Hi, has anyone had any recent experience with FirstBuild from Auckland

Hi Joesols We are in a middle of a build with these guys! Have you got a contact number? Cheers

Did you get your $100K back from Firstbuild Homes before they went into voluntary liquidation?

Firstbuild Homes was placed into liquidation 12 May 2023. CEO Rob Thomas sent an email out advising all customers his company has folded. We had given them over $500,000 and received little back. Our frames haven’t even arrived on site. Foundations are in and we are probably out of pocket $400,000. What the hell did Rob Thomas and (Richard) Mark Holman (the directors) do with our money? It certainly was not spent on our house we signed up for! We are incredibly angry, sad, disappointed, devastated. We can only hope they do not do this again.

Hi Sad Customers, I can certainly understand why you’re sad, angry etc. From mention of frames not arriving on site I assume this was a regular in-situ construction, rather than one of the factory type homes, that seem to have had so many problems. As such there are standard and legislative requirements for contracts over $30K. So for the assistance of others looking at their building contracts, it would be helpful to know how you ended up with a schedule of payments that required you to pay out so much, before the relevant sections of work were completed. I can see you might pay a 10% deposit up front, and then something for the completed foundations. Even for a $1M build that is unlikely to exceed $150K in total. So what was the rest of the payment for? Surely builders do not think their clients have become so desperate that they will pay the full cost of a build before work starts.

Firstbuild also did not pay their contractors, many since Jan, lots of people are owed money 🙁 with promises of invoices getting paid and no follow through. waiting on the public liquidation notice so that a claim can be filed to the liquidator.

Bloody good question Chris, I hope there is a response so it can help others to avoid potential disasters like this. I think in the boom of 6-12 months ago builders were perhaps preying on clients on their “fear of missing out” and contracts were sketchy at best and weighted in favour of the builder. For these guys I hope not and they can get some sort of resolution.

We signed up to Firstbuild because it was to be built in their factory then trucked to our site. After foundations were laid we paid the as per the contract, as it was promised a fast turn around. Then Rob Thomas and Mark Holman started with the excuses for delays at the factory. Then they changed it to bases and frames in the factory and remainder to be built on site. If that had been the case from the outset the payment schedule would have been vastly different.

Probaly not much chance of getting your money back from first build but i know they are going on a few holidays , i gather on other peoples money. Its not the first company he has owned that has gone bankrupt.

Ah, yes that makes more sense. I’ve recently read of a case where the houses were also built in a yard and then transported to site but when the company folded and all the almost paid up customers went to reclaim what they had paid for to date they were told by the insolvency company appointed to liquidate everything that they owned none of it until it was %100 paid for so they fell at the bottom of the list of people owed money to. It was taken to court and the customers lost. I don’t know if it was in their contracts or if that was standard practice (Chris might add some insight here) but that would be something people should definitely check when approaching modular builds such as these.

Hi Sad Customer & MJ, I’ve been involved with pre-cast type work (concrete walls, beams, facing panels), but had no dealings with any of these modular, podular etc etc factory-built house companies. On the face of it they seem like a very good idea. Should have better quality control, and less impact (delay, damage etc) from weather. My impression, from TV programmes, is that they seem to be successful in Europe, even to the extent of being manufactured in one country (in the case I saw a huge, space age factory in Poland), and erected in another (the UK). It seems a real shame that this kind of thing goes so badly wrong, so often, in NZ. So I suspect no one is getting involved with them at the moment. But to overcome this issue of nearly complete structures in the factory being taken over by liquidators, when a firm goes bust, is it not possible to have a contract that says everything that has been manufactured (or materials allocated to) a particular client, shall be the property of that client, provided payment has been made by the client for the work to completed. (Or at least that you own in proportion to the total cost that you have paid). Somewhat similar to the fact that I assume you would own any work completed on your own site, provided you’ve paid in accordance with the schedule of payments. Surely there must be some form of wording that gives you the right to go in and collect what you’ve paid for. For example in this case I assume no one is disputing that Sad Customer owns the completed foundations on his/her site (or are they?). Other precedents seem to be, I believe contractors may put in contracts that plant (ie machines) and equipment remains in their ownership while on your site, and items they have installed on your site do not belong to you until you have paid for them. To paraphrase Phil & Kirsty’s TV programme, what are the three most important thing in building work, ‘The Contract, the Contract, the Contract.’ Not much use to those already suffering, but maybe food for thought to those still brave enough to venture into the shark filled waters of NZ construction.