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175 points gjvc | 9 comments | 22 Oct 25 17:18 UTC | HN request time: 0.463s | source | bottom
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nevi-me ◴[22 Oct 25 18:36 UTC] No.45673324[source]▶
I could have benefited from this in the construction of our house. Riddled with inaccuracies, the engineer signed off on the foundations, but we found out when the walls were up that the builders used the internal dimensions as exterior dimensions. So our house is smaller by ~250mm on each side.

We had to make so many compromises and wastages as a result. Bathrooms now smaller if we want to keep other rooms the same, bathtubs couldn't fit, aw man.

Then when the house went up to 2nd and 3rd levels, the staircase was narrow and wasn't connecting between the levels. That alone delayed us by 3 months as we had to get the architect to build a 3D model of the affected area so we could figure it out. We have to hoist furniture up through balconies as it can't fit through the stairs.

I think having some machinery that minimises human error would be very helpful.

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asibahi ◴[22 Oct 25 19:30 UTC] No.45674008[source]▶
I am an architect who worked as a contractor and as a consultant and I made an account here just to comment on this.

When you found out the builders did that, what you should have done is stopped the work and have them correct their mistake on their own dime. This is an unforgivable mistake and a team of professional should never make something like that.

Obviously I am not in your shoes, but this is insane to me. Any supervisor or consultant or surveyor visiting the site should've caught that.

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1. jvanderbot ◴[22 Oct 25 20:01 UTC] No.45674401[source]▶
This seems like the just-world response. But how can one force this? If they just say "No" you end up taking them to court and delaying the construction of your house. You endanger the contracts for downstream work.

I had a landscaper screw up just about everything they could building a retaining wall, and they couldn't even get me an extra bag of grass seed after the fact.

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2. kiddico ◴[22 Oct 25 20:05 UTC] No.45674444[source]▶
Surely, a delayed house is better than a house built incorrectly, no?
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3. segmondy ◴[22 Oct 25 20:08 UTC] No.45674508[source]▶
so what? delay it. as you see the house is messed up, that's going to be an issue when it's time to sell. many people will notice a very narrow stairwell or tiny bathrooms. when we were house shopping there were many houses we passed because the stairs were too narrow, or too steep or the bathroom was tiny or some room was so tiny it didn't qualify as a bedroom in our mind or the ceilings were too low. all those tiny flaws cost the seller serious money and reduced the number of buyers.
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4. pjerem ◴[22 Oct 25 20:10 UTC] No.45674531[source]▶
Depends on the country. In France, and I think in Europe, you have 4 (IIRC) legally mandated visits during the construction. At each one of those visits, you have the right to suspend the next payment (you pay a legally mandated percentage of the house after each one of those visits).

I also had measurements issues and a contractor that tried to force it to me. I just said I will not pay until it's fixed. The next week everything was fixed.

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5. nevi-me ◴[22 Oct 25 20:18 UTC] No.45674619[source]▶
To add more context, the staircase is within local building standards minimums. Our architect at least was able to enforce that.

The bathrooms have slightly smaller tubs, though we scratched one of the larger tubs while trying to fit it in, and the supplier wouldn't accept it. It's still in our garage lol.

We were building on a contract where we paid for material at cost, and the contractor made their fee on the labour. They were inexperienced, I'd obviously never use them nor recommend them. We made them pay for most of the damages that we could quantify, and for things like crooked walls/non-90° corners we couldn't really do much.

To an untrained eye, the house is not bad, but we know where all the mistakes are.

6. ghurtado ◴[22 Oct 25 20:23 UTC] No.45674678[source]▶
Something something Nintendo video games....
7. jedberg ◴[22 Oct 25 22:06 UTC] No.45675742[source]▶
You tell the inspector. Point out that the hallway is 25cm short of code. I'm assuming since they are using metric they aren't in the US, but at least here the contractor can't say no the inspector without losing their license.
8. tdeck ◴[22 Oct 25 23:30 UTC] No.45676473[source]▶
Also im the US builders routinely create a separate shell corporation for each job so it can simply go bankrupt if they get sued rather than paying out.
9. ngold ◴[23 Oct 25 04:38 UTC] No.45678212[source]▶
That makes a lot of sense as a system. No courts, just I'm not paying you until it meets specifications