This guide will help you navigate the new build buying process: from selecting a plot, choosing a design through to considering security and parking. This comprehensive guide will help you make the right choices to ensure you find the perfect home.

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This 2000 word guide  is the perfect antidote to the marketing material provided by the builders ensuring that you are not fooled by artist impressions, glossy brochures, sales staff and show homes.

You can buy this guide for £7.99. or you can get it for free with our snagging guide that has been used by thousands of new build buyers.

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A snagging list is created by new build buyers in the UK and Ireland to detail the snags and defects in their new home.  Many opt to create their own snag list using a snagging checklist or guide book which represents great value compared to the cost of using a professional snagging company. A company will find more faults and will help ensure that the house builder rectifies the snags within a reasonable time.  However, these snagging services are not affordable for all and many have to create their own snag lists using a DIY snagging check list.

A checklist empowers new home buyers by helping them to carry out their own inspection without using a professional service. The checklist is written without the use of jargon to ensure that anybody can do an inspection. It helps new build buyers to create their list in a methodical and logical manor without specialist house building knowledge and helps to ensure that defects are reported as early as possible in the build process as possible for the builder to put right.

Ideally, snagging defects are submitted to the house builder and rectified before the buyer moves in. This means the homeowner does not have the hassle of arranging for builders to access the property after they have moved in,  and there will be no need to waste time and energy trying to get the home builders to rectify snags. It will significantly reduce the stress of buying a new build home.

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Over the past twelve months the mortgage lending market has stripped around 90% of products off their shelves, meaning that a varied choice of mortgage deals are not available for first time buyers. This means saving a bigger deposit is imperative. In previous years, a 5% deposit was deemed acceptable, however talking about the current climate, Louise Cuming, Head of Mortgages at Moneysupermarket.com advises, ‘now we have go to the extreme that if you have only got a 5% deposit you may as well not bother. It isn’t right to say that everybody that hasn’t got a 25% deposit is going to be a bad payer but that is nearly how the lenders appear to be looking at things now’. Louise recommends saving at least a 10% deposit before you start looking for property.

It is also important to consider any additional costs that may arise from owning your own property. Unexpected expenses may crop up at any time, including maintaining the property and needing to add or renew fixtures. Be prepared for these instances by saving some money in case of emergency. It is also important to purchase a good quality home insurance policy incase something happens to your house that you cannot control, such as a burglary or damages to the property that could not have been prevented. Compare home insurance at Moneysupermarket.com to find the best deals in the market.

It is notable that it hasn’t been this hard to save in a long while, with the general cost of living seemingly increasing by the day. Food, fuel and utilities are but a few household bills that have risen as a result of the credit crunch. This teamed with excruciatingly low interest rates means that saving has never been harder. The government has recognised that first time buyers are struggling to get on the property ladder, so have recently introduced Homebuy Direct – a new scheme which means that buyers only have to find a mortgage of 70% of the value of a newly built property. The remaining money will be raised by loaning half from the government, and half from the company who built the house. Only first time buyers can be involved in the scheme and their total annual income must be below £60,000. Interest rates are frozen for the first five years, giving the new house owner time to get on their feet and adapt to the extra expenses they will be incurring due to owning a property. Hopefully the scheme will give many young people who have just started their careers to be able to find an affordable way to own a modern, newly built home.

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Buying a new-build property clearly has its advantages – no chain, no DIY, cheaper utility bills. But buying new is not without snags, as Caroline Laws finds out

Getting the keys to a brand-new house that no-one but you has lived in before is a tempting idea. And there are lots of people for whom that dream comes true each year. Last year around 160,000 new homes were built, with the total set to increase by 50,000 a year.

Made to measure

The advantages seem clear: you can avoid locking yourself into an upward chain, and if you buy early enough you can have a big say in the fixtures and fittings. You won’t have any DIY bills, and, according to the National Energy Foundation, you can even save up to £500 a year on energy costs. Many are packed with the latest water-saving devices and use recycled and renewable materials. They’re also more secure: burglar and fire alarms are often standard fittings.

Most new homes come with a 10-year warranty, and according to the terms, any faults will usually be corrected within two years at the builder’s cost. After that, only structural faults are covered and you would have to make a claim to the insurer. The three well-known warranties are the National House Building Council (NHBC) warranty, the Zurich Insurance Building Guarantee and the Premier Guarantee. You should not consider buying a new home without a warranty, as you’re unlikely to get a mortgage.

