Latimer Homes - New Build experience?

TangoLime

I am looking into a New Build development from Latimer Homer (the development arm of Clarion Housing). This is for a private sale (i.e. no affordable housing) and the development is definitely marketed as premium.

Has anyone had any experience with buying from them and/or living in one of their developments? I am also struggling to find any prior completed projects from them (and reviews of those). Mostly I am concerned about build quality and management service (& any pitfalls around service charge increase abuses).

tinytiddles

Latimer Homes usually go into a joint venture with one of the major housebuilders, so it’s probably worth finding out who exactly is building the property you are looking at and then look at their reviews. For example there are a small number of Latimer properties on the development where I live and they are actually being built by Vistry Group (was Linden / Bovis). 

moneysavinghero

Don't take much notice of it being marketed as premium. As you say this is just marketing. Most new build estates describe themselves as premium in one way or another.

TangoLime

Thanks a lot both. Do you have any views on their build quality / new build issues (e.g. service charge abuse) too? And for build quality should you really be looking into the contractor (i.e. the construction company actually building it)? Or is the quality driven by the developer (as they are coordinating the overall project)?

OldMusicGuy

Quality is mostly driven by the contractor, although the developer has a big input. You will see posts on here from people castigating the national building firms and others praising them, often this is down to the quality of the contractors.

Service charge abuse is usually nothing to do with the developer. Once they have completed the development, they hand over the management of the common areas to a third party management company, and it is they who can "abuse" the service charges. Although sometimes the developer will stay on as the management company (not usually the case for larger housebuilders).

So before buying a property you need to do the following:

- Find out how the common areas will be managed - by a third party management company, by a residents' management company (RMC) or will it be left completely open. An RMC is the best option because this usually means the RMC will own the freehold of the common areas and all the residents have a share in the company. The residents then decide among themselves what the management fees and costs will be. If it's a third party management company, that's the worst situation and where possible service charge "abuses" can arise. 

- Get sight of the restrictive covenants that will apply to the property you are interested in. This should set out the basic terms of the management company charging basis and fees. This will give you some insight into the starting point for fees. If there is an RMC, you should be able to find out details of how this will be set up.

Bottom line - best thing to do is to visit the site and look at what has been built already. If you are buying off plan before ground has been turned, you won't really know what you are getting.

You also need to find out how the common areas are managed. If they are using a third party management company, you may be able to find out who this is and research them. Be warned, they are all awful and all get terrible reviews. Our last property was a new build, we lived there for 20 years. For the first 10 years or so the management company was fine (rubbish but no issues with charges). They were then taken over and we had a lot of trouble with them - increasing charges, charges for work that was not done and more. We had to take them to the Ombudsman twice.