So long story short, I ended up buying the property. I spent alot of time looking at other properties and the location really drove me to stick with the decision here. From both a work and personal perspective it just ticked all the boxes that I couldn't find elsewhere. I'll try to summarise my experience so far, which overall has been positive but there have been issues which not all are resolved on.
Presale/conveyancingThe initial process, as discussed above, was generally good but it turned out that the salesman I interacted with told quite a few fibs not just to me but other house owners on the site. Barwood and their legal team worked work to give me confidence throughout the conveyancing process (as you'd expect). I was given plenty of access to the property and emails/phone calls were responded to very quickly, typically within a day.
They were not pushy at all when I delayed the sale process, actually I was 8 weeks over the reservation expiration date and they didn't push/threaten me once. Kept responding to my queries and trying to re-assure me on my outstanding queries.
I had no movement on the sale price but I was able to get £12.5k of extras thrown in which has given me a very high spec house overall.
Completion/SnaggingThis was a little strange as I wasnt moving in on completion, and I still havent moved into the property (I am fortunate that i can have them resolve the issues). Because of this I had no formal handover or introduction to the property. They just gave me the keys and told me I had 7 days to send in the initial snagging list.
I found almost 100 issues quite quickly (from a building family and my mate has been running new build sites for many years) so again a little fortunate. Structural build quality of the house appears good (though time will tell) but the finishing is very poor as Unhappy notes. Generally I would say:
- Really sloppy mastic work (seriously, really bad)
- External doors and gates not hung properly
- Garage fascias not meeting brickwork (too short)
- Gutter joins missing
- Broken bricks and poor mortar work
- Lots of gaps hadn't been filled (extraction fans etc)
- Generally unclean
Decoration (painting) overall good. Cleanliness very poor - definitely not sparkle clean as you'd expect.
The site manager and customer care team however have been very good. Very responsive, site manager meets me at the property and regularly goes through the snagging list with me. When he has something will be fixed by X, it always has been. Of course, they are working through slower than I'd like but it's generally moving in the right direction. Neighbours have certainly had issues - one even had completely the wrong kitchen fitted
Biggest negative for me has honestly been the lying salesman that it looks like all new owners have experienced. He told everyone that it was fibre to property, when its actually copper; told all of us it was a different warranty; others were told various other things which havent come true. The company has apologised but really what more can you expect them to do. Sales be sales.
It's been a mixed experience so far but overall a positive one. The proactive site manager helps of course. In the grand scheme of things my issues are on the more minor scale, so if things start to go wrong it'll be interesting to see how they respond.