A sign informed customers about the stark realities of the family's situation that followed building company Bella Vista Homes going into liquidation last month, leaving 30 unfinished homes in the Mann's Lakes Boulevard neighbourhood.
The sign read: ''Sadly our dad tried to build us a home with BELLA VISTA!! That didn't do too well. We want to help dad finish construction of the house.''
Emily,14, was amazed by the generosity of people, saying one man gave them $5 without buying anything.
The girls were nervous that their father would find out and Warehouse staff who walked past were sworn to secrecy. It worked because when Mann arrived home after a day's work he was unaware of what awaited him.
''He was very happy and kept hugging us,'' Sophie, 12, said.
Mann took a big gulp and agreed: ''I was overwhelmed - they're amazing,'' he told the Bay of Plenty Times Weekend.
Their nan said Emily and Sophie had birthdays earlier this month and told their father that they did not need much in the way of birthday or Christmas presents because of the heavy costs looming on the house.
The fact that they had a home to move into at all, albeit unfinished, was due to Mann constantly leaning on the builders because he wanted the place ready for when his English parents Margaret and Maurice arrived from Exeter to spend Christmas in Tauranga.
He managed to pay for the electricity and sewage to be connected and the family moved in a couple of weeks ago.
But like others in the neighbourhood, Mann was hoping that the unspent portion of his mortgage would cover the cost of other builders coming in to finish the job.
However his budget would not extend to the hefty cost of building retaining walls and a driveway, with last Monday's torrential downpour carving out a deep cutting in exposed earth between the house and the unretained bank.
Maurice Mann said the ferocity of the storm reminded him of the monsoons from his military service in Singapore.
March said the family was meant to have moved into the house last Christmas but instead had spent nearly a year living with their nana.
It will be memorable Christmas for the girls with their English grandparents for a totally different reason from last Christmas when nearly all their presents were stolen from under the tree at their mother's house at Pyes Pa.
Friends and relatives chipped in to buy them new presents and although the burglar was caught, the original presents were never recovered.
Unfinished work on the Mann's house
- No retaining wall behind the house (''huge problem'').
- No driveway (original driveway dug up).
- No first-floor deck.
- Schist columns half done.
- No down pipes from roof.
