Browse Forums Building A New House 1 May 22, 2018 9:17 am Foremost Building Expert in Australia,assisting with building problems/disputes, building stage inspections,pre-contract review advice for peace of mind 200 blogs http://www.buildingexpert.net.au/blog Re: Building defects? Owner?, The law is not your friend! 5May 23, 2018 11:30 am Foremost Building Expert in Australia,assisting with building problems/disputes, building stage inspections,pre-contract review advice for peace of mind 200 blogs http://www.buildingexpert.net.au/blog Re: Building defects? Owner?, The law is not your friend! 6May 24, 2018 12:07 pm HIA has the power to enforce the spirit of the law, but there isn't a push from those profiting (builders, inspectors) to affect positive change. Where the volume of owners building one or two houses in their lifetime doesn't have the time or power to affect this change. Re: Building defects? Owner?, The law is not your friend! 7May 24, 2018 2:12 pm rum_home HIA has the power to enforce the spirit of the law, but there isn't a push from those profiting (builders, inspectors) to affect positive change. Where the volume of owners building one or two houses in their lifetime doesn't have the time or power to affect this change. HIA is builder's association representing their member interests, I know I was a member for many years before retiring from building. It has no legislative power but has power of size that can influence the government and it does. Owners have no power because they are just grains of sand on the beach. The rise of private inspections is due to the failure of building control. I am working because people need me, otherwise I would be fishing. Currently mandatory inspections are only for safety, health and amenity and are not quality control or contract conformance and mostly not compliance with regulations. If you read occupancy certificate it will clearly tell you it is no evidence of compliance. Building inspectors doing mandatory get paid around $120 per inspection, what will you get for that? Quality control, contract conformance and compliance is a black hole in our building industry so if registered building inspectors are not providing it , who is? Private building consultants. To provide 5 competent inspections (1 pre contract and 4 during build) will cost around 3K . You could ask government to provide that service and pay 3K and get nothing for it or you can pay your private inspector and get good value for your money. (assuming you have chosen wisely after due diligence) If you are a consumer and are waiting for government to do something for you, you will grow very old waiting. Foremost Building Expert in Australia,assisting with building problems/disputes, building stage inspections,pre-contract review advice for peace of mind 200 blogs http://www.buildingexpert.net.au/blog Re: Building defects? Owner?, The law is not your friend! 8May 24, 2018 5:58 pm building-expert To provide 5 competent inspections (1 pre contract and 4 during build) will cost around 3K . You could ask government to provide that service and pay 3K and get nothing for it or you can pay your private inspector and get good value for your money. (assuming you have chosen wisely after due diligence) Most people using volume builders will have signed to their volume builders preferred inspector. Which for the total price of the home will (or should) incorporate those 'competent' inspections. So they're already paying the 3K in their total home cost, and then pay additional inspectors like yourself. Someone is double dipping, and it's not the owners. Re: Building defects? Owner?, The law is not your friend! 9May 24, 2018 6:08 pm rum_home building-expert To provide 5 competent inspections (1 pre contract and 4 during build) will cost around 3K . You could ask government to provide that service and pay 3K and get nothing for it or you can pay your private inspector and get good value for your money. (assuming you have chosen wisely after due diligence) Most people using volume builders will have signed to their volume builders preferred inspector. Which for the total price of the home will (or should) incorporate those 'competent' inspections. So they're already paying the 3K in their total home cost, and then pay additional inspectors like yourself. Someone is double dipping, and it's not the owners. Re: Building defects? Owner?, The law is not your friend! 10May 25, 2018 8:25 am Joker Volume builders inspector is like having no protection at all, none, zero, dougnuts, when you work for the builder, the one who is paying you, your super compromised, only a complete nivea buyer would take such a risk, I know for a fact as told to me, we dish out best trades to customers with knowledge and independent inspectors, last are the pie in the sky types. I think there is a slight misunderstanding, by law you have to have a separate 'independent' company operate as your building surveyor/inspector. Volume builders do not have their own building inspectors, but they do have preferred company's that they'll only work with directly and pay for. If you deviate from that supplier, or if you even use that same supplier by no through them (volume builder) they'll not pay for or talk directly with them. Re: Building defects? Owner?, The law is not your friend! 11May 27, 2018 10:37 am Its only now that you must hire your own building surveyor or RBS I think it's been in law for 12 months or so. But i know that some builders still tell consumer's no don't hire an inspector because it will make your build longer or they say you will not be covered by the builder, the reason iam saying this its because I was reading this on one post on product review website I found that very strange to read so I posted back saying its a crap get your own building surveyor its on the VBA website. Not sure what happens after that. Re: Building defects? Owner?, The law is not your friend! 