The Labour Government is planning to create an impressive 1.5 million new homes. However, they need to ensure they are high quality. This is a concern with new builds. In fact, the New Homes Ombudsman Service did research last year to discover what people think about new housing. Sadly, 32% said new builds were “poor quality”. Only 20% said they were better quality. As a top designer of residential architecture in London, we can appreciate the call to improve standards.

Registration

The New Homes Ombudsman Service was actually established to deal with complaints about new builds. The Building Safety Act in 2022 made it possible to set up the service. It began operating in October of the same year.

One of the important details in the official act was it would require house builders to join. This in turn would give more protection for buyers. They would be able to take any complaints to the Ombudsman. They could then ensure that the house builder would correct issues to the right standard.

The issue here is the requirement to join the New Homes Ombudsman Service has not been enacted yet. House builders can opt to voluntarily do so, but there is no obligation.

The New Homes Ombudsman Service said in their first annual report that 90 large British house builders had chosen to join. This gave coverage to over 50% of the new housing in England, Wales, and Scotland. In addition, they said 91 more were taking the steps to join. This would take coverage to almost 70% of homes.

Small and medium size builders

The New Homes Ombudsman Service also said they need to get more smaller and medium size house builders to join. They gave a warning that most are not part of it yet.

However, they do appreciate the need to ensure joining doesn’t cause hardship for small and medium size builders. They want the pricing structure to be fair.

The Ombudsman is calling on the Government to ensure that all developers do join. They say it is even more necessary as they look to implement their ambitious plans to build so many new homes. It will ensure people get the help they need and drive the builders to create quality properties.

Want to create stunning residential architecture in London?

Coffey Architects appreciates the work that goes in to creating high quality homes. We support clients as they design and build them, catering for all of their needs. This can be individual properties or larger scale housing developments. You can browse some of our projects on our website to see the lovely homes we create.

So, if you need some help with residential architecture in London, come to us. We can produce amazing designs, help secure planning permission, and oversee the build if you need us to.