A MUM of three has spoken of her anguish after a ‘four-year’ battle with a housing group.

Zoe Cowell, who lives on Scafell Close in the Snebro area of Whitehaven, says she has been fighting with Home Group for the last four years.

Her complaints relate to water soaking through the walls and through closed windows.

On Sunday it was so bad that she had a puddle of water in her hallway. It has led to damp and mould on the inside of her walls right across the left-hand side of the house. Despite numerous efforts at redecorating, the problems soon return.

“It makes me bad to be honest,” explained mum of three Zoe.

“My little boy gets croup and he’s just started with that now. I don’t think this is helping. I just want it all sorted, everything, it needs to be done properly.”

Zoe says she has problems with damp or mould in the hallway, landing, on the stair wall, and in the kitchen and bathroom.

She says that, when it rains, water drips from the roof. Numerous surveyors have visited the house to inspect the problem, she claims, with little or nothing done. Zoe says she was even asked to clean the walls herself.

Struggling to make progress with Home Group, she reported the problem to Copeland Council’s housing team on Friday, who are now investigating.

If they find the property is not up to the required standard, they have the power to order Home Group to address it.

She says the house needs rendered or dashed, with all the wet insulation removed and the inside wall stripped back and re-plastered.

A Copeland Council spokesman said: “Our housing standards procedure dictates that when we receive a complaint about a rented property, we will inspect the property and notify the landlord of our findings.

“If we find that a property does not meet the required standards, we would inform the landlord of the action that must be taken to remedy any issues.”

In a statement, Louise Barkes, head of maintenance at Home Group, said: “Our customer first highlighted an issue last year.

“We tried to remedy it but we weren’t successful. Nor were we successful the times we have been out since, despite our best efforts.

“I can understand our customer’s frustration and I am sorry they haven’t had the issue resolved to date. However, a surveyor visited the property last week and after much discussion we feel we have a plan that will solve the problem for good.

“We will remove the cavity fill and re-render the property which will alleviate all of the damp issues that the customer is experiencing.

“We did receive an email from the local authority yesterday with regards the issue and we have advised them of our intentions and they were satisfied with our plan.

“I would like to stress that we do not have an issue at all with budgets or costs of repairs for this home or any other.

“On the issue of water in the hallway we will of course look into that for our customer.”