What ever you do, do not use Sentinel Homes

Hello Daniel, Who did you have dealings with at Sentinel? Which area franchise did you use? We are in talk at the moment with Sentinel. Thanks, Nimfa

Hi Daniel, Where area did you use Sentinel to build in?

Hello Daniel We are thinking of using Sentinel, which franchise did you use?

Hi Daniel Currently I am meeting some construction company like Jalcon, Sentinel & GJ Gardener. Could you share something more about sentinel? For example, the more detail about Sentinel’s quality issue on your house? I will really appreciate your opinion and experience about Sentinel

I don’t think either Daniel or Anthony are real people here. That seems fairly obvious. It’s too easy to type up poor Reviews in this column amd be anonymous.

Don’t use Sentinel at all costs, build quality is bad and they are cowboys from the top all the way down!!!

Hi Bob, What makes you say it’s ‘fairly obvious’ that Daniel and Anthony are not ”real people’? I assume their comments were written by human beings, not robots, so you actually mean they’re not using their real names, because they are writing false comments to in some way damage a builder’s reputation. That of course may be true, but what evidence do you have? If you have some connection with this builder (owner/employee/friend/relative) I think you should state that. And if you don’t, how can you know whether he’s any good or not?

Of course “Bob Dobalina” is a fake name in itself. Have heard it used in many situations so not very original. Although people could post negative comments to try and harm a builders reputation you would think the motivation to post a negative comment is more than likely being driven by a unhappy experience that person has had where they haven’t had a good outcome. It could be just as possible for a builder to post favourable comments under a fake name to try and boost his credentials so it can go both ways.

Hi Andrew, Exactly right. And my impression is that there may be a few ‘fake’ comments (both positive and negative) on this Site, but the majority are written about genuine feelings. Some people may of course have unrealistic expectations of their builders, and write in complaining about fairly minor issues, whilst overlooking how much went right. But I find it unacceptable that so many people seem to have problems with so many different builders. The building industry in NZ is clearly in a very bad state, and I think that more legislation is needed to make the penalties for unfair contracts and bad workmanship much stronger. I know that most of these are private contracts between consenting adults. But usually one party (ie the builder) has far more power to cheat the other party (ie the client), and basically ruin the client’s life. This should not be allowed to continue in a properly regulated society, which we (perhaps naively) believe NZ to be. For example, if a builder continues to take money from clients, or get work/materials from subbies and suppliers when he knows his business is already in financial difficulties, and likely to fail, in my view that’s a type of fraud.

agree totally. It is heavily weighted in the builders favour especially if there is no proper disputes/resolution process.