To be annoyed that my new garden isn’t flat?

[CatchingBabies]

In the process of buying a new build, all the site plans, street view diagrams, promotional photos and artist drawings of how it will look ALL show the rear garden being flat. Never has it been mentioned that the garden will not be flat.

It’s finally almost finished and we went to have a look, the rear garden has a significant incline and is fenced on an angle to accommodate this. Even worse is that it doesn’t slope down or away from the house like I’ve seen most sloped gardens but it slopes from right to left so the left side of the fence is higher than the right and the back fence goes up at an angle. They have installed the patio on this slope meaning that I have a patio that is basically a ramp from one side of the house to another and couldn’t actually be used for garden furniture as it’s too steep a slope.

Looking into next doors garden there’s slopes back down the opposite way, the front of the house on the street is flat so it isn’t like it’s a house on a hill where there is no choice. I don’t understand why they have done this and it means the garden isn’t usable as I imagined. They say it’s too late to change and they never said the garden would be flat, they never said it wouldn’t be either however.

AIBU to be making a fuss over this and saying it needs solving?

A patio needs a very small slope so that the rain water runs off (but nothing like the OP's!)

Social media is your friend here if they are being difficult. Link your Twitter / fb / instagram posts here and ask people to get sharing. Get on the phone to head office too. You are wasting your time going through your solicitor by the way as in all probability they are covered for everything in their contract.

Yes, it only needs a very minor incline. Just for drainage. It should be hardly noticeable to look at.

And having just spent £30k levelling my garden I agree with the op who said it can be very expensive to rectify.

Ridiculous, they sound lazy and happy to cut corners. Hope you can get it sorted OP.

i'd be extremely worried about the drainage set up if I were you

where are the run off drains?
where are the house drains?
what about neighbour drains? ...imagine if they run across your garden say 1 foot under ground level and then you want to level the garden in the future!

I’ll update tomorrow with what they come back with. To those who asked we exchanged months ago, we bought off plan and you need to exchange within 28 days so there was only foundations at the point of exchange. If we pull out now we loose £15k so not a viable threat. Completion is set for the 6th July, this was our pre-completion viewing when we saw what they had done. We will be delaying completion while this is resolved however, we are in rented so can drag this out as long as needs be. We will also now be having a full snagging survey done by professionals before completion, they do their own ‘independant’ snagging apparantly but I don’t trust that now, especially as the new build home inspectors have signed this off as being ok.

I know when you're talking about cash in hand compared to the cost of fixing something that you could live with but don't want to (and shouldn't have to) it's not a 1:1 exchange, but it's possible the cost to you of getting the land levelled properly would be more than 15k. So think carefully about how much a flat garden is really part of what you need from this house for it to be worth what you offered and find out what it will cost you to do that work after completion. Glad you have the freedom to take your time getting it (and any other issues your survey highlights) sorted out.

Yes i was thinking how much this would effect any re-sale value. What a massive pain for you OP.

DH is a builder for some of the best known companies and says there's always a couple of houses as a new estate gets completed which have a troop of potential buyers coming to view and leaving straight away again as the garden is worse than nonexistent in a variety of ways. Horribly dark, wet, stupidly sloped (!), inaccessible from the actual house, postage stamp sized, over looked/over shadowed directly by something huge ect.

Planners are great at knocking out the plans for these big estates but don't seem bothered that real families have to live in ALL the houses. The amazing show houses; open aspect and with massive lawn and flower beds all round them, don't show the whole picture. Same can go for the parking (and lack of it). Good luck with it all OP.

Same happened to out neighbours. We’re in a new build and ours is flat but theirs is not. They’ve now got legal processes involved because the company lied about it! Good luck op

Well we got no further today, apparantly we are waiting for someone to come and assess it, and the estimated completion date has been moved back AGAIN apparently because door handles havnt been fitted yet, that apparantly takes 2 weeks to do now. I am quickly losing all faith in the builders and it seems we have absolutely no come back on anything as they basically write the contracts saying they can do what they want but then you can’t change or object to anything in the contract so you’re forced to accept these terms.

