Anthony Morgan-Clark

Review of Two Rivers Housing

They are clueless. We've been in one of their prop...

They are clueless. We've been in one of their properties over two years now, waiting for them to sort an ongoing chronic damp problem so we can decorate and carpet. It took them until August of this year to send out a surveyor to confirm we have damp. A few weeks ago we had all the cavity wall insulation removed... and heard nothing since. Now we have a damp house with no insulation. Every repair has to be chased up again and again and again, with nobody seeming to know what has been done, what's finished, what needs doing. "Oh, I thought that was done." "Oh, I don't know anything about that." "Oh, that job's marked as complete." Makes me wonder what we're paying rent for.
Whether they'll finally put the time, money and effort into resolving this issue properly remains to be seen. They seem happy to patch up and wait for problems to reappear - in fact, that was their first proposed solution to the damp in the kitchen and living room, despite the problems having started years ago for the previous tenants. In fact, when we first reported the damp in the living room we were told that repairs were 'outside of their budget'. I wonder what would have happened if I'd replied that rent was outside of my budget?
UPDATE: They have finally received the report from the contractors they hired to look at the damp problem. They refuse to share the report with us, but have confirmed that they won't be doing anything to resolve the issue. This will be our third Christmas in the house, and we are still unable to carpet the living room due to the damp, though they might send someone to again replaster over the damp problem in the kitchen - meaning that in a few months' time the problem will reappear again. In any other industry charging people a fee (rent) for a service you refuse to provide (a decent, warm home suitable to bring a family up in) would be fraud. Yet in the housing market it's seen as fair.
FURTHER EDIT: we have now spent three years in a damp house that has lacked cavity insulation since September (seven months ago). We still have not heard anything about the damp coming through the chimney breasts, despite them saying they would do something in February. We are again chasing them to do the repairs they said they would, and to find out why they haven't followed up emails they said they would respond to. We have spent three years in a house with walls too damp to paint, and floors too damp to carpet, and they don't care at all.
FURTHER EDIT
They took down the damp plaster and remastered about six weeks ago. The damp took three weeks to start showing again. They have come and looked again, and gotten a quote for tanking the walls. They refuse to spend the money, so will be sending someone to bond and paint over the damp plaster again. Shameful and incompetent.