Developer urged to update buyers on key handover

Paul Murphy

A TD has called on a company behind the building of a new residential estate in Navan to announce publicly when prospective buyers who have signed up to purchase will be able to move into their new homes.

The call was made by Sinn Fein TD Johnny Guirke who has represented a group of people waiting to occupy houses at Bailey Hill just off the Kells Road. He said that he thought it was very unfair that people who had signed up to buy homes there had been waiting, some of them over a year, to move in. He said that he could not understand the reason for the delays and that it was incumbent on Kingscroft developers to say what it is doing about people’s complaints lodged with it.

The Meath West Deputy said he would be raising the matter in the Dail at the first opportunity. “This does not seem to be a case of one or two glitches in the system. This is a large group of people who are frustrated and annoyed”.

The Meath Chronicle has attempted to raise the matter through emails and texts with Kingscroft without success. The company was contacted last week and this week but has not responded.

The prospective residents had protested at what they said were long delays in allowing them to move into their new homes.

Work on the building of the 97-unit Bailey Hill development has been going on for some time. Three-bedroomed homes there are priced at €370,000 and four-beds at €430,000. A group of prospective buyers contacted Deputy Guirke and this was followed by an online meeting between the group and the Meath Chronicle where many prospective buyers vented their disappointment at the delays they were suffering despite having put down deposits a long time ago.

Many were frustrated that their mortgage applications had run out of time on a number of occasions and there were complaints that this resulted in some interest rates going from 1.9 per cent to 4.5 per cent in the intervening period.

Although purchasers had dealt individually with the developer, they formed into a group to lobby for more action on their purchases.

Reports circulating this week that a number of residents might soon be able to move into their homes could not be confirmed.