South London Lofts

I am a property developer with houses in South East London. We had a large number of building projects to be completed at the same time and decided to use the services of South London Lofts.

We met with Director of South London Lofts who explained how they had multiple teams and were therefore able to work on multiple jobs. Based on this we decided to work with Director of South London Lofts on a number of projects which normally consisted of a loft conversion and full house refurbishment.

Initially we were pleased
* Extremely competitive quotes
* The lofts conversions were happening quickly.

As the initial projects had started well, we engaged South London Lofts on additional projects.

In hindsight this was a terrible mistake.

The reality was South London Lofts do not have 'teams of builders' they instead subcontract out all of the work to other companies.

It then became apparent that these companies were only interested in completing the jobs as quickly and cheaply as possible. This meant at every possible opportunity the builders cut corners to save cost on labour and material.

Below are some of the examples of the resulting poor quality work:

* Incorrect plasterboard used in bathrooms. Instead of using moisture or water resistant plasterboard which is standard practice in bathrooms they used normal plasterboard and in some parts of the bathroom they didn't use any plasterboard at all. This is now a huge job to remove the bathroom and all tiles to apply the correct plasterboard. We can only assume they didn't use the correct plasterboard (or in some cases any plasterboard) to save time and money.

* We constantly have issues with blocked drains and water not flowing, particularly if more than one shower is used at a time. The patio was also later re-laid by them just placing the paving slabs back on top of the rubble. No preparation, no cement.

* As a result of their shoddy plumbing, we have experienced multiple leaks and water dripping through ceilings on numerous occasions at different properties. We have had to undergo expensive repairs involving cutting ceiling and removing bathroom tiles to try and rectify these issues.

Fortunately, another building company was able to take over the projects and finish them but still to this day we experience problems and unexpected issues as a result of the poor building work done by South London Lofts sub-contractors.

The Director of South London Lofts does not answer our calls or respond to our emails.

It is extremely disappointing how the relationship has ended and we would have expected Director of South London Lofts to have taken responsibility rather than avoiding our calls and ignoring our emails.

To the Director of South London Lofts - when you read this message rather than spending the time writing a reply - why not give us a call?

Converted our bungalow

We have got a bungalow with a big loft. We had seen our neighbours convert their loft and it was a great addition, with one large master bedroom and shower room/dressing room. We live slightly outside London but managed to convince South London Lofts to do a conversion for us as they had come highly recommended. They worked fast and the project manager was brilliant. The loft team were clean and respectful of our property throughout. We made the right decision with this company and got a wonderful pleasing loft conversion. Great job.

We chose South London Lofts (SLL) to complete a loft conversion and ground/lower ground floor renovation on our Victorian terraced house in Catford, SE6. From our initial dealings with Craig in 2019 (the owner of SLL) we felt reassured by his promises as to high work standards and excellent service. We agreed a price with Craig which was significantly lower than quotes that we received from his competitors, which Craig assured us was inclusive of labour and materials.

Once Craig had our money and the works started, so did the problems. In the hope that we can help others not go through the same pain we have gone through in the last 2+ years, we have summarised below the problems. If SLL reads this, please get in touch with us as, although nothing can make good all of the stress that you have caused us, we want to find a resolution.

· Subcontracting of our works. We felt as if SLL is essentially a sales platform, with SLL "passing on" our job to another building company and taking 10% for themselves of the agreed price without doing any building work. From what we understand, the loft building work was subcontracted to a company called SLL Contractors Ltd, which was previously called Build London (workers still wore Build London branded clothing). SLL Contractors Ltd appears to have been founded after Build London went bust. The renovation work was supposedly carried out by another company: Abele-M Ltd but they in fact also passed the work onto another building company after taking their cut, they supposedly still project managed the renovations works.

· Build quality. The loft was built rapidly - however, we soon discovered serious problems such as the roof having multiple leaks. SLL Contractors make several unsuccessful attempts to repair the roof before finally repairing it after a lot of excuses. Numerous cracks also appeared throughout the loft. There were also many serious problems with the renovation works - issues included radiators not being plumbed in correctly meaning they did not heat up, multiple leaks from new shower rooms, new lintels were not installed above new doorways meaning brickwork was left dangerously unsupported, the poor quality kitchen install meant cupboards would not open, flooring was not fitted correctly meaning carpet could not be laid, the list of issues was endless. Abele-M Ltd, the company that sub contracted out the work on the ground and first floors were a new company and their lack of experience really showed, not just with the numerous problems, but with how they failed to deal with them given they were project managing the renovation. Not only was the quality of the workmanship extremely poor and in some instances dangerous but the lowest quality and cheapest materials were used.

· How problems were dealt with. When we raised the issues with the contractor Abele-M Ltd they tried convincing us that we were wrong and in fact their work was fine. After much persuading, they attempted some repairs but the quality of the repairs was so poor it caused further issues. They also refused to redecorate after completing the repairs. The whole process was extremely stressful, time consuming and expensive. In conclusion, Abele-M Ltd did not resolve the issues and we had to hire a new builder to make all the necessary repairs, the repairs cost several thousand pounds and even now we still have issues due to the original works and are having to spend further money rectifying them.

· Cost. While the initial price was competitive, we soon discovered that all was not as it seemed. There were so many instances of "extra" charges, that we soon realised we would end up paying a lot more than we initially agreed with SLL.

Throughout the actual build process Craig was hard to get hold of even though our contract was with SLL. Craig became impossible to reach after we informed him of the issues even after sharing all our photos and videos. After giving Craig our money, we felt abandoned by him and left with a dangerous and incomplete project.

I just want to warn you again using South London Lofts. I've had a terrible experience with them and would certainly not recommend using them in any way.

Craig who you will probably meet initially comes across as quite polished but the reality is that once he has your money he will pass you over to various aggressive Eastern European subcontracting companies.

I found the whole experience rather intimidating and they do of course know where you live - something that along various factors works in their favour to not be that bothered if they treat their customers terribly.

They also very obviously make up reviews so don't be fooled by those. It is pretty clear that most / all of their Google reviews are made up. A person called Cliff Wilson posted on there. From his Google+ profile you can see he is a web designer that designed their website. See link here for his company with the SLL logo http://smallbusinesswebsites.uk.net/index.html Take away these and you probably have the accurate review rating (1-2*).

I also think this blog post reveals quite a lot of the character of the business - and shows also further how they have been making up reviews. Read the exchange between Amanda G and Craig. You'll notice Cliff Wilson pops up here as well with a positive review. http://www.streetlife.com/conversation/4e9abd3af97ab51dc3000bad/

I'm assuming by the time this gets read by them some positive reviews will pop up here too.

Don't be fooled by the intro meeting as I was. Sorry for the rant but really very worn out by the whole experience.

Don't use them - plenty of better companies out there! Can't vouch for their workmanship as didn't get this far but felt completely misled by them. Initial sales pitch was smooth and we were promised that work could start in autumn. An initial deposit of £1500 was required to put the job 'in line'. We made the payment and then could get no straight answer about when the job would happen. We had made it clear that we had a tight deadline and that if the job couldnt' be done in autumn we would need to find another contractor. We were never given a straight answer, continually being told they were 'trying to fit us in'. We waited for over a month, then realised a week before our supposed 'start date' that nothing was going to happen. We had to cancel the job and were treated extremely rudely, with the company taking no responsibility for their lack of communication and honesty with us. They still owe us the deposit. Stay away.