Scots couple 'living in swamp' after dream £300k Bellway home turns into 'nightmare'

dailyrecord.co.uk:

A Scots couple living with a 'swamp' in their back garden say it has made moving into their dream first home a nightmare.Paddy Harper, 30, and his girlfriend purchased a £300,000 new build from Bellway at the Summerville Gardens estate in Dalkeith and moved in after a delayed start in August 2022.The couple were excited to be embarking on the next chapter of their life together but problems quickly started to emerge during their first winter with persistent flooding in their garden, Edinburgh Live reports.The water ran down a hill from a farmer’s field at the rear of their home and in one instant Paddy captured video of a stream of water flowing through his back garden and into the street in front of his home during a bad downpour in 2022.In images the garden is seen constantly in a ‘swamp’ like state throughout 2023 and the beginning of 2024 due to ‘poor drainage.’The crime scene examiner has hit out at Bellway saying they have been abandoned by the house builder when trying to get the issue resolved.“When we first moved in there were always patchy bits and mud and it seemed to get wetter and wetter whenever it rained,” Paddy said. “The build up was constant and we raised the issue but they just blamed us.“None of the gardens on our street look particularly great but it seems as though our garden and our neighbours garden are particularly impacted by flooding.

Bellway sent out someone to assess the damage but the contractor claimed that the issue was caused by us not raking our leaves.“When we try to rake the leaves we end up taking up the grass due to how wet it is.

In October/November 2022 we had a full on flood through our garden and next door’s.“Water was flowing down like a river from the back fields and past our