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Shoddy workmanship the main complaint
NST 23/06/2003 By K.T. Chelvi and Aniza Damis
 
June 22: “I AM so sad and disappointed with my house!” said Brenda, tears of frustration on her tired face.

Like many young couples in their late 20s and early 30s, Brenda and her husband, Billy, are first-time housebuyers. Having striven to gain financial independence, they had finally bought a house — a step up from the rented apartment they currently live in.
 
Like many housebuyers, Brenda visits her house regularly as it is being built. These visits only serve to strip her of whatever dreams she may have had of owning a home.
 
"The wall tiles are falling off, the beam of the door looks like it's just been slapped on and the walls aren't even straight and smooth.
 
"And did you know, the staircase landing, which is supposed to be rectangular, is some trapezium shape with gaps between the wood and the wall!" exclaimed Brenda in dismay, mingled with a helpless laughter — a defence mechanism to help her cope with the reality of the nightmare.
 
Brenda's case is not an isolated incident. Last year, more than 105,000 complaints were made by houseowners to the National House Buyers Association of Malaysia (HBA).
 
From falling wall tiles, cracked walls and badly done flooring to poor support beams, shoddy workmanship featured largely.
 
Early this year in Taman Dato' Abdul Samad, Port Dickson, the wooden support beams holding up the water tank in Mohd Zahid Abdullah's house collapsed. The tank crashed through the ceiling and struck a double-decker bed in the room below, bending the metal frame. The house was flooded.
 
Fortunately, Zahid, his wife and two young children were out of the house at the time.
 
They had moved into the new house only nine days before the incident. The house did not come with a certificate of fitness, despite complaints to the developer.
 
This is a common problem. Although it has been a Ministry of Housing and Local Government ruling since July 1992 that CFs be given within two weeks from the date of delivery, this is not always observed. Subsequently, some houseowners can go months, if not years, without a CF.
 
Such a situation puts many houseowners through a lot of mental and financial anguish. They cannot move into the house because it is has not been declared safe for occupation. At the same time, having accepted the keys to the house, they then undertake responsibility for the security of the house — which is difficult to do unless they live in it. Workmanship defects, best discovered through occupation of the house, then also go undetected.
 
On top of this, they have to pay off their bank loans, and, if they are first-time housebuyers, they have to pay rent for their current housing.
 
Tapped financially, many are forced to take delivery of the property even though it does not have a CF. And some, like Zahid, would have to take a gamble on their family's safety.
 
But even when everything seems to be going well, apartment or condominium owners can still face problems with the strata title. Similar to a title deed for houses, the strata title is "a title deed in the sky", so to speak.
 
Last year, 28,550 owners in 155 projects faced strata title problems, representing 27 per cent of the total number of complaints received by the HBA.
 
According to the association, difficulties faced by owners without strata titles are numerous.
 
As there is no final and conclusive proof of ownership, an owner who wishes to sell his property cannot execute a straightforward transfer of ownership. Rather, he has to go through a deed of assignment and all the legal hassles that come with it.
 
Owners also do not have rights to manage and maintain the common areas and facilities themselves because such rights belong to the developer until the strata titles are issued. In the meantime, the owners have to continue to pay developers or their agents monthly maintenance charges.
 
But quite possibly the worst thing that can happen to a housebuyer is if the project is abandoned. With a housing loan on one side and no house on the other, the buyer would have to pay interest for what does not exist.
 
And though Real Estate and Housing Development Association (Rehda) president Datuk Jeffrey Ng believes that the number of abandoned projects in the last four or five years is "insignificant", what has to be remembered is that each project involves thousands of units.
 
As at the end of 2002, the Government has had to revive 359 abandoned projects involving 67,792 units valued at RM9.5 billion last year. And this was only what was deemed viable.
 
This money comes from the people's taxes — probably even from some of the people who have been ripped off by the developers.
 
Housebuyers like Brenda don't expect a bungalow and three hectares of land in the middle of the city for the RM180,000 that they are paying. But neither do they expect a rickety shack with lop-sided walls and a leaky roof.
 
And when the product delivered does not match the price paid, they shouldn't have to shrug and just accept it. And no one should expect them to.
 
Malaysian housebuyers are not citizens of an undeveloped world begging for alms and a simple shelter.
 

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