Many developers will offer a host of tempting incentives, including paying your deposit, legal fees and stamp duty. Some will also include expensive extras, such as carpets and flooring, so it can cost you a lot less to move into a new-build home than it would into a older property. But before you get carried away by the interior-designed show house and the lure of financial incentives, it pays to do your research.

Think twice

Marketing brochures and sales talk may overlook a few drawbacks to new-builds, such as smaller rooms and thin, plasterboard walls. Storage can also be a problem, especially in the fashionable three-storey townhouses, which sacrifice loft space. Many new-builds now have shared parking facilities and gardens are often simply compacted subsoil, with a thin layer of turf on top. Poor drainage means plants fail to thrive, so you may have to start again or call in a professional landscape gardener.

You should also look into transport links, and if you are planning to move on to a large estate, check whether community infrastructure such as local shops, doctors’ surgeries and new schools are planned to cope with the extra people. Developments over a certain size must now legally include social housing, so you may want to check how this could affect your property.

As for buying ‘off-plan’ (before the home is built), Andrew Frankish, managing director of independent mortgage broker Mortgage Talk, points out that this can be a gamble: “The buyer does not know exactly what the property will turn out like, but the rewards are that the first people to buy on site will usually gain better incentives and prices as builders try to attract interest in the development. They must however be prepared to live on a building site for some considerable time, often without properly surfaced roads and with regular construction traffic.” If you’d rather wait until the house is built, it can pay to negotiate at the end of the builder’s financial year when they will be keener to do a deal.

Before you start looking at new homes, check out the useful website newbuildinspections.com, which can arm you with a list of common show-home tricks, such as lights left permanently on to disguise the lack of natural light and missing items of essential furniture (such as wardrobes). It also provides details about the major house builders in the UK, such as Bryant, Bovis, Barratt, George Wimpey and Persimmon Homes, including customer satisfaction surveys on levels of service, and problems other buyers have encountered in the past. If you need to find out where the new-build developments are in your area, log on to the Smart New Homes and New Homes websites.

Sorting out the finances

It also helps to have mortgage finance in place before you start looking for a home, as often there is only a 28-day period before exchange of contracts takes place. And you need to establish exactly what’s included in the deal. According to Andrew Frankish, if the builder is offering to pay a deposit or to stock the kitchen with white goods, you must tell your broker. He says: “Usually lenders are happy with a 5 per cent paid deposit, although often no more than that, but free domestic appliances, carpets and other furnishings can affect valuation levels.”

Andrew also points out that although you may exchange contracts within 28 days, completion may take many months more. Builders will usually avoid giving definite completion dates, saying only that completion will take place within 14 days of the house being finished. He warns: “If completion is more than six months after the borrower’s mortgage offer, the offer will generally require renewing. Some lenders, such as Northern Rock and Alliance & Leicester, allow offers to be extended, although most will need either a new survey fee to be paid, or in the worst cases a fresh application fee.” This also means that you may have to take out another mortgage at a less competitive rate.

If you do face a long gap between exchange and completion, there is a niche product on the market called an exchange bond, which provides you with a deposit of 5 to 10 per cent of the purchase price, giving you the time to save up the money. Bonds can last from three months to four years. On completion you pay 100 per cent of the purchase price. There is a premium on the bond, so for example, if you were buying a house for £200,000 and took out a bond to provide 10 per cent deposit, the premium would be £850. You might therefore want to consider whether it’s cheaper to save up for the deposit or talk direct to the developer to do a deal. For more information on exchange bonds, try exhangebond.com

Although there are exclusive new-build mortgages from brokers such as Halifax and BM Solutions, you should always compare them with conventional mortgages. And ask the developer abut any mortgages they can arrange too. If you are a key worker in the public sector, a council house tenant, or on the housing register, you may qualify for the government-backed NewBuild Homebuy (also known as shared ownership) scheme, especially if you live in an area where house prices are so high they are affecting recruitment and retention. Not all lenders offer mortgages for these schemes, so check out the Moneyfacts website for who does.

Moving in

Before you move into your new home, make a thorough check to ensure it is built to specification. This is called snagging, and around one-third of new properties have between 100 and 200 defects on completion. These are usually minor and include incomplete tile grouting or broken roof tiles, for example. Catriona Bright, director of the newbuildinspections.com and snagging.org websites, says: “The developer should give you the opportunity to examine the property or get a professional organisation to carry out a thorough snagging inspection before completion. They should then set to work immediately remedying the defects highlighted. Ideally it would be nice to get everything done before you move in, but bear in mind that there is no obligation on the developer to do anything within a specific timeframe.”

