"Making my house impossible to sell"

Making my house impossible to sell. Nobody wants to pay extra charges for a little bit of land maintenance.
Charges keep going up every year.
Very unfair business model.
Have vandals coming in from other estates and wrecking fences and we need to foot the bill.

"Basically you pay money for a bit of…"

Basically you pay money for a bit of grass cutting and someone to come and see the grass has been cut. this is the next PPI style scam to be uncovered.

"Why can’t I give 0 stars?"

In our personal experience Greenbelt have been nothing short of terrible.

They have billed us for carrying out work on green spaces used by people who don’t even live on the estate. In our case they have claimed to have done work that they haven’t actually done. When we asked for copies of invoices for the work done they have declined to offer these.

Their billing year on year is above inflation in our case. We pay 100% council tax and pay a yearly maintenance charge to Greenbelt too. We disputed the payment a few years ago due to the extortionate amount our bill had risen and they charged us a late payment fee, which it states in our deeds they are not allowed to do.

On the phone they have been rude, sarcastic and unhelpful to us.

Steer clear unless you have an endless pot of money and don’t mind being stressed.

"Awful service"

I have to agree with the previous reviews. When I complained that trees were planted too close to my garden fence (they seem ignorant to the fact that they grow), they refused to do rectify the issue. Many more issues regarding this company. They are unprofessional, uncooperative cowboys but unfortunately I didn’t have a choice of company. Hopefully, house building companies will check out these reviews and steer clear of these louts in the future.

"Absolute tu|2d"

They rob you blind, they don’t do the work and best of all they charge you through the roof.

I caught one of their workers taking a wee! That’s right taking a wee behind my garden fence!

I said all he had to do was ask and I’d of let him use my toilet! When I rang Greenbelt as per usual they did sweet F@&K ALL! Not even an apology...

So now I’m moving in 2 weeks time and they are going to charge me an admin fee! Even though my buyer has just paid this!

So my top tip, stay clear of them!!!!

Lots of love

James ☺️

"Where do I start?"

Where do I start?

This company charge a premium for their management.
However, I struggle to see what they manage.
They employ a company some 60 miles away to complete the landscaping of the site. They only complete about 50% of the landscaped site.
We have a pond on site, but despite Greenbelts Landscape Management Plan suggesting they will maintain the water feature. This is left every month to become over grown and to dry up so this is not actually maintained.
I have never seen a Greenbelt representative on site, I have asked to meet them next time, however this appears to be too difficult. I can only assume they never turn up.
Their customer service is appalling, they often never respond to emails. Give poor excuses, and effectively you waste your breath trying to speak to them.
Emailing the CEO has no effect since he must take the training in the customer service, as I am still awaiting a response!

The standard of work is poor, and we have to accept it. Evidence is never taken seriously and we have to accept this poor management.

If you have a choice of management companies, do your research. We never had a choice!

"Cowboys & Redrow"

Don’t know where to start. Redrow handed over the site when the landscaping wasn’t even completed as per the plans. Even though this was 7 years post completion.
Rates are 75% higher then quoted when we first bought the house. They’ll come up with every excuse to allow them to do the bare minimum on the development. Dodgy white van turn up to landscape. Clearly don’t want to advertise the their shoddy work.
Our development is getting more and overgrown in places that residents are now having to take action themselves to cut back trees, bushes, weeds. Greenbelt will tell you they can’t disturb the natural habitat, due to respawning and other environmental issues. Yet the council will come and cut the banks around the development.
As for the open space it’s a none starter. Full of mud weeds and moss. Never had any grass grown on it. They blame Redrow for leaving it the state it was. We argue why they accepted ownership then and then the whole blame starts again. They will refuse to tell you when and where money is spent. Apart from once a year. Our site have contributed over £10k in 6 months. They put a sign up and cut the grass. That’s it. Oh and pick up litter apparently. They argue they’ve planted bushes and hedges but that’s just stuff that was missing from when Redrow left. Reply to one in five emails and a bloke called Nick will call who you can tie in knots with his poor excuses and car salesman approach to customer services.

"Possibly the worst company in the country"

When you buy a new build or recently built home with the usual fleecehold agreement (even though your property is freehold), check that this bunch of clowns isn't the company employed to take 'care' of some tiny, nondescript part of the estate.

The cons: they don't do a good job; the staff have the intellectual fortitude of sheep; their costs escalate (ours has risen 5% every year); they are not pleasant on the phone; they ALWAYS get the bills wrong and hope you don't check; the complaints process seemingly involves Wiccan rituals and a seance... it is as transparent as onyx; they may be invisible, given the amount of time they bill to our site - I'm yet to see a single operative; they don't actually have proper site records - and when challenged about incorrect charges, etc. you're expected to provide all the paperwork.

Pros:

Summary: the sooner this ridiculous practice is outlawed, the better - Greenbelt is proof that no matter how rubbish a company you are, and how badly you treat your customers, local councils are so lazy they'll greenlight jokers like these to further fleece residents already paying land taxes.

If Greenbelt was a foodstuff it would be soap - because they'd even get that wrong.

"It’s criminal!"

Very poor company. No transparency whatsoever.. well overpriced for works involved. We had no idea when purchasing our house that we were apparently so tied in to such an agreement - we would not have bought on the development had we known.

Makes your blood boil that they have been given a green light to print money.

Dear Greenbelt,

It’s your land, not mine.

Why should I pay you to come out and inspect your own land? Why should I pay you to maintain YOUR land? Why should I pay any fees to you when selling MY ‘freehold’ house?

How have you got away with this?

"Terrible"

This is what Greenbelt will charge you for and what I pay for each year. They manage roughly 1 acre of green space on the plot, which is full of divots and mowed grass is left on. They also claim to manage the hedgerow which is currently growing through our fence and doesn't appear to have ever been touched,

Monthly fee of £405.00 for "routine maintenance"

Monthly fee of £58.00 for "supervisor inspection"

Occasional £120.00 for "site snagging" - site snagging as I understand means checking the land/area/property for things to fix, which for some reason isn't done during the supervisor inspection or covered in routine maintenance.

"planting works" for £253.20

During Covid-19, they said they had "temporarily suspended our routine maintenance on ALL sites in late march 2020". They then decided to charge £303.75 for "routine maintenance" that month, along with an additional £260 for "woodland inspection". Woodland inspection I assume includes checking the ~20 small trees planted on the plot.

There is a further charge of £181.00 "managerial overview" and an admin charge of £39.00 per household.

They are the most expensive grass cutters I have ever seen. The whole plot must require less than 30 hours maintenance a year and somehow they charge what looks like £10,000. Absolutely baffling. Scam merchants.

Their contract is tied in with the purchase of the house and despite numerous requests, they have refused to provide any evidence of this contract.