12May 27, 2018 8:16 pm So if you have a private inspector and defects were picked up but not acted on by the builder is that evidence enough that the builders QA was not adequate? Surely the cost of fixing the defect during the build would be cheaper and if the builder chose not to do that it is their problem and should wear the increased cost of fixing the defect if it causes issues later (and not just cosmetically fixing it). Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/853390798159713/ Re: Building defects? Owner?, The law is not your friend! 13May 27, 2018 8:27 pm inexp_user So if you have a private inspector and defects were picked up but not acted on by the builder is that evidence enough that the builders QA was not adequate? Surely the cost of fixing the defect during the build would be cheaper and if the builder chose not to do that it is their problem and should wear the increased cost of fixing the defect if it causes issues later (and not just cosmetically fixing it). Yes, yes and yes The problem is that many builders try and get away with it, knowing that it is expensive and time consuming for the owner. If you have a good private inspector to push the right buttons then you will have a good chance of getting your defects attended. Many builders have tried QA but when the costs come in they revert back to just leaving it to the tradies on site and bank the money instead. So in many cases QA, what QA? Foremost Building Expert in Australia,assisting with building problems/disputes, building stage inspections,pre-contract review advice for peace of mind 200 blogs http://www.buildingexpert.net.au/blog Re: Building defects? Owner?, The law is not your friend! 14May 28, 2018 6:50 am The builder is only intrested in the next stage payment as soneone else posted on here, they dont care about anything and with the RBS gets all the work from them. Sad sad sad that greed over rules all here. Everyone is cashing in builders inspectors then you have lawyers on the other side telling you they will fight for you instead they also cash in by stretching the truth so your case goes for ever. Go and try understand all of this. Its got me very angry right now. Will see in a few weeks which way I am going to go if I will post every document I have and all the photos I have taken over the last 8 years of all the corner cutting these builders actually do to deceive consumer's. Regards Thank you to everyone who has posted and has given me some great advice and help. Thank you to all. Re: Building defects? Owner?, The law is not your friend! 15Aug 29, 2019 9:57 pm [quote="building-expert":v9z8vx77]Most people would assume that if there are defects in your new building that the builder would be obliged to fix the defects. Whilst this is true and the builder is legally obliged to fix defects under builder’s warranty (10 years in Victoria) there may be a very nasty exception for defects that are very costly to fix. This could leave a building owner in a situation where there is only a cosmetic fix or a nominal compensation for a major defect. How is this so?
It has to do with a common law precedent Belgrove vs Eldridge which in the interest of avoiding “economic waste” stipulates that rectification work will only be ordered where it is necessary to achieve conformance and further that it is a reasonable course of action to adopt. In other words, where the cost of rectification is disproportionate to the benefit to be gained the rectification will not be ordered. A particular example is say where Colorbond flat roof is specified but instead it is built in Zincalume. If there are no issues with town planning it seems that there is very little to be gained by removing air conditioners, lift the roof and replace roof sheets with Colorbond. A monetary compensation to the owner equivalent to the difference in cost between zinc and colour roof may seem appropriate. Now consider a scenario where you have a competent builder who has in place and maintains a quality assurance system. Errors and mistakes can still occur but the incidence and the severity of the rectification is likely to be lower and we could say that the builder has exercised due skill and care as required by warranties. I have no problem with such builder having the protection of Bellgrove vs Eldridge doctrine. However there are two scenarios that work in opposite direction. The first is the fact that quality supervision and the maintenance of a QA system is a costly item and there is a temptation to cut it back beyond the bone relying instead on tradies on site “to do the right thing” even if some have been screwed on price. The money that should be spent on supervision and QA instead is banked as builder’s bonuses. The second is that typically builders will take on more work than they can comfortably carry out, thereby stretching ever further what scant supervision there is. The result is that builders bank handsome profits (obcene perhaps) whilst short changing customers on delivery and quality and knowing they can do so with impunity because of our inept and corrupt building control system. Furthermore they know that if they truly blunder they may get escape ticket from Bellgrove vs Eldridge Australia is supposed to be a first world country but it is building its buildings without mandatory QA systems and delivering third world results as demonstrated by slab heave, multi storey cladding fiasco as well as poorly built, fire risky and leaking apartment buildings. Having spent last 15 years dealing with building defects and disreputable things done by reputable builders I would suggest that the protection of Bellgrove vs Eldridge against building defects should only be available to the builder if the builder can demonstrate the QA system was applied in full compliance. In all other cases it should be pull down and rebuild. Nothing works as well or as fast as when the builder has to pay for own mistakes. For the owner, the majority of potential problems can be avoided or dealt with competently by their own independent building stage inspector, performing inspections at critical stages of the build. It is always better to avoid building problems and defects rather than trying to deal with them afterwards.