Weeks Building Group

I would never recommend this business ever!! They suck you in quickly by saying "get in quick we are having a price increase next month" you sign up for land and building, pay the deposit and you never hear from them again. Communication is terrible, in particular the consultant that sucked us in. Land contract was never provided and no reason was given. It was 4 weeks and no response regarding land contract had to turn up at the office unexpectedly to make something happen. Refund of our deposit has also been like drawing water from a stone.

I am extremely happy with my decision of building with Weeks. After a few disappointing meetings with other building companies, I followed a family member’s recommendation and visited a Weeks display village. I was instantly impressed with the quality and variety of design options on offer.

Many thanks to the team for their friendly, professional service - Heather Liddell (Building Consultant), who expertly answered my many questions, provided extremely valuable design and building advice, and made the entire planning process enjoyable and stress-free; and Kevin Lawrence (Customer Project Coordinator) for his effective direction in navigating through selection/building timelines, prompt and highly informative feedback, and ongoing support well into the building process.

So far, I’m impressed by how quickly construction has progressed since slab pour. Brendan Pett (Building Site Manager) has kept me informed of progress with frequent updates, and at this point I am very happy with the quality of the construction and the builder's attention to detail. I cannot wait to see the final product!

After being fed up with our second choice builder we approached the Weeks Building group through their online help chat late on a Friday night. We had a very fast response and were pleasantly surprised with the ease in which our interactions were. By Sunday afternoon we had managed to achieve what we weren't able to with our two previous builders in 5 months. Everything ran very smoothly proceeding to the bank approval stage, when our bank decided that our previous pre approved loan amount was declined and they would no longer be able to help us. Eventually through a broker we were able to gain appropriate finance through another bank and we are about to have our slab poured this week. The banking fiasco set us back 9 months. Weeks worked with us, understood that none of the delays were our fault and helped out without pressuring us to hurry up or cancelling the build.

Building with Weeks was one of the key steps in having our Dream Home that we are so loving it. The entire process - be it the confidence of choosing the right builder that was given by the Weeks Building Consultant (Alice Wright) who answered our 1000s of queries with a smile and advised us of all the pros and cons of different decisions that we made in planning the built; to the Administrator (Kevin Lawrence) who made sure we are meeting the timelines by chasing up with us for pending actionable along with advising on the process before and during the build; to the Selections Consultant (Deborah Cicconi) who was amazing in helping us chose the right themes and styles that was absolutely fantastic; or the Building Site Manager (Brendan Pett), who was just brilliant with managing the entire project and keeping us updated with what's going on (at least once a week) with the build and fixing the stuff as soon as we brought to his attention; I would say the journey has been fantastic and we are so happy with the outcome. The house that was to be built in 6.5 months considering the Christmas break in between was handed over in just 5 months, which is remarkable.
We are amazed with the fit and finish and the overall quality of the house. All the standard selections have been of great quality and many of the standard inclusions are the upgrades with many other builders.
The entire team from Weeks was always there and they went above and beyond to make this difficult process a breeze.

Kudos to the Weeks Team - 5 Stars!

Although we are only coming to the end of the Administration stage, our experience so far has been fantastic.

So Far our Sales Consultant, Alice Wright, has been so professional and made this experience quite a breeze! We get regular updates from our Council Administrator and have been provided with these at each stage of the build so far.

For the price range and quality home we looking for, Weeks Building Group came in far above the rest, with their standard inclusions and quality suppliers, of which would have been costly upgrades with other builders.

With our build scheduled to begin in March, My partner and I can’t wait to see our ideas and plans brought to life through the quality of a Weeks Building Group home.

All weeks staff were professional and knowledgeable about the products they were offering. With my budget I was able to choose the design and colour scheme I wanted. I still think that default light fittings would be something weeks should consider for future builders. My only regret is that I didn't ask more questions as I keep learning from simple mistakes I made. Communication was great and very helpful.
Staff in the display home in Mount Barker were the reason why I decided to go with weeks.
Thanks to all staff for making this experience enjoyable. Looking forward too seeing the building process.

