain they will try and play on the fact that we want to get into the house, but we are so unhappy now with the chips, that we will just sit it out until it is resolved

[Julie-Ann]

Originally Posted by JoanieG

Your house is costing you a lot of money and is probably your greatest asset so hang in there and stick to your guns.

Hi JoanieG welcome to the Decorating Forum. I totally agree with your comment above. I think some builders forget this.

[pattycake4]

l would hire a private building inspector ASAP.You will see how
quick your SS becomes your best Friend

[Heytherek]

Hi,

We are getting Archicentre in hopefully within the week to inspect the house.

Funnily enough we did have a private inspector already do one inspection early on and it hasn't seemed to have made the site supervisor very accommodating to our concerns at all.

We are actually getting depressed going to the house now, as we found very poor paintwork in the garage today. The problem is we need to keep going to see what is happening.

K

[Heytherek]

Well we had booked in our independent inspection and the inspector had organised it with our site supervisor for this Friday, set a time and everything, then someone from the builder rang and said they were not going to allow it and that we had already had plenty of people through and had a previous inspection at lock up and we could only have it done at pre handover.

Grrrrrrrrrrrrr the builder has been very funny about this inspection but last week said it would be fine. In our contract we did add the words that we could have an agent into the house at frame, lockup and pre handover and obviously the builder is using these words to deny any earlier inspection.

It is only two or three weeks away before pre handover but their actions have definitely meant that we will not be accepting anything other than complete perfection with the house, and will not be handing over the final payment until that happens.

We gave plenty of notice for this inspection and we should be allowed to have it done at any stage if we want to.


All our goodwill has just gone out the window with the builder.

K

[Sooty]

What a nightmare but hopefully the builder will resolve this to your satisfaction as it doesn't sound right that your bricks are so badly damaged.

Not much consolation but it could be worse, I was banned from site so didn't see the building work until handover

[Di]

I'd contact the Building Assoc or Dept of Fair Trading to ask about what your rights are about that.

While there is a contract, there is also a major concern about the bricks.

Perhaps your Building Inspector knows how to tackle this predicament?

My blood would be boiling!

[rosierose]

They are probably fixing all those issues but need more time (wishful thinking?) Stand your ground girl ...stand your ground.....

No fix=No money...