Agony of sleepless nights and an empty fridge for owner of leaky home

Cathy Adams outside the Mission Bay dream home that has cost her a fortune in legal and builder's fees and years of worry. Picture / Martin Sykes

In 1999, Auckland executive Cathy Adams signed a contract to build her dream house in Mission Bay.

It turned into a seven-year leaky building nightmare.

Stress and lack of money for food meant the high earner lost 30kg in the last year alone. She estimates she has spent $500,000 on repairs and legal fees on a property worth about $800,000 and has taken handouts from a generous grandmother to survive.

Although she earns "a good six-figure salary", many days the single mother goes hungry. She has been forced to sacrifice paying daily living expenses such as food and petrol to afford the steep legal bills in her fight for justice.

"In the past two weeks I have eaten dinner twice, both times at my grandmother's, who first had to come and give me the petrol money. Now my son has started getting food free from his friends everywhere. This morning he said, 'Mum, don't worry, I got some extra food for you here'."

She has won part of her battle, after finding an excellent builder to make repairs. The leaks have been fixed, new walls have gone up and she is awaiting final compliance documents.

"The house is new from the concrete pad up," she says. "It doesn't leak."

Yet still she is fighting for financial compensation and has thought of visiting a food bank to survive.

A District Court claim has not been resolved and she still cannot sleep when it rains because she went through so many years of night-time panic about leaks.

She rejected taking a claim to the Weathertight Homes Resolution Service because she had no faith in the state system. Friends who used it were extremely critical and she believes she has fared better by taking her case to lawyers directly.

She estimates she has spent $100,000 on legal fees with four lawyers and about $400,000 on repairs. She signed a $140,000 contract to build the house and reckons that with all the legal fees and repairs, she has paid for the place many times over.

What has irked her lately is news coverage of the crisis as various parties put their case.

"I am tired of reading about the builders, architects, contractors, lawyers, councils, the certifiers, Building Industry Authority and the Government as they are all part of the problem or have something to gain from it.

"So I wondered if the Herald had considered doing a real-life leaky house story on the seriousness of the impact on homeowners caught up in this bloody scandal. And I am probably one of the lucky ones."

She wants people to hear about the consequences and the pitfalls of the situation.

The Government says it is reforming the system. Building Issues Minister Clayton Cosgrove is beefing up the Weathertight Homes Resolution Service and builders are becoming regulated.

Sound advice

* It's up to the homeowner to ensure the house meets expectations.

* Read the fine print in the contract and reject verbal assurances - they mean nothing.

* Negotiate to get what you want and reject assurances that jobs can be finished later.