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Bank / Building Issues

Hi All...

I'd just like to share with you a little valuable knowledge (which nobody shared with me).

I built my own home and in doing so I needed to take out a loan from the bank (as is the case with most people). The bank granted me the money to build the house - however, I only found out later that this money was going to be allocated to me at certain stages by the bank. As soon as one thing was complete they would give me the money to continue with the build. This however isn't always practical - sometimes you run into hidden costs and you are out of pocket...the bank then refuses to pay you any extra money which means you are sitting with a half (or quarter) built house.

It caused me a lot of frustration and had someone SHARED THIS WITH ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It would have saved me a lot of time, effort and trouble. Hope it may help someone out there.

Commission Dispute

ATTENTION ALL SELLERS!!! BEWARE!

If you are selling your property and you have given your property to Estate Agents to list make sure you are not liable to pay double commission.

If you have multiple agents who are marketing your home make sure that when you receive an offer there is a simple bit of legal jargon included in that contract.

"Agent X is the effective cause of sale. Furthermore, it is hereby understood that should a commission dispute arise the Seller is not liable to pay the commission of the agent in question. This contract hereby indemnifies the seller from such an instance."

We learnt the hard way - take this valuable piece of advice, it could save you A LOT of money...

Tiling Nightmare

I thought I'd share something with everyone out there that scared me half to death...

We had just bought a new house (it was 3 years old, with all of its certificates in order - electrical compliance, rates clearance, NHBRC and everything else in between). It is a beautiful home and is completely tiled.

We had just been through a very, VERY cold spell. The weather was now beginning to heat up. I was in the kitchen cooking lunch when I heard what sounded like a "ping" from upstairs. I had no idea what it was so I went upstairs to see what it was. As I got to the staircase this sound happened again. I ran to the bedroom where this noise was coming from (it was getting louder and more frequent) as I got to the room I saw the tiles popping up (yes, I really do mean POPPING UP!). They ended up in a pyramid across the room. It is probably one of the most horrific things I've had to deal with. I was watching the tiles of our new home lifting up.

At the time we thought it was structural issues - the house may have been built incorrectly or something like that. We found out later the real cause...

It's actually a simple law of physics: when things get cold they contract - when they get hot they expand. What had happened was that the cold weather had caused the slab, the tiles, the grouting and the tile-fix to contract slightly. When it started to heat up again the tiles started to expand at a faster rate than the slab. In normal circumstances this would cause (at most) a hairline crack through one, or two tiles. Unfortunately for us the tiler had not used the correct mix and therefore when it heated up the pressure on the tile-fix was too much and the tiles began lifting.

It is an awful thing that happens (and believe me...according to some of the experts that we got to help us fix the problem - it happens quite often) and for some reason people refuse to discuss it. I'm here to tell everyone that it has got NOTHING to do with your house being built badly, it is a simple case of a USELESS TILER!

Thankfully the problem has been fixed and we are now living happily in our new home.

Building Problems

Hi all, I found your step by step on how to build, albeit too late for me, very comprehensive and very informative. My wife and I have just completed a building project (our second) and we thought that, once done, second time a breeze. Forget it! Our builder up and left and I had to take leave and jump in to complete the project myself.

Fortunately the periodic payments were deposited into our account and the builder would then request his portion from us. This enabled us to keep a check on the finances. I suggest that this be a good practice that the draws from the bank be managed by the owner and not paid directly to the builder. We suspect the builder thought that the money would roll on for ever and a day but I kept a spreadsheet of items for his account and PC items for my account as well as on payments made to him which were reconciled back to his account. Unfortunately his financial planning was not up to par and he could not complete the project in terms of the contract. The case is now in the hands of my attorneys.

Just one further thing we learned about the bank set up. Banks have building loans for new buildings and bonds for existing houses and they operate differently. During the building process the building loan is in operation but once the building is completed the loan is converted to a bond. We were paid a certain periodic payment and paid the builder his portion and kept the rest for PC items which were not needed right then. My wife, quite rightly, thought that she could put this amount back into the building loan account, thus reducing the interest, and get it later when we needed it, as we had arranged at the bank for accessbond facilities. BIG MISTAKE. The building loan will only pay out after an assessment by an assessor and will NOT release any money paid back into the account. Only once it is converted to a bond does the accessbond facility kick in where all advance payments, over and above the installment, can be accessed. SO BE WARNED! Can you imagine our consternation when we needed the funds and couldn't get it! And the bank wouldn't budge! After much haggling with the powers that be at the bank an assessor was sent out and we could finally receive funds, which had been previously released and available to us, to carry on with the project.