Oxley Woods Living

Life in an Oxley Woods eco house

 
 

Posts Tagged ‘eco homes’

 

Public exhibition of Oxley Woods plans

July 6, 2011

A public exhibition is to take place on July 13th 2011 at The Church of Christ the Cornerstone in Central Milton Keynes.

All residents should have received an invitation to attend a public display of the revised plans for the Oxley Woods development, and comment forms will also be available to provide feedback on the proposals should those attending wish to do so.

Apparently ”the development team“ will be on hand to answer questions and provide further information.

Discussion is already underway in the Oxley Woods Living Forums concerning the event.

Full address is: The Church of Christ the Cornerstone, 300 Saxon Gate West, Milton Keynes, MK9 2ES. Exhibition times are 3pm to 7:30pm

Can we just have our money please Taylor Wimpey?

August 27, 2010

When is a genuine gesture of goodwill, not all it seems?

When the management at Taylor Wimpey get involved, or so the case would appear to be.

In the early days of our ongoing problems with leaks, damage, unfinished items, and all the rest, our site manager here at Oxley Woods made a generous and, I believe, genuine offer to cover our fuel bills, as I believe has been mentioned on here before.

Well, after being turfed out of our house in the build up to Christmas 2009, having all doors and windows replaced, and other (but not all) remedial work completed, it felt in the spring of 2010 that we were coming to an end of our horrible time here at Oxley Woods, and were close to being able to just enjoy our family home.

We felt that it was a good point to draw  a line under an apparently perpetual agreement and finish the reimbursements for domestic bills, much of which was consumed while were out of the building.

In April 2010 Taylor Wimpey agreed to this, and assured us we would receive our money.

Here we are, a few days shy of September 2010, and we still don’t have the money we were promised.

There’s been all the usual stalling tactics played out by Wimpey, until it seems they’ve revealed their hand, and their attitude towards honesty, openness, and customer care.

They want me to sign a confidentiality agreement BEFORE they will reimburse us with the money promised over four months ago!

The fact we’ve been waiting so long, so therefore have had months to complain to our friends, neighbours and families about the situation, appears to have passed them by.  Plus, this shows, once again, how they like to shift goalposts and delay doing just about anything for as long as possible.

Perhaps they’ve been pre-occupied trying to abandon the original Oxley Woods plans in favour of continuing with more conventional housing, and they’ve forgotten about us who are already here. those who’ve money they’ve already taken, those who they owe money.  I somehow doubt it, I think they just don’t like paying up, even when they’ve agreed to do so months previously.

Felt to me like a disgusting attempt to buy silence, and clearly, one not working.

Are we nearly there yet?

April 24, 2010

Maybe so… at least, sat here on a sunny morning in Oxley Park, with the estate feeling quiet and bright, it feels like we may really, nearly, be there.

We now only have a handful of outstanding items. Sure, some of them seem quite big, some seems quite mysterious and apparently very hard to solve, but it feels like, ALMOST two years in, we’re finally approaching a point where we can just settle in and get on with living in our Oxley Woods home.

So there’s a couple of hurdles and no doubt stumbling blocks to be negotiated yet, but we’re almost there.

It’ll be amazing when we finally arrive!

The drip drip effect at Oxley Woods

February 3, 2010

It’s not been long since we moved back into our home at Oxley Woods. The newly installed windows are a vast improvement over the old. Personally, I prefer their appearance, but most importantly, so far, they’re proving weather proof! We’ve had rain, we’ve had snow, we’ve had wind… and so far so good, the water has remained on the outside of the property!

So, for the first time since June 2008, it seems our Taylor Wimpey and Wood Newton constructed eco house is water tight!

Unfortunately, it’s water tight, but still, in the case of one room (and the skylight area, of course), still rather wet.

Our Son’s bedroom is at the front of the property. It has a corner window, the same design and orientation as the kitchen on the ground floor. Unfortunately it gets wet. Very wet.

A couple of days ago I grabbed some photos, it wasn’t actually anywhere near as bad as it can be. Below show his bedroom window, our daughters window in the neighbouring room, our bedroom window, and finally the kitchen window for comparison.

Front bedroom

Middle bedroom window

Master bedroom

Kitchen window

As you can see, there’s quite a dramatic pool of water in our Son’s bedroom.

This is not unusual. It’s been very bad since we moved back in, and following a meeting on site here at Oxley Woods last week with Wood Newton and Taylor Wimpey we’re not even sure what’s going to happen. It seems they don’t really know what the problem is (sound familiar) and why this particular section of glass is suffering so much, when all others around it are not. It’s not a hot room in the winter, and it’s not unique in it’s style/position (other than elevation, it’s much the same as the kitchen, which by rights should be the “damper” of the two rooms.

Our son doesn’t breath more than myself and my wife combined, or even probably much more than our younger daughter in the next room. We don’t hang things on the radiators… there just seems to be a problem with the glazing in his room.

We really hope this gets resolved as soon as possible, as water on wooden windows cannot be a good thing, neither can the damp in a children’s bedroom, and the fact the water runs down the recently painted walls, leaving run marks as it goes, certainly isn’t pleasant at all.

Meanwhile, if you have any suggestions as to what could be causing this, please feel free to comment below, as we feel we need all the help we can get to resolve our problems right now!

Warped and wondering at Oxley Woods

January 31, 2010

In July 2008 we reported an issue of a warped fridge freezer door. That’s eighteen months ago. During that time, several doors have been sent to the site by the supplier Symphony, apparently all also warped, or warping. This has been ongoing the entire time we’ve been in the property.

We spoke about this once again towards the end of last year. Apparently Wimpey were going to talk to their head buyer and sort this problem once and for all. It did seem they were taking it seriously, but as I said, from our point of view it’s been a year and a half of living with an increasingly warped door, a faulty product, and we seem no closer to getting it fixed.

The fact that Symphony appear to be continually supplying the builders with replacements that are also faulty is neither here nor there from our point of view. We paid our money to Wimpey and it is, of course, their responsibility to make sure we get wait we paid for, a product of suitable quality.

Anyway, this is what the door looks like, at the top from both sides, and at the bottom. Quite a difference I”m sure you’ll agree.

Fridge door

Fridge door

Fridge door

Anyway, last week (January 2010, remember, this problem has been present since July 2008!) we were told once again about Taylor Wimpey talking to their head of buying talking to Symphony to get this sorted. The same thing we were told over a month ago?! I’ve no idea what’s been happening in the mean time, but this is another example of us waiting… and waiting… and waiting… and putting up with a substandard product, and here were are, a year and a half down the line, and it feels like we’re getting nowhere fast.

Maddening.