We signed the initial contract with Weeks in late 2015 and moved into the house in November 2017.
Pros:
Most of the basic inclusions are of a good standard (I would reconsider next time things like the range hood that sounds like a tank rolling through from installation)
The process up to initial signing is good, helpful and expedient.
The steel frame is good (was not given the in-frame insulation option unfortunately)
Cons:
Once deposit is paid things slow down significantly
Although I had several delays triggered by local council (light regional – worst council I have ever dealt with) the length of each delay was 90% attributed to Weeks Groups time to process change or respond (My motto for them was “months not Weeks”). Even when they made a minor mistake on the final plan (which took some time to draw up I small change to please council) it took a month to redo.
Found that what is on the plan is not what is cut out for your block, in a sloped block they will basically cut a hole just big enough to build a house in and only services at the minimum depth. When you cut the rest of the block as per plan, services such as water, phone, electricity and gas are exposed. If you go with them get your own contractor to cut the block and plan it with them ahead.
Site was a mess all through, and care was not taken with materials delivered to sit and sitting on nature strip for weeks before installed.
Had various site managers, final one had slab sanded as he recognised poor standard finish, this was evident on back patio which will have to be tiled.
Communication is extremely poor, unless you call them and follow up they will not contact you. Most contact initiated by Weeks was related to or to ask for money.
Selections is very fragmented, unless you live in the CBD it will mean many trips in to Adelaide to see several different suppliers then a final visit to weeks for final selection.
At hand over, several things that were not done or needed fixing here is a few none were done at the non-existent 3 months maintenance:
- External clean not done due to weather, took 7 months to get it done, first attempt after 6 months was just to take stickers off windows.
- A toilet roll holder that was not attached to a stud was just sat back in place for the inspection, I ended up fixing it myself.
- Poor finish on plaster work, when fixed 6 months later I think more damage was done by the handy man bringing in and taking out his equipment.
- Lumps of excess concrete on back patio
- Range hood was installed defective, but my problem to sort under manufacturer warranty
They under estimated the dirt to be excavated from original plan and forgot to add in the extra from a 0.5 m lower slab. In total the estimated 160 ton ended up being over 600 ton, which was a significant extra expense.
Finish to most things is adequate but nothing special.
Would I build with Weeks Group again, no I really think I would not.
Would I recommend Weeks Group, no. I did early in the process and regret it as he was delayed starting even after everything was approved.
If you do use them, please contact them until it borders on harassment otherwise you will wait for ever, go into deep detail on exactly what needs to be done, employ an expert to oversee the process.

In regard to the Administration side of our new home build our initial Salesman was fantastic. He was so accommodating to our every request and changes to design. Great communication with us culminating in exactly what we wanted. Our Administration consultant totally followed on with this excellent customer service. His professionalism, efficiency, communication was second to none. The final selection area is well equipped and flows well. Our selections consultant was obviously fairly new and inexperienced which slowed this process up a little but we got there. We are now onto the construction stage and can't wait for our new home to be finished. At this point I can only thoroughly recommend Weeks Building Group due to the great level of customer service we have received so far.

We're building our first home with Weeks and our build has just moved from the administration to construction stage. While the admin process took a lot longer than we would have liked, due in large part to issues beyond Weeks control, we couldn't be happier with the support and assistance provided by our administrator Kevin. Kevin kept us well informed at every stage of the administration process, provided honest estimations of timelines, patiently answered our many questions, ensured that our paperwork progressed smoothly, and promptly responded to our emails/phone messages. We can't thank Kevin enough for everything he has done for us throughout the administration process. We're now looking forward to the construction process beginning and finally moving into our new home.

UPDATE: the VIC office has closed down. No surprise why.

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT: they lie and have no processes, or checks and balances. We were told that our plans (that we took to them) were feasible for our site taking in to consideration council and building requirements and could be built for under $1m (upper limit). After taking $8000 from us, they did nothing and eventually when we separately engaged a planner to try and move things along - turns out our plans wouldn't get through council. Weeks wanted us to spend more thousands of dollars in order to prepare more plans through another supplier just so they could give us a building estimate. Eventually they admitted they couldn't do the project within the budget. When we requested a refund, it was refused. We're taking them to VCAT now.

