The problem with windows and our Oxley Woods eco home, is that they don’t appear to be water tight by design. Which, as I’m sure you can appreciate, isn’t ideal.
After only owning the property for a couple of weeks, we had some rather nasty looking water marks on various walls, mostly concentrated above and around windows, although not exclusively so.
We have been informed that the design has been modified/changed as a result of this discovery, and all previously built houses are being treated retrospectively, so that’s a positive thing. Our main issue, believe it or not, wasn’t really with the water leak, but the fact that even now our windows still, to us (and the managers on site agree) look repaired, and certainly nowhere near as good as new.
This all goes back to early July, but the sequence of events has gone something like this…
Clear mastic applied to the sills. Clearly not right, so dug out (some chipping/scratching occurred when this was carried out), and black mastic applied in it’s place. This was not applied neatly, or painted over well, looked pretty terrible so eventually a painter/decorator was called in to do it. Eventually builder’s caulk was used instead of any type of mastic, and the job was better (not great), BUT, as this was applied in hot weather (and also over previous repairs), we had terrible problems with bubbling and peeling….
Last week the painter came back, we believed to removed the old, scruffy, cracked caulking, take back down the paintwork to smooth it, and paint it over again. Unfortunately, only a few hours on the job later, and the work is not up to scratch at all, and the caulking and previous repairs have largely just been “gone over” again.
So, frustratingly, we’re awaiting the return of the decorator(s) to spend a decent amount of time taking back all the layers of below par repairs, to start afresh. Our frustration is compounded when we see the neighbouring house has had the caulking done and the job is very neat and tidy, blows ours away, and that we had a chipped rear door frame painted to a very high standard. So we know it CAN be done, it’s just not being done for us.
Hopefully we’re going to get there, and the next time it will be taken seriously, and the job will be done properly. It’s a shame it took several bodges before we actually had a painted in to do the painting, and even then it’s been in poor conditions, and to a substandard level. Fingers crossed for the next time (and for decent enough weather to allow the repairs!).
These pictures illustrate some of the states of repair the windows have been in, up until October 17th. We’ve taken loads more as you can imagine, but wont bore you with them all here!
