As homebuyers and snagging inspectors often tell me:
"The vast majority of issues they fixed should never have been there in the first place"
-and there in a nutshell is the issue with UK housebuilders.
Why take longer and do it right first time, when you can throw it up, with no care and no snagging and get the money. Any problems can be sorted out later - often much later, if indeed at all.
For every homebuyer that complains to their housebuilder, there are hundreds that either don't, not even noticing the defects at all, or accept whatever fobbing-off the site manager/customer care comes up with by way of a justification for doing nothing.
The overwhelming majority of new homeowners either give up the uphill struggle of getting work done, or have such low expectations in the first place, that they don't believe that they have any reason to complain. The HBF 2015 "satisfaction survey" even points to the fact that a staggering 93% of new homebuyers "experience problems" with their new homes. In other words, buy a new home and you are virtually certain to have problems with it. Worse still, is that people buying a new home actually expect problems – with 47% stating that the "number of problems were in line with their expectations." up 20% on 2014.
The housebuilding industry has succeeded in managing customers' expectations so well that the existence of defective workmanship, snags and faults, such as poor quality decoration, leaking pipes, creaking floors and more in their new homes has become normalised, expected and is perceived by both industry and customer as unavoidable.
Clearly this is as wrong as it is unacceptable.
I am pretty certain that things like appalling paintwork can always be prevented throughout an estate, but I suspect few buyers can be bothered to complain, especially considering the enormous disruption that corrective work entails.
