FAQs for After the Build for Self Builders

Question 1

What is snagging on a self build?

Accepted Answer

The end-of-build inspection that lists everything not yet finished or not yet right - and it only has power if each item is written, located, photographed and priced. As a build ends, the work is inspected and everything not yet right goes on one list: the door that catches, the paint that stops short, the cracked tile, the missing sealant. That list is the snag list, and the process - walking the build room by room and writing it down - is snagging. What most self builders miss is that a snag list is a money document, not a mood: unpriced, it is a set of complaints that goodwill is supposed to fix; priced, it tells you what to hold back from the final bill until the work is actually done, and it tells the builder that finishing properly is cheaper than waiting you out. Each item should be numbered, located, photographed and priced, issued with proposed dates, and closed only on evidence - a photograph of the fix, not a promise of one.

Question 2

When do I get my retention money back?

Accepted Answer

On the dates your contract names - typically part at handover and the rest when the defects period ends - and only reliably if you diarise them. Retention - the slice of each payment held back as security that faults get fixed - comes back in the way your contract says, and only there: commonly a first release when the build is handed over, and the final release months later when the defects period - the run of months in which the builder must return and fix faults - comes to an end. Two failures cost self builders here. The first is releasing early out of politeness, which buys nothing back if a fault appears the following month. The second is simple forgetting: the final date arrives, nobody walks the house or claims the money, and the sum quietly stays where it is. Put both dates in your diary the day the contract is signed, book a walk-round a month before the period ends, log anything that has appeared, and release when the contract says so - not before, and not never.

Question 3

What is the defects period after a build?

Accepted Answer

The months after handover when faults that appear are the builder's to fix - if they are logged and notified in writing while the period runs. New buildings move: they dry out, they settle, and their faults introduce themselves over the first months of living there - the crack above the lintel, the door that sticks in weather, the joint that opens as the heating cycles. The defects period exists for exactly this: a stated run of months after handover during which faults in the builder's work are the builder's to come back and fix, at no cost to you, with the last of the retention held as the reason to actually do it. The period only works if it is run in writing: each fault logged when it appears and notified to the builder in writing the same week, kept on one list with dates and photographs, and swept up in a final walk-round booked a month before the period ends. What the period does not cover is wear, misuse and the things you have changed yourself - which is another reason the written log matters.

Question 4

Do I have to pay the final bill while snags are outstanding?

Accepted Answer

Pay for what is complete and hold a fair, stated amount against what is not - priced, in writing, released as the work finishes. The end of a build is a trade the contract already anticipates: the builder wants the account settled, you want the work finished, and the honest position sits in the middle. Paying everything with a promise attached converts your last leverage into goodwill; refusing everything over a modest list is the other unfairness, and it sours a settlement that was close. The commercial answer is to price the gap: put a fair cost against every unfinished or defective item, hold that - and only that - from the account, say so in writing with the priced list attached, and release line by line as fixes are evidenced. That position is difficult to argue with precisely because it is fair. Where settlement wording needs legal force - full and final, disputed sums - that is a solicitor's ground, and the close-out says exactly when to take it there.

FAQs for After the Build, Self Builders

Frequently asked questions

Closing out

What is snagging on a self build?

When do I get my retention money back?

What is the defects period after a build?

Do I have to pay the final bill while snags are outstanding?