Rant Persimmon & Charles Church New Homes

Thinking of buying a new home from Persimmon or Charles Church, then this web site will make some interesting reading. http://www.charles-church.org.uk

btw I appreciate the credit crunch, lack of willing money lenders (hence higher rates, and preference for 25% depositis) fears of negative equity, and other worries with the economy are perhaps more topical reasons to not be buying currently.

Reality is that the Charles Church owners opinion site's reports are actually giving a better impression than the reality faced by new home owners, as home owners are scared to complain for fear of damaging their investment and making it difficult or harder to sell on. Their is also risk in that the 1st home owner has to legally declare whether they considered claiming on the property warranty, whereas the house builder can buy back the property and sell it on with a known fault without having to answer than same question, hence being able to hide known faults which the warranty made difficult to fix or wouldn't fix at all.

The amount of bad press and complaints against Charles Church in particular is very worrying, considering it's the luxuary high end brand within the persimmon group - and with ones own experience of serious structural issues, which estimates to fix are very high, with the builder claiming ignorance and using a whole host of tactics to avoid dealing with the issues in the property construction.

Some good news is that the Office of Fair Trading is investigating new house builders in the UK, and their is hope that government legaslation might be supported to finally get new homes covered by the sale of goods act, so that consumers can have some tangiable rights to quality and fit for purpose, as well as a genuine warranty that covers faults, rather than the NHBC insurance scheme which is paid for by the builders and which is run/influenced by too many people with an direct interest in the building companies.

 

Hmmn, I had a brief experience with Charles Church about a year ago, without going into any details I found them to be shambolic, bordering on incompetent. It might just have been the particular office I was dealing with but you form your opinions based on your direct experiences so I have to say that I would avoid them. Its especially worrying as they are supposed to be at the upper end of the market where you would expect a better standard of customer service, all I seemed to get was the same poor service you can get anywhere but they simply charge you more for the privilege.

No doubt others may have a different experince and someone will always be able to give a glowing tribute about how wonderful any company that deals with the public can be just like others will give bad reports about them but like I said above you go with your own experiences and mine wasn't good.

 

With regards to buying property from developers, these things are built on a budget with profit generation in mind. please do not fall for any property developments on a large scale because you are not getting value for money.

get an old 2 up 2 down Victorian property and pump the extra money into renovation before you move in, it will outlast you.

 

Death 4 year old Boy - Persimmon Homes, Charles Church, Persimmon Group plc

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1095601/Boy-4-crushed-death-collapsed-50kg-stone-mantelpiece-held-plaster.html

Tragic story of the death of a 4 year old boy in a Persimmon Homes' Home. Fire place was not properly secured, and fell onto the boy crushing him.

With Office of Fair Trading investigation into UK housing (supply of land, and quality of customer experience) things have still not improved at Charles Church for us. Now 3+ years on and even simple things like leaks are not being fixed. Many faults dating back to original 1st day in the new homes. Leaks reported to Home Serve (builders 24/7 call service) twice, Customer Services multiple times (telephone, email, written letter), etc.

Charles Church is part of the Persimmon Group, which also includes Persimmon Homes. Persimmon Homes customers do not sound happy either.

 

New Home Charles Church, see also Persimmon Homes (both part of Persimmon Group plc)

2011 New Year begins and we thought we could share an update on our progress with Charles Church, and trying to persuade them to honour their warranty on our new home, and finish items to NHBC Standards.

Suffice to say over four and a half years after purchasing our new home, multiple defects are still waiting to be repaired. These include; electrical, heating and plumbing, sanitary and construction.

Poor quality of service has been our biggest headache as the builder promises action one day only to deny later, leaving us going round in circles, and starting over and over again, with the same mistakes being made by Charles Church again and again.

Buying a new home from Charles Church still remains the worst decision we ever made - and that was despite taking all reasonable precautions prior to purchase to try and avoid such a negative experience.

As it currently stands work might commence in a few months time (but already this seems to be delayed), with the intention being to move us out for somewhere in the region of 3-9 months planned for.