RORY SALAZAR | Finance | Contact
For off-the-plan apartment buyers, signing that contract has become one of the biggest gambles you can make.
That’s because there is now a 50/50 chance you’ll either get what you paid for, a home, or end up homeless and broke after an expensive legal battle seeking compensation for the uninhabitable building’s countless defects.
But thanks to an innovative new approach from Architecture Firm Lovett, Hewitt & Ramsey, those days are numbered after the Firm included future building defects on-the-plan in their latest development project.
“Our brief was to give buyers confidence that signing that contract was a safe bet,” said Architect Ted Ramsey.
“And what better way to do that than by showing them all the defects their new home will 100% have on-the-plan.”
To illustrate the point, Mr Ramsey showed The Advocate floorplans that detailed apartments with water flooding through them from the level above, as well as tiling faults that, as Mr Ramsey explained, will only present themselves once the dodgy builder has dissolved their company to avoid liability for the shonky work.
The architectural drawings are even accompanied by a CV of the building inspector who will be paid by the developer to wilfully ignore defects throughout the building’s construction phase.
Our reporter marvelled at the transparency the Firm was offering consumers, and could barely believe their eyes upon viewing an elevation plan of the building that showed where external wall cracking would commence, and at what point in time the highly flammable yet cheap external cladding would spontaneously combust.
The Advocate was even shown a video of one the Firm’s completed residential towers. In it, one could see the inside of an apartment and hear an unearthly and thunderous groaning of metal that stemmed from the tower’s structure as it was buffeted by strong winds. “This is a common defect that often gets overlooked,” said Ramsey, who followed up the video with yet another that saw the same tower collapse into a pile of rubble with residents still inside. Australia’s consumer watchdog, the ACCC, has praised the Firm for their transparency, and their CEO has even signed a contract to purchase off-the-plan.
