Damage to garden from freeholder's building work

TonyG1977

All,

We own a flat in a building (leasehold). The freeholder is building a new flat and our (private) garden has been badly damaged in the process.

Our grass has been damaged, a flowerbed with various flowers wrecked and a 15 year old climber was pulled from the building, cut at the roots and is now dead.

A few questions:

- If grass is damaged (it's now patchy over most of it) is it usually replaced by returfing or seeding, bearing in mind it's now really late in the summer and we want to get it back in action as soon as possible? I'm pushing for returfing but I'm already getting pushback.

- The project manager (who is managing the building company that did the damage) seems to be insisting we deal with him over this matter, but he seems almost entirely profit driven and his priority seems to be keeping costs as low as possible whether or not we get what we are entitled to. I'm waiting from a proposal from him - if we're not satisfied I'm going to make a formal complaint to the freeholder and ask for him to sort it out directly. Any thoughts on this? Should I be going to the building company (who did the damage) before I do this? I have been told that they'll probably be more amenable to us than the project manager, but he seems to be trying to keep control of the situation. I'd be interested in any thoughts on this.

We're pretty angry about the whole thing - we were promised that if we cooperated with the building works that any damage would be rectified, and I really don't feel I should be having to fight over this, but I guess this is property / construction for you. I am however not going to back down as a point of principle on this.

Any thoughts on this would be gratefully appreciated.

Soundgirlrocks

TonyG1977 wrote: »

All,

We own a flat in a building (freehold). The leaseholder is building a new flat

Have you got that the right way round? I would suspect you to be the leaseholder, and the freeholder to be building the new flat.

First point I would be looking at is your lease, does the freeholder even have the right to build the new flat? Is the garden private and forms part of your lease? or is it communal and you've just ended up planting bits and making it nice (if its communal and the freeholder manages it then I suspect you are entitled to very list redress) if its private and forms part of your lease different matter. Also the building itself is the responsibility of the freeholder, it could be that the climber posed a risk to the building / prevented maintenance etc but if it was attached to the building the freeholder ultimately has the right to remove it.

TonyG1977

Oops - thanks! Fixed

The garden is fully ours and under our lease and there was no legal problem with them building the new flat (we didn't particularly mind, but did want agreement that we wanted replacement if any damage was done).

We had been asked informally to cut the climber back and were just about to do this as soon as the scaffolding was down. I don't know if they had the right to remove it from the building but I know it was unintentional and due to a miscommunication. We definitely hadn't been given any notification of it.

societys_child

So the lawn possibly needs re-seeding and the flowers will grow again next year?

sheramber

It would be unlikely any turf laid into an existing lawn would be level with it, resulting in a bumpy lawn.
To lay turf properly the existing grass would need to skimmed off and then the surface prepared and the turf paid.

Seeding could be done by raking over the bare bits and then sowing the seed. It will merge with the existing level of the lawn.

AdrianC

TonyG1977 wrote: »

Our grass has been damaged

You go on to say "patchy over most of it" - how badly, how big an area? It will quite probably simply grow back within weeks.

a flowerbed with various flowers wrecked

"Wrecked"? Or some plants have had their season cut short?

and a 15 year old climber was pulled from the building, cut at the roots and is now dead.

Which you go on to say you'd already been told to remove, and would have done so once the scaffolding was down anyway.

- The project manager ... seems almost entirely profit driven and his priority seems to be keeping costs as low as possible

Umm, yes. That's kinda why his business exists, after all.

You do realise that if the rectification increases the cost to the freeholder, then you and the other leaseholders are the ones paying it, right?

Pupnik

The OP said they had been asked to cut back the climber, not remove it entirely.

I had something similar last year when scaffolding was put up and the workmen cut one of my vines right down to the base. Luckily it has grown back this year, but at the time it didn't look like it would recover, and the paperwork beforehand had said that if they needed to cut anything back in the garden they would let me know before they did it - they didn't, I just returned home one day to find my arch dismantled and the vine cut much, much lower than it needed to be to accommodate the scaffolding. In my case they agreed to reimburse me for the cost of the vine, it was only £30 or so but I pursued it anyway because I was so annoyed they had damaged my garden after explicitly saying they wouldn't do so without warning me first, it was quite a depressing sight to return home to.