Five-Year Builder Warranty Under RERA: Seepage, Cracks and Other Faults After Handover in Bangalore
Picture an owner who moves into a flat in Bangalore in March. The first heavy June rain brings a damp patch to a bedroom wall, and within a year a hairline crack appears near a window. RERA anticipates exactly this with a five-year warranty on the building, which no sales agreement can take away. The sections below set out how it works and how an owner can use it.
What the Warranty Promises
The warranty comes from section 14(3) of the RERA Act of 2016. Any fault that the builder is told about during the five years after handover has to be repaired free of charge, and the repair must be done within thirty days. If it is not, the owner can seek fair compensation.
Five categories appear in the section. They are structural faults, faults of workmanship, faults of quality and faults in services. The fifth category is any further promise in the agreement for sale that the builder has failed to honour.
That fifth category reaches further than most owners expect. Whatever the agreement states about specifications, fittings and amenities is a promise the builder is bound to keep. A mismatch between the document and the delivered flat, if noticed in time, calls for the same free correction.
When the Five Years Begin and Who Holds the Right
Counting starts on the day the flat is handed over. Booking, signing the agreement and registration are irrelevant here. The handover letter normally proves the date, so file it carefully, and keep any messages about a delayed handover if the builder had already offered the keys in writing.
Ownership of the right goes with the flat. The Act counts later buyers by sale or transfer as allottees, so a person purchasing from the first owner receives whatever time is left. Take a flat that is three years old at resale: two years of warranty remain. Common parts such as lifts, basements, terraces and outer walls fall under it as well, and the residents' association generally raises faults in those.
Is It the Builder's Problem?
The Act gives no catalogue of covered items, so each case turns on what caused the fault. If the origin is design, materials or the method of construction, the builder is answerable. Damage resulting from how the owner lives in the flat, or from alterations made later, is not the builder's concern.
Some familiar examples help. Normally the builder answers for structural cracks in pillars and slabs, and for damp from failed waterproofing. The same goes for faulty wiring or pipes buried in walls, loose or hollow tiles, and lifts, pumps or fire systems that fail to perform as promised.
The owner answers for wear and tear, repainting, misuse, appliances fitted later, and leaks that follow the owner's own plumbing changes. Arguments tend to start with fit-out, when a builder may say the trouble began as the owner's carpenter drilled into a wall. Dated pictures of every room on handover day, before carpentry or painting starts, are the plainest reply.
Building a Paper Trail
The thirty days run only from the moment the builder is informed. A casual conversation with the site staff proves nothing, and a written complaint is therefore essential. It also tends to make repairs faster.
A good complaint follows this order:
- Record the fault with a dated picture or short video and note which room and wall it is on
- Email the builder's registered address and send a hard copy by registered post
- Name the fault, mention the handover date and cite section 14(3) when asking for repairs
- Retain the acknowledgement, any ticket reference and all answers received
- Let the repair crew in, and note the dates and the work they did
- Complain again if the fault recurs, so the file shows it came back
Timing counts for two reasons. A fault that is raised early can be tied to construction much more easily than one that was ignored for years. Once the fifth year has passed, the section no longer helps, however serious the fault may be.
What Happens After Notice
The builder must correct the fault within thirty days and cannot send the owner a bill. Correcting means removing the cause, so repainting a damp wall alone does not count. If the cause is in a shared area, such as the roof slab over the topmost flat, the repair has to be made there.
Some agreements add a private warranty of a year or two. That is a bonus on top of the statutory cover and cannot reduce it. The state's model agreement for sale, issued in 2020, also repeats the five-year obligation in its own words.
Escalating When Nothing Is Repaired
An owner whose complaint is ignored can approach the state regulator under section 31. Filing is online on Form N, with a Rs. 1,000 fee, and the usual request is an order to finish the repair by a fixed date.
Compensation follows a separate path. Under section 71, an adjudicating officer decides what is payable under section 14, based on the loss suffered. If the owner has already paid for repairs, the contractor's invoices and an engineer's assessment back up the figure claimed.
A complaint is strong when backed by documents. Useful ones include the handover letter, the specifications annexed to the sale agreement, dated pictures, copies of notices sent and the builder's replies. Records of failed repairs help too, as does an engineer's report for serious faults.
The Act leaves other remedies open, so consumer commissions remain another forum. For faults in shared areas, an association can file on behalf of all owners and divide the expense of expert reports.
Where the Warranty Does Not Reach
The section reaches only registered or registrable projects. Small schemes, with land of up to 500 sq m or no more than eight apartments, are exempt from registration, so their buyers depend on their contracts and consumer law. A project whose completion certificate predates 1 May 2017, when the Act came into force, is also excluded.
What matters is notice inside the five years. A fault must be reported during the period, though the repair or complaint can run on afterwards. An independent engineer's inspection in year five is wise, because concealed faults surface while the builder is still liable.
Habits Worth Forming Early
The warranty works best when the handover itself is careful. A snag list countersigned by a representative of the builder records how the flat looked that day. Anything left open on it carries into the warranty period.
The first two monsoons test waterproofing and external walls hardest. Owners who inspect ceilings, window edges and bathroom walls once a downpour is over catch seepage early. People comparing projects can ask us about a developer's handover record via the contact page.