We’re currently a month away from the slab being poured and so far Weeks have been very good to us, particularly Clare Shepherd who has been outstanding right through. Clare was particularly proactive during the final stages of the SA Water / Council approval and we are very grateful for her involvement. It must be noted that this was not the case with our previous administrator - who we understand has now left the company. At the time, we received misguided and contradictory informations which delayed the process. Fortunately for us, the issue was promptly addressed by Rick Pisaniello and we are also grateful to him for stepping in at the time.

Daniel Gauci and Sharee Pritchard were also exceptional! Both went consistently out of their way to provide us with well researched and timely advice. For example, Daniel was right about the need for an SA Water approval r.e. the easement and he got back to us very quickly with the right information. As for Sharee, she very wisely advised against our intention to reduce the width of our kitchen bench in order to save room. How right she was!!! Thank you very much to both of you!

The selection process was also excellent and made particularly smooth thanks to Clare and Sharee’s excellent communication … and Sharee’s patience when we decided to abandon the idea of carpet in the bedrooms!

The suppliers were all very helpful and always happy to spend the time it needed for us to get exactly what we wanted.

One thing we would suggest to Weeks is to make sure that prompt communication with their clients remained a priority at all times as there was an instance for us where it took quite some time - and a few extra unnecessary phone calls and emails - to receive written confirmation of an important amendement to the earthwork/backfilling quote.

Sue is our current construction administrator and she has been excellent so far. We’re now looking forward to an equally smooth building process and to moving into our new home at the end of July!

Weeks building group

Started mid november 2015

First home owner/first time building

$209,000 house
$139,000 land
Munno para west

We decided choose weeks building group as we like the steel supaloc frame and they where competitive on pricing.

We started off at the evanstan south display home where we chose one of the displays as our home, George was really helpful with the beginning process and any changes we wanted to make he had no worries in doing so, we only had to flip the house design to suit our block, we changed from double roller doors to one big single and where surprised how cheap it was to make that change.

The initial stages did take a while until we had our first selections but these first few months are standard waiting times for most builders.

Some builders only have one selection process and are very limited on choices but with weeks group we went to each one separately, that did mean it took a bit longer but it was definitely worth it to be able to see all the different choices available.

First we went to Climat for our air-conditioning, they where very helpful and great on pricing.
Next was demore for bath/kitchen appliances and they have a huge variety, we ended upgrading almost every aspect and it didnt cost overly much more to do so.
We then went to beaumont tiles and had another great selection experience there.
Next was our clipsal appointment which was a bit more expensive than we initial accounted for as we had to double the amount of power points and lights, downlights are approx $120 each one so we had to limit ourselves with downlights, we put a power point in the loungeroom to power our electric lounge and for future rear surround sound which is something many people wouldnt think of doing, I would suggest doing all lights around the perimeter of the house and having multiple power points outside, some of the points for rainwater pump could be double and used for other things if its in an ideal location , gas mains point outside is cheap if you ever want to have a bbq with no worry of running out of gas.

Last selection was at weeks group building, Roxanne was our consultant and was nice and helpful, we were running out of time to settle on our land at this point so weeks had done our documents quick and roxanne even went to the trouble of hand delivering them for us to sign, one thing we added on afterwards is extra support trusses on the steel frame for a future verandah and it was very cheap but didn't realize it was an option so i recommend asking about that.

There have been no extra hidden costs!!!! once we had signed the final contract then that was it.

Sue was our weeks group office contact and she has been great with responding quick if we had questions or picked up on a few errors with selections during the build, one thing was a wrong shower head was selected and we didnt pick up on it and same as the panel lift door was never added and we had to change that halfway through, all these little things were handled very well.

Slab was poured in the middle of july,
We then met up with our site superviser who we then asked a few questions about the building process and rough timeline of when each portion would be done by, he was very helpful and didnt mind us ringing occasionally with more questions.

Frame was up 3 weeks after that as weeks let the slab set for a decent amount of time before adding weight/bolting framework down, unlike other builders.

Brickwork was finished by the end of august

House was at lockup at the end of september

We moved in middle of December with only a few things needing repairing or finishing from handover

The maintenance part was very slow and hard to get times for people to come and fix items from our list, ended up taking 6 months to get everything done but the main thing was it all was finished and done to an excellent standard
I Would highly recommend building with weeks
Loop

Have had a great experience with Weeks building group. Very happy with house design and how Weeks were able to accomodate our tight time frame regarding finance approvals. Kevin was great in assisting us with the various steps in getting our build started and always kept us updated on every detail. He even went above and beyond to help with issues that weren't even his responsibility. Glad we chose to build with a company who take pride in their work.