[/quote:v9z8vx77] Re: Building defects? Owner?, The law is not your friend! 16Aug 30, 2019 11:15 am who were your independent inspectors? Foremost Building Expert in Australia,assisting with building problems/disputes, building stage inspections,pre-contract review advice for peace of mind 200 blogs http://www.buildingexpert.net.au/blog Re: Building defects? Owner?, The law is not your friend! 17Aug 30, 2019 12:29 pm AandM How can owners protect themselves?! We had an independent inspector for every stage plus an extra visit to assist with a dispute during construction. We’ve been in our house more than a year and we’ve initiated a dispute over the brickwork, and we’ve learned that we have structural defects from the final inspection that were not rectified plus non-compliant mortar. Our builder has mentioned (splitting the cost of) rendering but has not provided evidence that the mortar is strong enough to last. Our engineers have recommended rebuilding the bricks. Apparently we will most likely end up thousands out of pocket for vcat before our builder will consider doing the right thing and get our house within compliance. It’s a nightmare. building-expert Most people would assume that if there are defects in your new building that the builder would be obliged to fix the defects. Whilst this is true and the builder is legally obliged to fix defects under builder’s warranty (10 years in Victoria) there may be a very nasty exception for defects that are very costly to fix. This could leave a building owner in a situation where there is only a cosmetic fix or a nominal compensation for a major defect. How is this so? It has to do with a common law precedent Belgrove vs Eldridge which in the interest of avoiding “economic waste” stipulates that rectification work will only be ordered where it is necessary to achieve conformance and further that it is a reasonable course of action to adopt. In other words, where the cost of rectification is disproportionate to the benefit to be gained the rectification will not be ordered. A particular example is say where Colorbond flat roof is specified but instead it is built in Zincalume. If there are no issues with town planning it seems that there is very little to be gained by removing air conditioners, lift the roof and replace roof sheets with Colorbond. A monetary compensation to the owner equivalent to the difference in cost between zinc and colour roof may seem appropriate. Now consider a scenario where you have a competent builder who has in place and maintains a quality assurance system. Errors and mistakes can still occur but the incidence and the severity of the rectification is likely to be lower and we could say that the builder has exercised due skill and care as required by warranties. I have no problem with such builder having the protection of Bellgrove vs Eldridge doctrine. However there are two scenarios that work in opposite direction. The first is the fact that quality supervision and the maintenance of a QA system is a costly item and there is a temptation to cut it back beyond the bone relying instead on tradies on site “to do the right thing” even if some have been screwed on price. The money that should be spent on supervision and QA instead is banked as builder’s bonuses. The second is that typically builders will take on more work than they can comfortably carry out, thereby stretching ever further what scant supervision there is. The result is that builders bank handsome profits (obcene perhaps) whilst short changing customers on delivery and quality and knowing they can do so with impunity because of our inept and corrupt building control system. Furthermore they know that if they truly blunder they may get escape ticket from Bellgrove vs Eldridge Australia is supposed to be a first world country but it is building its buildings without mandatory QA systems and delivering third world results as demonstrated by slab heave, multi storey cladding fiasco as well as poorly built, fire risky and leaking apartment buildings. Having spent last 15 years dealing with building defects and disreputable things done by reputable builders I would suggest that the protection of Bellgrove vs Eldridge against building defects should only be available to the builder if the builder can demonstrate the QA system was applied in full compliance. In all other cases it should be pull down and rebuild. Nothing works as well or as fast as when the builder has to pay for own mistakes. For the owner, the majority of potential problems can be avoided or dealt with competently by their own independent building stage inspector, performing inspections at critical stages of the build. It is always better to avoid building problems and defects rather than trying to deal with them afterwards. All 3 items listed are defects and are of concern. Please seek qualified independent inspector and/or legal advice for your state. 1 8501 1 9703 Hi It came to my attention after the handover that - The facade cladding on the face and the side are not straight. -The face tapers down by 50mm from left to right and… 0 2947 |