Residents of an upmarket newbuild estate claim they have been subjected to ‘awful’ treatment by the developer after being left with huge lists of snags for years.
Some have given homebuilder Bellway the nickname ‘Hellway’ amid complaints of collapsing stairways, ‘rollercoaster’ fences, leaking toilets and unsupported floors.
Work officially ended on the 100-property Bassingbourn Fields estate last year but purchasers who moved in as much as three years ago are among those furious that problems still haven’t been fixed.
Many are now talking of selling their homes, some of which cost nearly £600,000, or are refusing to pay fees to the management company for the development’s upkeep.
Residents of Bassingbourn Fields, an upmarket newbuild estate built by developers Bellway (pictured), claim they have been subjected to ‘awful’ treatment
For two years the children’s playground was waterlogged (pictured) and residents have given homebuilder Bellway the nickname ‘Hellway’ amid the string of complaints
Pictured: Some of the problems residents have been having in their houses on the estate
One young woman, who asked not to be named, revealed the staircase collapsed within weeks of moving in and her husband plunged into the understairs cupboard.
‘The contractor who came to fix it said there was only one screw in each step. There should have been 14,’ she said.
‘We’ll leave as soon as we can – too many bad memories here.’
John Trevenna, 70, who moved into a four-bed property in 2022 with his wife Norma, 74, said: ‘We’ve had a number of snags. We expect these things to happen but we don’t expect the issues we’ve had.
‘The biggest one was the main en suite bathroom. We had a leak from the cistern of the toilet.
‘They fixed it and had to lay the floor of the bathroom again and a short time later it leaked and they fixed it again.
‘It leaked three times before they finally fixed it and they had to relay the bathroom floor four times.
‘The en suite is above the main living room. When they were fixing it there was water dripping through the ceiling.’
The retired pest control firm owner said the house had two central heating systems – one upstairs, the other downstairs – but the downstairs radiators had been plugged into upstairs pipes and vice versa.
‘I was turning the central heating on and wondering why it wasn’t coming on,’ he added.
‘We had a fence between us and the neighbour which was like a roller coaster. No attempt has been made to make it straight.
‘There were so many problems, most of the small stuff we had to fix ourselves.’
One young woman, who asked not to be named, revealed the staircase collapsed within weeks of moving in and her husband plunged into the understairs cupboard. Pictured: Houses on the Bellway estate
John Trevenna, 70, who moved into a four-bed property in 2022 with his wife Norma, 74, said: ‘We’ve had a number of snags. We expect these things to happen but we don’t expect the issues we’ve had’
Work officially ended on the 100-property Bassingbourn Fields estate last year but purchasers who moved in as much as three years ago are among those furious that problems still haven’t been fixed. Pictured: A fence cordoned off as it awaits repairs
Megan Saint-Denis, who had ‘really bad flooding’ in her back garden since moving in three years ago, said: ‘They’ve only just come to dug up the entire garden, which meant we lost all our plants at a big cost to ourselves.
‘We’ve taken time off work having to wait for people who don’t show up and it’s stressful having to chase them constantly.’
Stephen McIntyre, 54, has appointed solicitors after living with snags in his four-bedroom home for three years, including unsupported floors, leaking radiators and sinks, a broken toilet, flooded back garden, unsecure ground floor window, uneven patio and cracked shower tray.
The hospital engineer said he and his wife had taken 20 weeks off work and spent thousands of pounds on independent surveys and getting work done themselves.
‘I’m a thick-skinned Glaswegian and it takes a lot to get me riled but I have had every extreme emotion with various different directors at Bellway because no one wants to take responsibility,’ he added.
‘It’s been one calamitous issue after another. I would not buy a tent off Bellway. I have no faith in their construction skills.’
Despite the horror stories, Bellway is not a cowboy outfit.
It’s operating profit soared 50 per cent last year to just over £500 million on the strength of winning five-star status for eight years on the trot in the Home Builders Federation awards and it was recently declared the winner of the Large Housebuilder prize in another industry competition.
Its brochure boasts: ‘Our impeccable attention to detail is at the forefront of our build process and our standards are reflected in our dedication to customer service.’
There was a frenzy of interest when three, four and five bedroom homes went on the market at the spacious Bassingbourn Fields estate, which sits in the heart of the Cambridgeshire village of Fordham and offers owners of the handsome homes spectacular views of tree-lined fields.
