Developers are preparing to bulldoze 18 houses in Sydney’s notorious ‘sinking suburb’ as some residents of the estate express their regret about ever buying there.
Reports emerged in 2018 that Jordan Springs East estate, in the western Sydney suburb of Llandilo, was sinking due to being placed on insufficiently stable landfill, causing large cracks to appear in houses, driveways and footpaths.
Lendlease, the $4billion company that developed the estate, was forced to start a compensation scheme in 2020 and bought back 50 homes from people to either fix and put back on the market or knock down because they were ‘unlivable’.
Retired couple Robert and Veronika Borland bought one of the repaired properties on Private Circuit late last year for $820,000 after getting an engineer’s report that it was sound – but are now shocked to learn the house next to theirs is being demolished.
Retired couple Robert and Veronika Borland were shocked to learn that the house next to theirs is to be demolished in February
‘If we’d have known that house was coming down, it was too badly damaged or not up to standard, we wouldn’t have bought this property,’ Ms Borland told Nine News.
Mr Borland agreed.
‘The heavy machinery is going to impact our property and we have no insurance,’ he said.
‘We’re going to lose. We’re not going to get what we paid for it and we’re on a pension and retired so where do you go?’
The Borlands have taken their case to the NSW Department of Fair Trading with demolition of the neighbouring house set to start next month.
In a statement provided to Nine News, Lendlease said it was ‘continuing to stand by our customers and committed to providing ongoing support as we work through the process’.
Jordan Springs East estate, in the western Sydney suburb of Llandilo, has been sinking due to being built on insufficiently stable landfill
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Two other houses purchased back by Lendlease have already been knocked down with another 18 to be bulldozed in February.
Penrith City Council had previously slapped warning notices for would-be buyers on 841 homes, worth a total of $605million.
Original owners who chose to stay in affected homes were given compensation and an ongoing guarantee of 15 years of support from Lendlease.
Mr Borland accused Lendlease of only offering minimal communication, although the company had offered an assurance that disruption of neighbouring houses would be kept to a minimum.
The Borlands have already spent around $30,000 on renovating their home.
‘Everyone’s gonna say “well, it’s your fault, you signed the document”, which we did,’ Ms Borland told the ABC.
‘But yeah, we just feel like we’ve been deceived, that the situation here in Jordan Springs isn’t as secure as they make out.’
When Daily Mail visited Jordan Springs in 2020, young families said they were facing very uncertain futures.
Amit Vohra, 35, had his whole front yard sink about 18cm within months of moving into his home in June 2018, wrecking his driveway and putting dents in his lawn.
The problem was finally fixed earlier this year with developer Lendlease re-laying his entire front yard and giving him a new driveway.
But the IT engineer said he was still worried about the future and what else could go wrong with his Navy Road home.
The sinking has caused large cracks to appear in houses, driveways and footpaths on the estate
‘We put our life savings into this house so I’m anxious and scared that we will get cracks in our walls or the driveway will sink again,’ he told Daily Mail .
Mr Vohra and his pregnant wife and 18-month-old son live at the epicentre of the crisis engulfing the suburb.
The house next door to him has been left to rot due to huge cracking problems, with weeds growing around it and a brand new kitchen gathering dust.
He said the house was like that when he moved in, and even before that while his home was still being built.
‘My real estate friend tells me the value of my house will already have gone down and I don’t know if it will recover with the suburb like this,’ he said.
A few doors down on Navy Road, Suman Saini and Sandeep Kumar had similar problems with their driveway that are yet to be properly fixed.
The ground sank so far it exposed the bottom of the driveway slab on this house that the Daily Mail visited in 2020
The ground sank about a foot, exposing the bottom of the driveway slab, and took the couple two tonnes of soil to fill in.
They still have to put more decorative stones into parts of the garden bed bordering the driveway every time they do any gardening as it keeps sinking.
‘We’re just so sick of it, we don’t know what’s going to happen next or what will go wrong in the future,’ Ms Saini said.
Jordan Springs East was built on swampland and an old creek bed, and is on a floodplain. To reclaim the land for development, soil and other materials were added on top.
However, the developers allegedly used bigger rocks instead of finer soil, and then didn’t wait long enough for the rocks to settle and finish compacting before starting to build.
The issue was made worse by heavy rain in late 2018 and early 2019 that caused a temporary detention basin to rise due to a blockage, according to Lendlease.
Lendlease has been contacted for further comment.