The MJ Gleeson Group has lost an important round of a defective house dispute that has yet to be resolved after more than a decade.
A judge granted Philip and Rosemary Seeney – who were promised a replacement house, but are still living in their “significantly defective” Cambridge home 14 years after it was built – summary judgment on one aspect of their ongoing dispute with Gleeson, and said that the housebuilder may not have fully thought through the stance it has taken in the proceedings. He added that he had “grave concerns as to how the parties have ended up in the current position”.
Coulson J said that, in 2001, the Seeneys brought 1 Fuller Way, Cambridge, from a company within the Gleeson group, but it was “significantly defective” leading to “substantial claims” brought by the couple. Those claims were compromised by a 2009 agreement, the judge explaining: “It was effectively a property swap: Gleesons would build a new house for the Seeneys and take the existing, defective house in exchange.”
He said that, except for finishing details, the replacement property at 19 The Crescent has been completed for some time, but continued: “Sadly, because of the ongoing dispute between the parties, it is sitting there, empty, while the Seeneys continue to occupy the defective house at 1, Fuller Way.”
He said that that the dispute came to the fore in September 2012 when Gleeson sent the Seeneys a demand for £89,575 said to be due for extras that the Seeneys had instructed. In the ongoing proceedings, Gleeson says that failure to pay that sum amounts to a repudiation of the 2009 property agreement, or that it has a counterclaim worth up to £440,937.
The judge said: “Thus, it appears to be Gleesons’ case now that, although they have provided the Seeneys with a defective house at 1 Fuller Way for 14 years, they can either put to one side the subsequent settlement agreement into which they entered by way of compensation for those defects (the repudiation/rescission arguments), or constitute a mechanism by which they, Gleesons, receive almost half a million pounds by way of counterclaim.
“It may be that the commercial, reputational and practical realities of such a stance have not been fully thought through.”
Dealing with the issue before him, he granted the Seeneys summary judgment on their claim that Gleeson agreed in an email to accept payment of £30,000 arising from additions or variations to the works requested by the Seeneys up to 1 September 2011.
He said that Gleeson’s starting point for these costs from which the eventual agreement was made was a figure of “£57,000-odd”, adding: “On that basis, Gleesons appears content to spend £16,576 (their costs of the hearing before me) in order to argue about a point which was worth just £27,000 (£57,000 less £30,000). The lack of commercial reality seemed to me to be stark.”
He said that he was in “no doubt” that the parties reached a binding agreement that the value of the extras ordered by the Seeneys as at 1 September 2011 was £30,000.
Other issues remain to be resolved, including extras Gleeson say were ordered after 1 September 2011 and the value to be ascribed to them.
Seeney and another v Gleeson Developments Ltd and another Technology and Construction (Coulson J) 16 November 2015
Seb Oram (instructed by Hewitsons) for the claimants
Tom Owen (instructed by Systech Solicitors) for the defendants
