Aussies’ ‘nightmare’ as builds stall
Aussie families were promised their dream homes but are instead living a “nightmare”. Pictures reveal why they’ve had enough.
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Some customers from a major Australian construction company say they are facing a “nightmare” as building on their dream homes stall and they’re left with an agonising lack of information on when they will be complete.
Customers of Victorian building company Grandeur Homes have reached out to news.com.au to share their frustrations, while the builder denies the claims.
Grandeur Homes is currently managing around 110 projects throughout Victoria.
Dami Adebiyi, a psychiatric nurse, and her husband wanted to build their “dream home” for their children aged eight and five.
Instead, the experience turned into the “worst nightmare you can imagine”, she said. They signed on with Grandeur Homes in March 2022.
Ms Adebiyi said they had paid around $370,000 to Grandeur Homes for the home they are building in Cobblebank, Victoria.
Contractually, the house was meant to be handed over to the family in October 2023 but Ms Adebiyi said they couldn’t get any answers from Grandeur Homes on when the house would be completed.
She claims the build has been plagued by delays.
“The delays started off initially during Covid time. We were told there was no timber and that went on and we allowed six months of nothing happening. But every house on our street was building and our construction company was the only ones that weren’t working on the site,” she told news.com.au.
“Now the whole street is built and even though our house was the first to start, now it’s still sitting vacant.”
Ms Adebiyi said work began on the home in October 2022 and now it has sat at lock up stage for months.
“We are literally stuck and the company are not doing anything,” she added.
“It’s a nightmare every day. I said to my husband I have stopped crying as I don’t have anymore tears to shed.
“There is no end in sight. They were meant to give us the key on 11 October last year and they can’t even give us a date that they can give us a key.”
Do you have a story? Contact sarah.sharples@news.com.au
Contractually, Grandeur Homes was required to pay $250 a week for not delivering the house on time but the family hasn’t seen a cent.
At the start of July, Grandeur Homes told the family it was “working tirelessly to complete your home as soon as possible”, citing carpentry issues that needed to be rectified before starting the next stage of building.
But Ms Adebiyi said they were told the exact same thing about carpentry issues back in January by Grandeur Homes.
A company representative told the couple over an email dated July 11 that they were “unable to give a finish date at this stage of your job”.
Grandeur Homes’ lawyers said a meeting did occur in July “but our client has no record of any meeting or correspondence with Ms Adebiyi or her husband in January”.
Ms Adebiyi complained to Grandeur Homes over email in July that there had been “a despicable lack of communication” and a lack of transparency.
The experience has left the family “financially drained”, added Ms Adebiyi.
“We have moved into a rental, we are paying a mortgage on a house that is not getting built so there is stress all over. You’ve got to deal with work stress, life stress and Grandeur stress,” the 35-year-old said.
“Other builders said they can’t take on the project unless Grandeur Homes give you a release letter or goes into liquidation.”
After news.com.au sent questions to Grandeur Homes, Ms Adebiyi met with the construction company and an agreement was made to mutually terminate the contract.
She said the family had approached a new builder already, who had quoted an extra $58,000 to finish the home.
Grandeur Homes lawyers told news.com.au delays in Ms Adebiyi’s case were caused by suppliers.
“Specifically, the supplier contracted to install heating and cooling went out of business earlier this year, and a replacement had to be found,” they said.
They added the $250 a week payment was a liquidated damages provision in the contract.
“Ms Adebiyi made no claim for such damages and abandoned any claim she might have
had by the deed she entered into with our client on 9 August 2024 to resolve their dispute,” they said.
However, in an email sent by Ms Adebiyi on July 8 to Grandeur Homes seen by news.com.au she asks when the $250 weekly payment will begin “due to your lack of delivering our build on the set date”, she said.
Sam*, who did not want his real name used due to the nature of his job, believes he may have one of the oldest uncompleted houses among Grandeur Home’s customers.
He signed a contract with the building company in October 2021 and construction commenced in May 2022.
However, his build was put on hold for an extraordinary 172 days due to a timber shortage from June 2022 to December 2022.
He had signed on to pay $752,335 to build his dream home for his family, including his wife and two children, to live in.
“So it’s been 841 days since site start, subtract from that the delay days, and we have 669 days,” he told news.com.au.
“My HIA contract states they have 365 days to finish the build. This means they are over the contract by 304 days, that is 43 weeks.
“I honestly don’t think they will ever deliver my house.”
Grandeur Homes’ lawyers said the customer has a complicated double story custom design and internal lock up of his property with all internal rough-ins have been completed.
They said Sam had prevented Grandeur Homes from proceeding with plastering by not signing and returning the contract variation, which has been in his possession for a month.
Aside from the timber shortages, there were several reasons for the building delay, Grandeur Homes’ lawyers said.
“These have included the client’s decision to get a private inspector at each stage of the project. (Sam) is entitled to do this, but as the contract explicitly notes, it can cause delays in construction time,” they noted.
“(Sam) acknowledged in signing his contract that involvement of an independent inspector can lead to a variation on the building completion time.”
The 41-year-old said it had been more than two years since construction commenced and he still has no idea when his home will be delivered.
