Our £700,000 newbuild may have to be torn down after the builder found a problem with neighbours’ homes – we’re furious
A COUPLE living in a £700,000 newbuild may have to tear it down after the builder found a problem with their neighbours' homes.
Barratt David Wilson Homes is knocking down 36 new homes on a housing estate, in Cambridge, because of problems with the foundations.
The developer said during inspections of the Darwin Green site they found some of the homes did not meet their "usual high standards".
The "most effective course of action" was to demolish the properties and re-build them at a cost of up to £31 million.
And now, Caner Altinbasak, 43, who has lived on the development for nearly three years with his wife and two kids, worries his family will be without a home.
The software engineer told the : "I thought that just one or two houses were affected.
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"But when I heard that 36 houses were being demolished, it was obvious that the same mistake had happened over and over again.
"It is worrying that these affected houses seem to have passed various tests until nearly the point when keys were going to be handed to owners."
Caner told how he has concerns about whether his house passed the checks - but is hopeful as they've had "no problems" yet.
The massive development, which lies 1.6 miles north west of the city centre, has outline approval for up to 1,593 homes, as well as a new primary school, supermarket and library.
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The new community will also feature a central park with 15-acres of open space and sports facilities.
Phase two of the development is currently being built, with two, three, four and five-bedroom homes now selling for between £575,995 and £850,995.
It is believed a number of the affected homes had already been sold, but are not yet occupied - with some of them still being built.
The news has been described as "absolutely shocking" by Councillor Cheney Payne, who is now calling for an independent review.
She told The Cambridge Independent she "couldn’t quite believe it" when Cambridge City Council was first told about the issue last week.
Councillor Payne said: "The buildings are already in place and pretty much completed. To suddenly find they're not fit to be occupied and actually need to be demolished is absolutely shocking.
"It's certainly been quite concerning for the residents who are living in nearby properties, built by the same developer, in terms of what it means for their homes."
Councillor Payne now wants the developers to hold a public meeting to keep residents updated.
She said: "I've had residents in touch from both within Darwin Green asking questions about what's happening and what it means for their own households, and also from the surrounding area, where I would imagine demolishing a lot of houses is going to cause an awful lot of noise, disruption and dust. It's worrying to think about."
Cambridge City Council said it was made aware of the problems last week but has yet to receive an application for the demolition work.
A spokesperson said: "Officers will continue to work with the local community and site developer to ensure any impacts of the demolition works are appropriately controlled."
A spokesman for Barratt David Wilson Homes Cambridgeshire said: "As a five-star house builder we have an extensive quality assurance process and during inspections we found that a small number of unoccupied properties at our Darwin Green development did not meet our usual high standards.
"Unfortunately, the most effective course of action at this stage is to demolish the properties and rebuild them.
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"We have apologised to the customers affected and understand their frustrations, but we are doing all that we can to lessen the impact of this for them.
"The most important thing is that the homes we build for our customers are of the highest quality possible and this means spotting and mistakes and putting them right, which is what we are doing here."
