Cowboy fears stop essential maintenance

The report says people need better guidance

People's fear of being ripped-off by "cowboy" builders is so great they are delaying carrying out essential repair work to their houses.

So says a new report by a housing research group which suggests that the country's housing stock is suffering because of negligence.

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation claims the priority of most people is not obtaining the best price, but finding a builder they can trust.

This means many owners put off doing the work and let their homes rot, or try to carry out tricky renovation and repairs themselves.

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Home-owners were worried about a number of problems, including poor work and the possibility of a mess left afterwards.

Fear of rising costs, and builders with a bad attitude, who were reluctant to sort out problems afterwards, were also putting people off booking work.

Another problem revealed in the report was ignorance about the long-term costs of delaying repairs.

Although owners were able to spot routine repair work that needed doing, many could not diagnose major or more technical work.

Reluctance to call in surveyors or other professionals to give advice was based on experience of limited valuation surveys required by mortgage lenders.

These memories left people with the impression that a surveyor's report would be costly and uninformative.

Many fear work will drag on for months with a large bill left behind

The report was funded by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation but carried out by Professor Philip Leather of London's South Bank University and Professor Moira Munro of Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh.

It calls for the setting up of a scheme for "recommended" builders, based on stringent vetting and an agreed disputes procedure to help owners find a reliable firm to do the job.

They say trade organisations are not enough because they represent the industry and not the consumer.

The authors add that mortgage lenders and the government could also help by raising awareness of the importance of keeping homes in good repair while offering advice and information on dealing with problems.

Stephen Moon from the National Federation of Builders admitted there were problems, but said more was being done to help vulnerable householders.

But he said: "There are also cowboy customers who simply go for the cheapest and then they are surprised when it goes wrong. They wouldn't buy cars in the same way. They wouldn't buy holidays in the same way, but they do tend to buy building in that way."

He pointed to the creation of a voluntary code of practice by trade associations, but said a compulsory registration scheme would simply regulate those in least need "while the cowboy continued to operate".