“I’m very emotional about this. I’m not a crier usually but with this project really I can hardly sleep, hardly enjoy anything and I have cancelled so many overseas trips in the hope that something would happen on site,” he said.
“I am so invested … but it’s just slow … It is a nightmare.”
He feels Grandeur Homes “do not know how to run a proper project” given the delays to building his house and it has led him to “sleepless nights”.
“I think the scariest part is my construction loan has already expired once and I’ve asked the bank to extend it,” he said.
“I don’t think the bank will allow for another extension and if that happens I will need to refinance and apply for a completely new loan for a construction project that isn’t finished and I’m now drowning in debt.”
Grandeur Homes’ lawyers said they were in receipt of WhatsApp messages where Sam “appears to be being coached by an ex-client, against who Grandeur Homes has initiated proceedings in the County Court of Victoria for their failure to pay as to how he can engage a new builder” unbeknown to Grandeur Homes.
“Noting that in these messages, (Sam) expresses worry that his intention may be revealed to Grandeur Homes and then admits that he is trying to get as much work out of Grandeur Homes as he can without (it would seem) divulging his intention to repudiate the contract,” they said.
However, in the messages Sam also speaks about a new carpenter being bought in to “fix the mess” made. He later writes he hopes the carpenter will return to site despite being owed $2000 by Grandeur Homes.
News.com.au spoke to six other current and former customers of Grandeur Homes who did not want to be identified.
In the majority of cases, Grandeur Homes’ building projects are proceeding without incident and the clients are satisfied, their lawyers added.
“Grandeur Homes provides fortnightly updates to clients and responds promptly to all queries,” they said.
“The company is not aware of any clients whose calls have gone unanswered or unreturned or who have not received regular communications about their builds.”
Grandeur Homes is sympathetic to the difficulties faced by clients whose projects are affected by delays, but in many cases, these are due to factors affecting the Australian construction industry as a whole, and are beyond our client’s control, their lawyers added.
“Grandeur Homes is working hard to mitigate the impact of delays, and it maintains regular and open communication with its clients to keep them informed of progress,” they said.
Another family who said they were impacted is the Pandeys, who signed up to build with Grandeur Homes on land they had purchased in Donnybrook.
Mum-of-two Kalpana Sapkota Pandey and her husband signed a contract with the building company for $565,000.
“In August 2021 we signed the HIA contract then our nightmare started from there,” Ms Pandey said.
Between September 2021 and February 2022, revised architectural and engineering drawings were prepared, but in August 2022, without any warning, Grandeur Homes suspended works on the property due to the discovery of rocks beneath the surface, she claimed.
In November 2022, Grandeur Homes requested a contract variation requiring an extra $25,000 to be paid – and an agreement was made.
The 37-year-old said they then got an got an email from the site supervisor asking them to come into the office in March 2023.
The Pandeys were told they would now be required to pay the at least $59,999 for the works to continue.
“We went for the meeting and were showed another invoice of close to $60,000,” Ms Pandey said.
She said Grandeur Homes couldn’t guarantee that there wouldn’t be more price rises.
“We stood up from the meeting and said ‘We are not building a house with you – that’s enough. We can’t afford any more money’,” she said.
“We said ‘we are not giving any more money and said we are done with you’.”
The family hired a lawyer to terminate the contract alleging that the claim for more money and suspension of work was in breach of the contract.
In a prior breach notice, their lawyer said that Grandeur Homes had been “clearly put on notice that the property contained a significant amount of subterranean rock” as per the soil report. The letter added that contractually Grandeur Homes was not able to recover the extra money needed to complete the work.
Grandeur Homes lawyers said a thorough response to Ms Pandey’s lawyers assertion that the contract price could not be varied was provided and “this claim is plainly incorrect”.
They added the contract explicitly stated that the contract price “is not fixed” and may be altered as a result of variations.
“Ms Pandey’s refusal to pay the varied contract price and purported termination amounted to a repudiation of the contract,” they noted.
Meanwhile, the family went with another builder but it’s taken a toll, said Ms Pandey, with a huge impact on her mental health.
She and her husband are both working seven days a week and had to fund an extra $150,000 for the house to be built with a new company – money they couldn’t secure from the bank but had to stump up themselves.
“Our kids keep asking why don’t you have time for us,” she said. “It’s too much, we are mentally drained.”
Grandeur Homes lawyers said the company were only on-site for approximately two months. “When excavation commenced on Ms Pandey’s land, it became apparent that there was a significant amount of rock present under the ground, which impeded excavation,” they said. “The contract provided that the removal of 50 cubic metres of rock was included in the contract price, and beyond that, Ms Pandey was liable for the cost of removal.
“Instead of paying for the removal of the excess rock, Ms Pandey decided to redesign her custom home to try to avoid needing to excavate as deep. The redesign of the project added to the cost.”
Grandeur Homes lawyers said the company is currently in the process of finalising several projects and is working hard to deliver for all of their clients.
“Grandeur Homes sympathises with the frustration and hardship of those who have been affected by the industry-wide delays experienced in recent years,” the lawyers added.
“They assure all of their clients that they are doing everything possible to complete all outstanding projects.”
*Name changed
sarah.sharples@news.com.au
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