Sorry you’re having issues OP, I have read so many similar stories from people buying new builds re completion date being moved.

I think we were very very lucky with ours

I bought a new build, on the plans my garden looked flat but it has a slope. In my case it's a small slope and goes up away from the back of my house so it isn't a huge issue. The patio is flat at the back of the house, only the lawn slopes.
I did have a drainage problem where the sloped lawn meets the flat patio however, about 3 inches of water was just collecting. Unfortunately it was underneath my shed so could've caused issues, but site fixed it as soon as I notified them.

One thing I would mention, in terms of snagging, definitely do a full check. We were missing a vent cover on one of the windows causing a draft, and the kitchen under unit lights weren't working. Also (the main issue), the bath hadn't been sealed properly. It appears they had sealed the bath without putting any water or weight in it. This meant as we started using it and putting weight in it the seal broke, and we ended up with water pouring through our living room ceiling at 8pm on Christmas eve. They did get an emergency plumber and electrician (it was dripping out through the light fittings) there within an hour after ringing site customer care to be fair to them.

Cupcake We had the same issue with the showers. Sealed without anyone's weight in them, so they leaked around the edges. Water came through the lounge ceiling. Also they'd forgotten to join the plug holes to the waste pipes properly so as soon as you pulled the plug out the water went half on the floor.

I'd go mad at that patio OP. They should have levelled it at the same time they did the house foundations as it would have cost not much more at that point. I assume your house is level obviously.

That slope is very strong and in the wrong direction to keep the house safe from floods. I don't think you should have to have such a slope on a patio. Aesthetically is looks quite nice on that similar picture but it's not a patio. They need to level it off with a load of soil to make it level and then re-lay it. I have never bought a new build as I was always worried about not seeing what you are buying and this thread doesn 't convince me I ever should.

They may not have guaranteed specifically that the patio wouldn't slope, but then I bet they didn't guarantee specifically that the floors wouldn't slope, either. It's just a natural requirement and assumption for both patio and floors to be usable.

Don't be fobbed off with this, OP.

Start making noises about taking the whole contract to court - pick out a few obvious instances of unfair terms, and start making noises about being angry enough to go for a test case, going to newspapers etc. Look very enthusiastic about really goingfor it legally and point out what a great photo your 'sliding patio' will make for the papers.

They might well decide to sort it out to shut you up.

Totally agree re snagging we also used an independent company which was worth the money as they picked up things we wouldn’t have even noticed or thought to check so it’s good you are planning on doing this

Ok so we got some resolution today. The patio has been pulled up and the garden is being levelled. 🎉🎉

Second question. How many manhole covers (that apparantly) can’t be covered by turf or patio would you deem acceptable in a garden that’s 12 meters by 10 meters. We’ve got 6! And then 2 in the front as well. That seems excessive to me.

Six is crazy, what the hell are they all for? I’m no expert but I’ve got one in my back garden and that’s it.

I would be wondering WHO those manhole covers are for? Are they related to pipes that are for other houses? Will you be expected to provide access? I can see no reason why you would have six for just your property.

You must be at some junction with another road or estate - that’s a lot. See if you can get a price reduction. We have covered one manhole with gravel in a path and dropped paving into another on patio, but you have your work cut out.

Definitely ask about the manhole covers. That sounds insane!

I’ve emailed to ask about removing some of them. I don’t mind 2 of them as they are in easily covered places. And the one in the middle of the patio whilst not attractive I can live with but there is 3 clustered together and it looks awful! I wonder if we can ask for them to be removed? I’m not happy at all to have so many, you expect 1 or 2 but 6 is ridiculous and yes like others have said who are all those for?

Photo shows the 3 together.

Sounds to me like they've used you as a drainage 'spot' so if it goes wrong they've only got one area to check out, rather than spread them through your neighbours. You could end up with some awful drainage smells if things go wrong.