More than 50% of UK new home buyers have trouble with properties - report

More than half of the buyers of new homes have experienced major problems with their properties, the Guardian reported, citing a YouGov survey conducted for the Shelter housing charity.

The survey found that 51% of homeowners of recent new builds in England said they had experienced major problems including issues with construction, unfinished fittings and faults with utilities.

It comes after Bovis Homes agreed to pay £7m compensation to customers for poorly built houses.

The survey, which polled 4,341 UK adults online, was published with a Shelter report that concluded that the housebuilding sector is rigged in favour of big developers and land traders rather than families looking for homes.

"For too long, too much of the value generated from building new homes has flowed straight into the pockets of landowners and developers. They have done very well out of this broken system, at the price of a generation of people stuck in expensive, poor quality homes," Shelter said.

Eight in 10 working families who are renting privately cannot afford to buy a newly built home – even if they use the government’s Help to Buy scheme, Shelter said.

The YouGov poll showed 41% of homeowners disagreed with the statement “I would prefer to live in a new home rather than an older one”; 29% agreed, and 26% neither agreed nor disagreed. And 45% disagreed with the statement “New homes are built to a higher standard than older homes”; 22% agreed and 23% were neutral.