Swindon has seen a lot of new housing in recent years, from large estates such as Wichelstowe and Tadpole Garden Village to apartments close to the town centre and station. Alongside them sit the town’s Victorian railway terraces and plenty of post-war homes. New-build lets are popular with commuters and families, and landlords often assume a new home needs only a light-touch inventory. In practice the opposite is true.
Why new-builds still need detail
A brand-new home looks flawless at the start, which makes small changes easy to miss and hard to prove later. Scuffs on fresh paintwork, marks on new flooring, chips to kitchen worktops and damage to sealant can all appear within months. Without a detailed, photographed baseline, it is difficult to show whether they were caused during the tenancy.
Snagging versus tenant damage
New homes often have snagging defects: small construction faults such as cracked plaster as the building settles, poorly fitted doors or uneven sealant. These are usually the builder’s or landlord’s responsibility, not the tenant’s. Recording them clearly at check-in avoids unfair deductions and helps the landlord pursue any warranty claims with the developer.
Appliances and manuals
New-builds often come with integrated appliances. The inventory should record make and model where visible, their condition, and whether manuals and warranty information were left for the tenant.
Older Swindon homes
For the town’s railway terraces and older housing, the focus shifts to recording existing wear accurately: well-used floors, older windows and signs of damp. The principle is the same: describe what is there, so the end of the tenancy can be judged fairly.
Independent inventories across Swindon
We cover all SN postcode districts in and around Swindon, with reports typically delivered within three hours. See our property inventory services in Swindon, or read about our inventory with check-in service.
Work with us in Swindon
We are growing our Wiltshire team. If you are organised and want flexible self-employed work, see our inventory clerk jobs in Swindon.