We did a lot of research on all home builders and found that Weeks Group were the most accommodation when it came to our custom designed home. Signing a prelim agreement meant that we weren't locked in and were able to have all expected costs communicated to us upfront before signing the building contract. From start to finish, we continually received professional and prompt service and our queries were always responded to in a timeley fashion. We would definitely recommend Weeks Group to anybody looking to build as they cater for all building needs. We love our new home and enjoyed all aspects of the building process.

I don't normally write reviews on anything, but I feel it would be remiss of me not to make comment on our builder. We are in the final stages of building our house at Middleton through Weeks Building Group and I can not fault them at any stage. Having lived in the North Eastern Suburbs all of my life, we were unsure of what house to build down near the coast.

During our first meeting with Weeks, we were pleased to be guided by their designer Jonathon regarding the layout and how best to maximise our space. He worked with us to design a practical yet classy single storey U Shaped house which suited our wide block. In the end, we love the design. Tick!

Selections was made easy due to Roxanne's friendly approach and some of the suggestions made by her have been really useful and have complimented to design.
Tick!

The tradesmen to date have been exceptional. The brickwork is first class thanks to Steve the bricky and the entire process has been very smooth. Our site supervisor Ben has been happy to work with us as we are doing some of the internal part ourselves and if we have any concerns, he is readily available to provide answers and when needed, solutions.
Tick!

I highly recommend Weeks Building Group to anyone looking for a hassle free ( as much as building a new house can be!) builder. They have exceeded our expectations and I would definitely build with them again.

Like many other people we have had a horrible experience with trying to get a home built with Weeks (or months as they've been christened by some others).
We have had nothing but trouble and bad customer serivce from Weeks.
We first saw a house and land package advertised through them on realestate.com.au which we enquired about at the start of Feb this year. Upon correspondance we put thru an offer to them for the block of land. The land was also advertised privately by the owner for $380,000. We put thru an offer at the advertised price however it was rejected. We then increased the offer thru dealings with the vendor to $390,000 and he accepted. The next morning we had an email from the sales consultant at Weeks saying she was sorry to inform us the offer had fallen through and the owner was going with someone else. This was incorrect and she later emailed again to say she had made a mistake. We then went into the office to sign the land contract and being the build process. Along the way mistakes occurred and timelines blew out. It took them about 2 weeks to get us an air con quote, amended quotes took weeks to get, things went missing off the floor plans or placed in the wrong spot, plus we got told to do selections, then told not to as it would 'hold things up'...??!?!!
The whole time we made them aware of the fact that we were moving interstate at the end of the year and this home was a rental so needs to be done as quickly as possible as we need to be here for it finishing and we need to minimise our holding costs. Nothing was done to keep things running on time and even after I was promised our reports etc would be made a priority they were still delayed.
To get things moving Weeks made us sign a Preliminary Design Agreement and pay a $3,000 deposit which would be used for plans, amendments and soil/engineering etc reports done by Ginos. The kicker is that to get a build contract you HAVE to sign the PDA and pay the cash otherwise you cannot get an accurate indication of the build costs. The problem here is that if you pull out because of price esculations or issues with the builder they will KEEP BOTH THE CASH AND THE REPORTS! That's right, you get NOTHING for the $3,000 you paid to them even though the reports were done by a third party!! The agreement is totally one sided and in the builders favour. Be aware of this as there are builders out there who don't make you do this....
So we paid the cash and signed our lives away to get moving because we wanted to build...With the months passing by and nothing being done (5 months later and plans weren't even in council / we hadn't seen a build contract or any reports), we decided to pull the pin on Weeks. We looked around at a number of other builders who agreed the time frame was not normal and that this was most likely due to the part owner moving to another building company and taking most of the good staff with him. A lot of staff have left or quit in the recent past and the structure of the company is disorganised so different sections don't complete tasks at the same time, they can only do 1 thing at a time.
We were told our build contract wouldn't be ready for another 3 or so weeks but once we said we were leaving it was suddenly ready a few days later...what a suprise... After a bunch of back and forth negotiations and many conversations with numerous staff members a compromise could not be agreed upon. We gave our final goodbye and requested a copy of the reports Ginos had done on our site. We were told by about 3 different staff members that we will only get a copy of the reports if we sign a build contract with them (blackmail) and if we leave for another builder we won't see them at all!! Hmmm, does this seem fair? Afterall we paid the $3,000 for these and they are applicable to our site only. We were told it's 'company policy' not to release the documents however we have spoken to other people who have changed from Weeks and have been provided with the reports. That was a few weeks ago and we are currently in the process of gaining assistance from Consumer and Business Affairs on the matter, if this doesn't get anywhere then we are considering legal action as we have been told by a lawyer that the agreement has unfair contract terms and is in favour of one party (the builder), additionally we had no choice but to sign the document to continue the process.
Let this be a warning to anyone looking to build with Weeks, if you do go with them make sure you have plenty of time and money because they have no respect for either. They treat people poorly and hide behind their PDA when things go wrong. They use the PDA as a way of making people build with them even when they are unhappy because they don't want to lose their hard earned money. $3,000 for you may be a months salary but to them it's nothing and that's how they treat it.

