New build - garden sloping, not sure of rights?

buel10

Excellent post with lots to think about. Thank you. To be honest with you, I’m very much in the camp of wanting them to do it as a gesture of goodwill being as this wasn’t something that was explained to us upon viewing,
Regarding cost, I should have explained that it incorporates the garden path too so is 12m in length.

Really appreciate posts like yours ((99% have been brilliant on here!!)

letsbetfair

To be fair on the developer, there are a lot of ways to deal with sloping gardens. I live near a steep hill - and solutions there range from retaining walls on multiple levels to just having a big slope. Did the developer give you reason to think it would be level?
Of course, this is a money saving forum. If you can get the work done for free as a goodwill gesture you won't beat that price

blue_max_3

If you get yourself some railway sleepers, you could just lay them along the boundary and stack a couple or three high. You can get 'pins' to fix them together, but I doubt they'd be going anywhere. Should be fairly straightforward. Then some pea shingle in the bottom for drainage and some compost and create a wildflower flower bed or something. 
They tend to be about £30-£40 each and it's going to cost you pizza and beer for a few mates at the weekend. Oops! socially distanced obviously : )

gettingtheresometime

buel10 said:

Update;
Developer has offered to do put in a retaining wall for the lawn and path but for £1,750. Thru added ‘ Please note that we haven’t had the wall designed so it wouldn’t come with a warranty, so at your risk.’
They also offered the workmen to do it out of work hours / cash in hand for less.

Worth pushing for reduction?

Anyone else think that this is going to be a bodged job by the developer?

buel10

Interesting find here....

NHBC-STANDARDS-GARDENS-pdf
https://www.newbuildinspections.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/chapter-9-2.-NHBC-STANDARDS-GARDENS-pdf.pdf
GARDEN AREAS 9.2 - D4 Garden areas shall be stable Items to be taken into account include: (a) slopes Unless the stability of new or existing slopes has been determined by an Engineer in accordance with Technical Requirement R5 the following maximum gradients apply: • unsupported granular soil should be 5° less than its natural angle of repose • unsupported cohesive soil should not exceed 9° (1:6). (b) retaining structures Where it is necessary to provide retaining structures to ensure the stability of the ground they should be designed in accordance with Clause D3.

To this layperson, this looks like it helps me?

Slithery

It isn't soil though, it's grass.

unforeseen

Davesnave said:

buel10 said:

Mutton_Geoff said:

The sloping lawn looks the perfect opportunity to construct a Ha Ha, stately homes often have them.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ha-ha

A new build I'd bought in the past (from an apparently "reputable" local builder) had a patch of grass about 6 foot by 3 foot that would never grow properly. I decided to investigate and found the builder had turfed straight over an old door that was just lying flat in a shallow "grave" a couple of inches under the soil.

Wow, thanks!
No way for me to find this out unless I get my spade out?

As I said yesterday " I'm still digging up whole bricks from the construction of our bungalow in 1974. This shows how well previous owners have cultivated the ground in the intervening years."

It's not that the managers are particularity bad, but workers on building sites have been burying stuff  for donkey's years. Sometimes it's accidental, quite often deliberate, especially when 150mm of top soil is going to be added at the end. That ground will have been driven over by all sorts of machinery, in rain and shine, compacted and stuff will have been 'lost' in it.

I tried to rotovate the garden of one house I lived in and found the old road 9 inches below the surface. That's why nothing would grow

GDB2222

Davesnave said:

buel10 said:

Mutton_Geoff said:

The sloping lawn looks the perfect opportunity to construct a Ha Ha, stately homes often have them.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ha-ha

A new build I'd bought in the past (from an apparently "reputable" local builder) had a patch of grass about 6 foot by 3 foot that would never grow properly. I decided to investigate and found the builder had turfed straight over an old door that was just lying flat in a shallow "grave" a couple of inches under the soil.

Wow, thanks!
No way for me to find this out unless I get my spade out?

As I said yesterday " I'm still digging up whole bricks from the construction of our bungalow in 1974. This shows how well previous owners have cultivated the ground in the intervening years."

It's not that the managers are particularity bad, but workers on building sites have been burying stuff  for donkey's years. Sometimes it's accidental, quite often deliberate, especially when 150mm of top soil is going to be added at the end. That ground will have been driven over by all sorts of machinery, in rain and shine, compacted and stuff will have been 'lost' in it.

A friend of mine was the operational research manager for a very large building company. He reckoned that the cheapest build they ever did was one where they concreted over the entire site before they started work. Yes, that cost money, but they weren’t losing stacks of bricks into the mud, the usual chaos was reduced, and the work went far quicker.

getmore4less

I like this story. 
There was a brown field site with old brick buildings(Asylum ) that got planning for housing, the demolition company leveled the site in preparation.

When they came to start the housing project and prepare footings they found that the basements of the buildings were still intact.

buel10

Slithery said:

It isn't soil though, it's grass.

I believe it means the soil beneath the grass. Soil can grow grass at any point, can't it? No grass without soil.