Owning your own home

Relish?

I'm on the wrong side of Crouch Hill... I'd need a 50ft tall antenna :)

I think I'm going to go for http://www.three.co.uk/standalone/priceplan-details?planid=1400624204948 combined with something like https://www.tp-link.com/za/products/details/cat-4691_Archer-MR400.html as it's cheaper and faster (broadband) to do this than get 2 broadband connections and bond them.

At least 5g is coming to London next year...

Is virgin cable not an option? Thought this area was well covered.

I've used these before, did a decent job https://www.wardaerials.co.uk/aerials

Cheers, I ended up booking arielforce.co.uk, will find out tomorrow if they’re any good!

Just be wary of performance variations on the EE service. I use it occasionally. At quiet times I can get 150Mbps (I am 100 feet from an EE tower) but at peak times it drops to about 10 mbps.

I feel your pain. My last place was the same, couldn't even stream 480p on youtube. Eventually (5 years) we rallied enough interest in the building to convince hyperoptic to come install their service. Was great to be able to enjoy the memes thread once again.

Couple of recommendations needed folks...

Alarm system - Bit nervous about having a house thats so accessible from the street and has old single glazed sash windows you could prob blow open - suggestions? I'm kinda lost. Looked at the Yale options and they look ok? Would need something pet friendly. Would love it to be voice controlled.

Wood shutters for windows - same windows, solid wood, traditional, I can google (and have) but anyone with any experience of suppliers?

Surrey Quays, and it's amazing 1.5MB "broad" band...

better windows > alarm. what's your front door like?

Hmmm.. yeah, you are right, they are on the list but are not very cheap so want an interim solution. Hope the shutters will add to the security.

Door is average/ok, prob need to put a bar in.

Yeah. Rather infuriating to be just over the river from the mega banking land and still be staring at buffering icons.

Is the rest of Surrey Quays still that shite? I'd have thought BT would have got their act together by now.

We were recommended sash window locks like these after our window was prised open.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Sash-Window-Stop-Restrictor-Polished/dp/B00BHF4FG2?ref_=fsclp_pl_dp_5

We put one at either side of the window and it certainly feels more secure than the old locks.

I've had my house done by complete shutters in woodford. they use real wood not mdf for mdf prices.

dont worry too much about the security of the house. just make sure you have good insurance and bung a fake alarm box on the front if you are worried.

Cheers, have dropped them an email. Abbotts (my local) gave me a quote of around 1k - was kinda hoping it would be able to find them for less - thats just for one bay window, sound about right to you or expensive?

@dinosaur cheers, will buy...

Rather infuriating to be just over the river from the data centres housing the core UK Internet infrastructure

FTFY

How many / how much were did your shutters cost if you don’t mind me asking?

we have some weird, localised damp spot popping up in the house. nothing too onerous (i hope) but doesn't look too hot against the white paint. what's the hive mind opinion on getting this looked at with a view to identifying the source without being sold 20 000 notes worth of DCP?

Its not really a problem that BT can afford to solve. Speeds are mainly dictated by distance from exchange and distance from green cabinet that serves your premises. To build more of these is phenomenally expensive and requires a lot of road digging.

We are in a roughly similar situation in our block in Blackheath. Over a mile from the exchange and inexplicably 750m from our green cabinet despite there being other closer ones. Bt have said they wont address this until at least 2028 when they might be rolling FTTP out to the area.

A tad high, try Shades of Chingford. Good enough for me and Bradley Walsh, should be good enough for you.

we have some weird, localised damp spot popping up in the house. nothing too onerous (i hope) but doesn't look too hot against the white paint. what's the hive mind opinion on getting this looked at with a view to identifying the source without being sold 20 000 notes worth of DCP?

External walls?

We had a Yale wireless smartphone-controlled alarm at our old place, it was ok. Easy to add extra sensors and customise with zones (so you can go for a piss at night without setting it off for eg.) but the ‘pet-friendly’ sensors don’t work if your pet can jump up on things.
The version we had wasn’t very smart and didn’t integrate with any home assistants but that may have changed.

Thats the model im thinking... discounted too.. a new model has Alexa integration but I hear its not as great as claimed..

@Ramsaye cheers! Will give them a try too...

Short version:
Are we entitled to claim for damages to our property as a result of a leak from a council owned flat?

Details:
I first reported the leak to the council on 3rd July when I noticed the wall outside our front door was wet and there were drops forming on the porchway ceiling. The leak was finally fixed on 26th October after numerous chases ups from me, some possibly from upstairs neighbour, and several from the upstairs upstairs neighbour where the leak is believed to originate from.

During the time it took them (Mears as contracted by Lambeth) to complete the repair the leak completely soaked upstairs neighbours hallway wall leading to black mould from floor to ceiling along about 3m of hallway. In our flat it's blown out the plaster on the hallway. All of this damage occurred as a result of it not being fixed promptly.

The reason it took so long to fix is that Mears were sending out people they were performing an inspection, couldn't complete the repair then and there, filing a report and then it was being marked by Mears as complete rather being elevated to a revisit with the correct tools/materials.

I've got a quote of ~£500 to repair the plaster and paint the hall which obviously I don't want to stump up myself in light of their negligence. Has anyone had anything similar and how did you go about dealing with it?