She recommends that if your property is complete before you exchange contracts, you should ask your solicitor to look into getting a timescale for snagging incorporated into the terms of the contract, ideally to state that all accepted items will be completed within 10 weeks of the date of completion. You should also consider holding back a retention of £5,000 to £10,000 until everything is done, and this includes the final wearing course for all the roads and pathways on the development. A professional inspection costs from £175 (including VAT); if you want to do it yourself, get a snagging checklist from Snagging.org for £14.99

Source:  What Mortage

Snagging.org has just released a new version of its snagging checklist in response to feedback from Snagging.org members and input from professional snaggers. The site, which has been featured on national TV, receives thousands of visitors per day and provides snagging stories, forums, polls and much more to help new build buyers.

Here is the snagging checklist.

A new version of a snagging checklist has just been released allowing new homebuyers to create a snagging list on a property for themselves.

Snagging.org has been featured on national TV, receives thousands of visitors per day and provides snagging stories, forums, polls and much more to help new build buyers.

The new snagging checklist includes the following top tips and many more.

A new guide to make buyers aware of the tricks used to sell off-plan properties, including show homes, has been produced by New Build Inspections (NBI).

NBI say it is common practice for house builders to use show homes to sell off-plan properties, but warn it is essential that home owners are aware that these can be misleading. The new guide aims to highlight some of the tricks used to sell off-plan homes thereby allowing new build buyers to make a more informed decision about their purchase.

New Build Inspections director Catriona Bright, who produced the guide, discussed the issue with Janet Street Porter on Channel4′s Demolition. Read more: Snagging

A pristine blank canvas on which your family can make its mark, a brand new house is an option worth serious consideration for those in the market to move…

If the idea of a brand new house brings to mind rows of identical, boxy houses on estates located too far from the shops, then think again. These days, new homes take all kinds of forms, and are often designed with a much more thoughtful approach to how they will be lived in.

Whole estates and small tracts of new homes are still going up – in some cases, making good use of redundant ‘brownfield’ sites, thus avoiding incursions into the countryside.

Read More: Snagging.

Snagging surveys grow in popularity but with it comes choice and pitfalls.

Stories of leaky, flawed and defective homes and consequential personal suffering have resulted in an explosion in the number of new home snagging companies – it is no longer a question of whether or not to get a snagging survey but rather which company to choose for the job. Read more:Snag List Advice (Archive)

Proliferation of new home ‘snagging’ services brings new risks

Snagging surveys grow in popularity but with it comes choice and pitfalls.

Stories of leaky, flawed and defective homes and consequential personal suffering have resulted in an explosion in the number of new home snagging companies – it is no longer a question of whether or not to get a snagging survey but rather which company to choose for the job.

It is important that new homebuyers choose with care to ensure they get good value for money and a professional service. This short checklist will help discerning homebuyers choose the right snagging company.

1. Are they truly independent?
Never use a snagging company that works for or is recommended by your house builder as this represents a potential conflict of interest and may result in the production of a “watered-down” snagging report to suit the developer’s needs rather than yours.

2. What do you get for your money?
Does the price include a second visit to inspect the remedial work? If not, how much do they charge for this? Does it include any after care service? If it does, what does this include?

3. Are the inspectors qualified and experienced?
Currently it is possible for anyone to set themselves up as a snagging inspector. Make sure you get someone who is qualified and experienced. Qualifications vary, but look for professional qualifications in subjects such as chartered surveying and building surveying and membership of professional bodies such as the Chartered Institute of Building.

4. What track record has the company got?
How experienced is the company? Do they have customer testimonials available? Do they have good media relations, which can be a good tool for resolving extreme cases?

5. How fast is the service?
Larger companies with nationwide coverage will be able to provide the fastest and most efficient service. They will be able to arrange an inspection at short notice and issue the snagging report within the shortest timeframe.

Remember that a snagging inspection can pay for itself many times over and will often be a fraction of the cost of rectifying the defects identified which the developer will be obliged to deal with. However, if cost is an issue but you have time on your hands then it is worth considering purchasing a snagging checklist, such as the one provided by www.snagging.org which allows you to conduct your own snagging survey.