Albert Van Vliet Architectural

Apr 27th, 2018

Jul 4th, 2017

Reading the reviews it appears that there is a very inconsistent experience being provided by Albert and unfortunately my experience is very similar to Stephanie. Infact, our experience is the same as Stephanie's. After being recommended to Albert by our builders Stroud Homes (who were equally worse), we were told that Albert would have everything sorted within 4-6 months. But good mate Albert was too busy to even get started on the project for the first few months and after 5-6 months of absolutely no progress - not even a satisfactory scheme plan - a decision to withdraw the project was made from Albert and Stroud Homes. After pulling our project, it took a further 4 months of multiple emails to provide an invoice on the work which had been. To make it worse it took another few months for for a refund to be provided. Worst of all, he has charged us for work which has produced no tangible results and definitely over charged us. Hands down, I would never ever recommend Albert to any other friend of mine. He is unreliable and lacks communication skills to make his clients feel part of the planning process. If you did go with Albert please be careful. I would hate for anyone to feel the pain and disappointment of building their house which I have experienced with Albert. I would advise paying only for work as it is completed rather than the deposit, using your own contacts to get work done and regularly placing deadlines on work. I hope this review helps anyone make an informed decision as to who they chose to plan their house.
Mar 24th, 2022

I've just read Stephanie Adams review on Albert Van Vliet Architectural and would strongly recommend that any potential user of Alberts services check out the background of her posting before making any negative decision on using him. Albert designed our new house in Half Moon Bay Auckland during this same period of 2017 and we moved in during November 2019. It is a fabulous house to live in and continues to get "rave" comments from both neighbours and strangers passing by. I had no hesitation in providing a reference for Alberts services and attach a copy of that reference to this post. 31/07/2018 To whom it may concern Albert van Vliet has just completed the design and documentation for our new family home and I am hereby very pleased to provide a reference as to both the professionalism of his service and of him as a person. Building a new home is a fraught undertaking as it involves a major expense with long term repercussions. It is not a process that most individuals are experienced in and it revolves around the hopes and desires of a unique family in a unique location. As with the majority of people we were required to put our faith in an architect without any experience of working with that person, based on images of past designs that related to sites other than our own, and no knowledge as to how successful he had been in achieving his clients aspirations. We feel very fortunate that we selected Albert. Albert has given us a layout and style of home that perfectly suits our hopes for the future, it is a modern design yet fits into an area of traditional houses on a tight site and importantly has been enthusiastically supported by our immediate neighbour. The whole process has been made easy by the Alberts attention and empathy to our often woolly ideas, his professionalism in completing the design and documentation, and importantly the value we feel we have received for fees we have paid. I do not hesitate to recommend Albert to any person starting out on the path we have just completed and would be very happy to talk directly to anyone who may wish to contact me with relation to this. Roger and Sue McClymont
Jun 5th, 2020

We took our concept design to Albert Van Vliet Architectural to draw up in April 2017. We were promised building consent documentation in July 2017, October 2017 and in December 2017. We had a builder lined up to start in September 2017. All these agreed deadlines were missed by Albert. The last set of plans presented to us took 10 months from the start of the project were full of errors and omissions. Using Albert's own words. "I have over promised and under delivered". "I have taken too long" and "I understand I have let you down". After consultation with our lawyer we decided to head to court. Albert had refused to refund our fees as is required under the Consumer Guarantee Act We finally got our days in court - We attended two full Disputes Tribunal Hearings under two different referees (one retired). This process took a year as Albert adjourned two hearings at the very last minute on 'medical grounds' - I understand he had a bad cough. At the Tribunal Hearings I presented over 50 pages of evidence which detailed our issues. Our case included details of breach of contract, unacceptable delays and material omissions to our plans. As an example of material omission - one steel beam that was to hold up the entire front of the house was missing - it was 14m long. The Disputes Tribunal awarded a refund to the tune of $15,870 . If you want to use Albert then my suggestion is that you remove the postponement and cancellation clauses from his contract and don't pay a deposit. Use your own engineer and pay for work as it is actually done.
May 22nd, 2020