Respond! housing anyone any experience?

fattymuatty

Has anyone any experience of living in respond housing? Can you tell me the positives and negatives? I know that you can't buy a Respond! house like you can a local authority house but other than that I don't know much.We may be offered a respond house in the near future and I was just wondering what peoples experiences are.

Victor

As I understand it, they are a voluntary housing association (likely to formally be a charity). While the rules will be similar to those imposed by a council, there will be differences. They seem to take a more pro-active approach than councils though in tackling issues.

http://www.respond.ie/

tiredmum

I lived in a Respond! house for over 3 years. The upside: You can do anything you want inside the house, with written permission from Respond, meaning, if you want to install a tap outside, you have to ask permission. You don't need permission to paint, change flooring, tiling, hanging pictures etc...
The downside: the rent is much more than with the council. If you have a problem with the neighbours, you have to sort it out yourself. They also don't fix things immediately. We had a leak from our bathroom upstairs and it took them about 2 months to repair it. Other than that, you are free to do what you like as long as you don't cause damage to the place or to someone else's property. Hope that helps.

hellboy99

fattymuatty wrote: »

Has anyone any experience of living in respond housing? Can you tell me the positives and negatives?

My advise, stay away from them! They are great at taking the rent you pay, but when it comes to maintenance issues they are responsible for fixing be prepared to wait and your lucky even if they get fixed.

tiredmum wrote: »

They also don't fix things immediately. We had a leak from our bathroom upstairs and it took them about 2 months to repair it.

You were lucky with two months, I'm currently in a Respond house, myself and my family have been here since they were built in 2001 and here are my problems:

• Some of the radiators have not worked right since 2001, still waiting to get them repaired.

• 2 years to fix my back door.

• 1 year to fix a window.

• 14 months now and still waiting to get a hole in my landing floor repaired.

• I haven't been able to light a fire in the sitting room for nearly 4 years now, still waiting to get my chimney fixed.

That's just to mention a few repairs needed.

There nothing compared to the next issue I have with my house.

In 2006 I noticed cracking appearing in all the rooms of the house, walls coming away from the ceilings, movement of ground level floors, gardens sinking and a major problem with the sewer/drainage system.
From day one I told them that the house was sinking, over a 4 year period they sent out numerous engineers, one of which they blamed my staircase coming away from the wall due to my 6 year old son running up and down them at the time :mad: .
Nothing was getting done so this time last year I got a local councillor involved and a story printed in my local newspaper about the nonsense carry-on from Respond. Shortly after the story was printed I had another engineer visit, and guess what his report found, "the house is sinking" :rolleyes: .
Three months later, the week before Xmas and the first week in January of this year I had a ground investigation crew out drilling the front and back gardens. All going well I thought, I was due to move out of my home in July while the repair works were to be done. I'm still here and nothing has started due to insurance problems and this could mean a delay of months.

With this delay in mind I asked 2 weeks ago could 3 things be repaired;

1. The 14 month old hole in my landing floor.
2. The radiators that have not worked right since 2001.
3. Repairs to the chimney as we cannot light a fire and have been told by the engineers not to do so.

The chimney especially needs to be fixed if we are in for another bad winter, as last year we were at times left with no heating. I was told on Friday that the repairs I asked about would not be done until the major house repairs are addressed. I thought it was more than reasonable to ask for the 3 above repairs to be done given certain delays and that either way they need to be done. Not only that but as a paying tenant and under the contract I signed, Respond are responsible for the repairs and they should be dealt with in a professional and prompt manner, especially given previous failings and delays with the major repairs that need to be done to my house.

In case you don't believe me, below are the newspaper articles:

http://www.argus.ie/news/lsquosinkingrsquo-house-living-nightmare-for-resident-2320138.html

http://www.argus.ie/news/respond-examining-possible-solutions-2320094.html

compnetgreg

I agree with Hellboy99
Avoid to deal with RESPOND! if you not done yet.
You can look at my post also to find out why.
2014.11.06

The_Conductor

Zombie thread, closed.