This is very tough to write, as a homeowner who has lived here for 5 years now. I brought my fist ever property here over 5 years ago now on the help to buy scheme. I was 27 and desperate to make the change from paying a landlord to paying off my own mortgage. I own a modest 1st floor two bed two bath flat and I want to start with the positives, which are as follows.
The build quality is actually very good and the room sizes are by new build standards huge! Heating and electricity bills are very cheap thanks to the modern insulated design and there are several areas/ parks for young kids to play and explore. You can take a walk to the river and enjoy their small wilderness walks among long grasses and wild flowers.
Now for the not so nice parts, in the 5 years I have lived here I have seen the arrival of the uber boat service and the train station, despite these additions the value of my flat has not increased. So if your hoping to see growth on your property’s value I suggest you look elsewhere, although the help to buy scheme will save you a few bucks, the flats are over priced to ensure the developer is well compensated.
The train station, well for some reason the train line runs to gospel oak and avoids zones 1 & 2. So if your working in central its actually just as quick to get on a bus as it is to take the train. Check its route and your travel time as its still an hour. And as for the boat its allot more expensive and unless your work is close to the river your actually worse off. Again I highly recommend you check your route and travel times, plus costs.
However if you are someone who drives to work please bear in mind that the traffic in and out of the development is truly horrendous from the hours of 7am to 6pm. Again please check using google maps as I kid you not their are times it takes 15-30 mins to drive what must be all of 3 miles. And there are plenty of idiot drivers trying to undertake and push you out.
You also need to remember this development is no where near at full capacity, and seeing as the trainline goes to nowhere, people are likely to remain going by car so its only going to get worse, food for thought if I haven’t already discouraged you!
So that about wraps up transport links.
Now for the bad bits about the environment, firstly I would like to mention the lovely buzz of the overhead power lines, fortunately I am not that close to any of them however at certain periods of the day in the week they make allot of noise. My advice is try to buy as far away from them as possible, say for instance not on the development.
The deal breaker, so if you do not already know the development is situated in between two very large and very pungent human waste sites. Beckton Gas works is actually a site where they process our human waste and create methane gas, the name Beckton Gas Works is just a clever play on words. Then on the other side of the river to the east of us you have crossness sewage treatment works. Together these make up the largest waste sites in the whole of Europe, and luckily they are right on your door step. Now to be frank they don’t always smell, in fact more often than not they don’t. They have sealed the lids to allow the processing of the smelly gasses, however from time to time they have too much and need to realise it into the air. The problem is it leaves the smell of what can only be described as a 7/10 human fart rating, and say its released at 3pm, you will be left with the smell until the early hours of the morning. This tends to happen 2-3 times a week in the summer and 1-2 in the winter.
Thirdly you may or may not be aware that it is still a building site, and it is right next to gill aggregates, a company that ships in thousands of tonnes of sand. The sand is stored in giant open pits, the problem with this is the sand is free to travel with the wind. And this sand tends to land on cars, now if your using your car daily this is not a major issue however it will stick to windows, balconies and cars that don’t get used all that often. Again depending how wind a day it is will play a factor although it can get very windy what with being next to the river.
You also need to remember that the development is surrounded by a big dirty industrial site, that has many businesses that deal in waste management, they have large lorry’s carrying building waste and recycling waste and they tend to leave a trail of mess in their wake. I couldn’t tell you how many lorry’s pass through there every day but its a huge amount and they are mainly responsible for the horrendous traffic throughout the day. I don’t know if the industrial site will be moved at any point but until it is, it will continue to ruin the roads with traffic and overflowing waste.
So that round about wraps up the local environment.
So finally time to review the not so local amenities, community and developers.
I cannot deny their are now two local small co-ops, they are reasonably priced and open 7am-10pm and have very friendly, welcoming staff. You can definitely pick up a variety of supplies however as always they don’t have everything you need, so your still going to need to pop to a big store or get a home delivery. If your not a fan of online shopping then its a 15 min drive to Asda, Sainsburys or Tesco’s, although the latter two can take longer during peak traffic hours. There is a small tatty looking coffee shop next to the co-op that’s part of the older development but I have never been interested in going to it. And there is also a local pharmacy but again its small and my experiences in their have not necessarily been bad but they could definitely be allot better.
For all the gym freaks out there your closest one is back in town which is about a 25 min trip, other than that there is a floodlight pitch for football though i have never seen any invites to play. And to be fair I’m useless at football so there may be an opportunity for any football fans to join up but you would need to check first.
As for community the local church seems a blast and always has things going on, its a majority african community and they are really friendly. If you are into this sort of thing I have no doubt you will really enjoy yourself. Its as busy as the A13 slip road most days so evidently a great venue.
As for schools I cannot comment but they are new and there are several to choose from. As for trouble/ crime, I am aware that there are two local drug gangs and we have had several police vans and police squads in the local area protecting one gang from another, due to a gag related shooting. However I have to state that i have personally never had any trouble at all in my time here. And I have often stumbled home from the local bus station with absolutely no issues at all. In reality there is trouble in most areas and of all the places I have lived this definitely scores low on crime in relation to the other places I have lived. It is genuinely a very nice community here.
Finally onto the developers, now lets be real here, anyone expecting high quality service from a business that’s building cheap houses on this development is kidding themselves. They know its cheap, they know its smelly and they know if your buying here, you either cant afford anywhere else or you haven’t bothered to do your research. Fortunately the only issues i had with my place were scuffed doors and some finishing of painting. Now I had to chase them to complete what should have been done before I got the keys but one call and one email sorted it relatively pain free. However since this time I have had multiple parking issues that go undealt with and as for the maintenance charges well they are a rip off to start with and they went up 50% around 12 months ago. In total I spend £3,300.00 a year on ground rent and maintenance. And in return I get someone to hoover the communal spaces once a week and spray some cheap perfume. The lift gets a sticker once a year and a couple of blokes cut the grass once a month. The windows also get washed twice a year so all in all, I’m getting robbed as there are about 90 properties in our building.
So why write this? Well assuming this actually gets posted, I don’t want my loss and pain to be experienced by anyone who has bothered to do what I didn`t. And that’s research, as soon as the fire cladding issue is fixed on my property it will be going up for sale and I shall never return.
I am confident even if this makes it onto the website, some unfortunate sole will still buy my flat and if not I will just rent it out.
As they say you get what you pay for…
Cheap but overpriced, Smelly, poor commuter links, ridiculous traffic, now property value growth and a severe lack of local amenities.
And there are still more homes to be built so the above will only get worse.
Please share one thing (or more) which you wish you had known before you moved in:
How bad it smells, how bad the traffic is, how unclean the surrounding areas are, how bad the transport links are and how much sand blows onto the development.
How has the building management responded to any problems or issues you have raised:
They are non existent and ignore every email. Too lazy to actually deal with any issues.