We are in the process of building with Weeks Building Group and believe they should rebrand again to Months and Years as every step takes forever. By the time our house is finished it will be almost 2 years since we started. They didn't give us a straight answer and wanted to charge us more money at every opportunity. I would not recommend them to anyone. They may seem cheaper but in the end the stress involved is not worth it.

UPDATE: The lies continue, do not believe the sales people, they just tell you want you want to hear and once you are passed on to the rest of the team, they are left to tell you how stupid you were for believing them.

My 1st enquiry was made with Weeks Macklin early May 2015 for a house and land package on a flat subdivided block of land not too far from the CBD perfect for my situation.
2 days after signing the building contract late August 2015 I was advised the council tree out front of the property needed to be moved at the owner's cost.
The owner is expected to contact Council, seek approval & pay Council to remove existing tree & replace
It was explained if that wasn't possible the plan would need to be flipped & the water meter moved at the owner's cost.
I was then advised the owner is responsible to contact new neighbour's about fencing,
No contact details are provided, so I contacted the Council for help.
Each time plans have been provided, they've included more detail & consequently more cost to....you guessed it, ........the owner including plinths and retaining walls.
The engineers declined to speak with me directly, therefore I had to source alternate services to assist me in understanding the plans and my obligations.
The owner is required to seek their own quotes for retaining walls and over Xmas it's been difficult and quotes vary by thousands of dollars.
The latest letter arrived from Weeks Macklin on 18.12.15 advising me the water meter had been stolen and is required to be replaced at...... the owners cost.
I contacted SAWater and the Police to report the theft. Thankfully SAWater will replace the meter with a Police Report Number.
The section is required to be cleared of vegetation & rubbish by......... the owner.
AND finally the latest plan included advice that....... the owner is responsible for pegging out the section.
Being a 1st time owner of a build project I have found the process leading up to the build extremely stressful and the purpose of this review is to provide some insight into the process.
So I recommend you ensure you check all these types of things out BEFORE you sign or get a builder broker or a fixed price contract or seek expert advice.
Fingers crossed the next phase is hassle free. I'll be back at the end of the process.

We are having our house currently built by these guys. There has been a long wait to get the council approval. Approximately 9 moths !. I never understood why but at one moment the girl that was dealing with the council said that the plans needed a change to the driveway width. That was about 4-5 months after the contract was signed. After that episode it took another 4 months to get the final approval. After they started construction though they were pretty good. Except that nobody made me aware that I had to build a retaining wall, which turned out to be pretty expensive (about $8000). And it had to be done in a hurry (they told me about it after the slab was poured and it had to be done before they started putting the frame up). For their credit they helped me with sending requests to three different contractors and I was able to get a good price. The quality of the works is so far good. I'll see what's next.

We had our home built by these guys 5 years ago and had a little hiccup raise its ugly head!We were so worried at how we could afford to fix the problem so I rang Weeks who came out very quickly to have a look & with no hesitation at all accepted full resposibility & was fixed at their expense very promptly.Huge thanyou to Hayden,Atilio,Rob & Gary we will not hesitate for 1 minute on who will build our next home..Thanks again guys!!!