Bellway’s brochure boasts: ‘Our impeccable attention to detail is at the forefront of our build process and our standards are reflected in our dedication to customer service.’
Stephen McIntyre, 54, has appointed solicitors after living with snags in his four-bedroom home for three years, including unsupported floors, leaking radiators and sinks, a broken toilet, flooded back garden, unsecure ground floor window, uneven patio and cracked shower tray
Mould (right) and cracked brick work (left) are just two of the many snags found at Stephen McIntyre’s house
A safety sign in place after the drainage system continued to flood. Miserable homeowner Kelly Heather claims to have had more than 200 snags in her home
But miserable homeowner Kelly Heather claims to have had more than 200 snags including damage to flooring on the ground floor and a dodgy shower unit and became a ‘project manager’ during her maternity leave.
‘It’s been awful. It can take three weeks to get a reply to an email and sometimes we’re just ignored,’ she complained.
Another couple, who bought their home almost three years ago, went through a long list of problems such as a crooked stairway, drainpipes and gutters not secured to the walls, loose roof tiles, a fence so far into their neighbour’s property that they may have to ‘sign it over’ to the owner if it’s not resolved, and even an infestation of mice because the ventilation to the toilet was not properly sealed.
They nobly said the issues had to be ‘put in context’ as the estate went up ‘during or after the pandemic when there was a building supplies shortage’.
The woman described how Bellway issued ‘a bunch of vouchers for our garden’ as an apology when their move-in date was put back a week.
But her husband said: ‘Why are these things getting signed off?’
Back at Jon Trevenna’s house, he had a theory for the disasters that have beset him and other residents.
‘My humble opinion is that the site managers at Bellway are to blame,’ he said.
‘Since we’ve been here, there were three site managers. They come and go. I blame them for not keeping on top of the contractors.
‘The other thing is, who checks? Why didn’t they notice that the radiators were plumbed in wrong before they signed the house off?
‘You have a pair of properties here worth £1 million between them and they can’t put a straight fence between them.’
Under current regulations, newbuild properties have a ten-year Buildmark warranty through the National House Building Council. Pictured: The playground which is still unfinished
Samantha Curling, chairman of the National Association of Professional Snagging Inspectors, admitted the allegations about Bassingbourn Fields isn’t unusual. Pictured: building work taking place at the estate
Sam Dowman, 30, who arrived on the estate with his wife 18 months ago, said the garden fence of their three-bedroom house was too high, leaving them feeling ‘like we were in a prison cell when we were sitting in our living room’.
He added: ‘The rubble on the [communal] grass outside wasn’t removed, so when they started strimming, it smashed our front window and we still get peppered every time they cut the grass.’
Under current regulations, newbuild properties have a ten-year Buildmark warranty through the National House Building Council, although developers must correct any problems discovered within the first two years of a property selling.
Samantha Curling, chairman of the National Association of Professional Snagging Inspectors, admitted the allegations about Bassingbourn Fields isn’t unusual.
This is because demand for housing means it is difficult to get ‘skilled tradespeople to finish the job’.
With homebuilding set to soar under the new Labour government’s demands for 1.5 million homes in the next five years, this suggests, to quote Sir Keir Starmer, ‘things will get worse before they get better’.
A Bellway press officer told the Mail most of the defects were ‘cosmetic issues’ and the ‘general product is good’.
He also appeared to suggest some customers had made things sounds worse than they are, saying: ‘Some residents came in and got professional snaggers and some went to the media to try to get things fixed quicker.’
The firm said in a statement: ‘While we are unable to comment on the individual allegations being made, we are aware of defects on the site and have been proactively working with homeowners to rectify any issues they have had as part of our warranty commitments.
‘A new home is a hand-built product, so defects do occur, and often only become apparent once homeowners move into their home.
‘This is why the warranty is in place to ensure these issues are addressed. We apologise to any homeowner who may not have received the service expected of Bellway but we are working on resolving any outstanding issues at the development and expect all items to be completed by the end of September.’
East Cambridgeshire District Council said it ‘sympathised’ with residents but said it was not responsible for signing off the quality of the build, only reported breaches of planning conditions, should they arise.