Handover and defects liability

Signing the deed transfers ownership. Handover is a separate step: the appointment at which the finished dwelling is walked through, the meters read and the keys handed over.

The handover inspection

Bring the contract annexes. The specification, the finishes schedule and the drawings are what the dwelling is compared against; without them the inspection becomes a conversation about taste. Go in daylight and bring a surveyor if the purchase warrants one. An owner who cannot attend may send a representative with written authority.

Work through the dwelling in a fixed order rather than wandering. Open every window and door, run every tap and watch where the water goes in the shower, start the boiler and the ventilation, test the sockets and the kitchen extract. Read the electricity, water and gas meters and write the readings into the record. Count the keys, fobs and remote controls, and ask for the manuals.

Where a material or a model was named in the contract, check it item by item. A substitution may be reasonable, but it should be agreed, not discovered a year later.

The snag list and what belongs on it

Everything found goes onto a list attached to the handover record, with the location, a short description and usually a photograph. Both sides sign and date it, and both keep a copy.

Three different things tend to arrive on one list, and separating them saves argument later. A defect is work that was not carried out as specified or that does not function. Damage is harm caused after the dwelling was completed, and who caused it is the question. A variation is something the owner would prefer differently, which is a new instruction and priced as one. The first is for the developer to put right.

Signing a record with a list attached does not waive the items on it, and no buyer should be asked to sign a clean record on the understanding that the work will follow. Refusing handover over a scuffed skirting board serves nobody either: the usual course is to accept the keys with the list signed and a date agreed for the return visit.

What the developer remains liable for

Liability does not end at the door. National law in both Spain and Lithuania gives a new building tiered periods of liability: the shortest tier for finishing work, a middle tier for failures that make the home unfit to live in, such as water penetration, failed insulation or defective installations, and the longest for the structure: foundations, load-bearing elements and roof structure. The length of each tier is fixed by the law of the country, and the tiers are not the same in both. Ask your notary or a local lawyer which periods apply to your contract.

In Spain the structural tier is backed by insurance the developer must hold, so the owner is not left with only a company to pursue. Ask for the policy reference with the rest of the documents.

Alongside the statutory tiers run the manufacturers' guarantees on equipment: boiler, lift, gate motor, appliances. They start on their own dates and most require the servicing in the manual to be carried out and recorded. Normal wear, work done by the owner's contractor, misuse and a missed service are not defects, and that is where most disputes about a warranty actually sit.

Who maintains what in the first year

Three parties share the building in the first year: the owner inside the dwelling, the community of owners in the common elements, and the developer for defects within its liability. The lines blur because the community is new and the site team has not yet left.

In practice the developer usually holds the first maintenance contracts for the lifts, the pumps, the gates and the irrigation, and passes them to the administrator the owners appoint. Get one thing in writing at handover: who to telephone when a lift stops on a Sunday.

Some of the first-year work falls to the owner and protects the warranty. A new building dries out for months after completion, so ventilate rather than sealing it up; fine cracking at junctions in the first season is usually shrinkage rather than a structural fault. Keep the boiler serviced on schedule, and consult the services drawings before cutting into any wall.

Reporting a defect so that it is recorded

Report in writing, to the channel named in the contract. Identify the unit, describe what happens, attach photographs and give the date you noticed it. A call to the site manager is often the faster way to get someone to look, but it leaves no record; follow it with a message.

From there the sequence is predictable: the developer inspects, accepts or disputes the item with reasons, agrees a date, does the work and has the owner sign it off. If the same fault returns, say in the new report what was done the first time, because a repeat points somewhere a fresh description does not. SAVO keeps the handover record and the snag list in the file for the unit and logs reported defects against it, so the history stays with the apartment.

When developer and owner read the same crack differently, an independent expert report is the normal next step, and a lawyer the one after. Take advice before withholding a payment: the contract usually says what that triggers.