JCT Home Owner Contracts Explained (HO/B & HO/C)

The JCT publishes the contracts the UK construction industry runs on, and two of them are written deliberately for homeowners, in plain English, short enough to read over a coffee. If your builder “doesn’t really do contracts”, the Home Owner Contract is the answer that removes every excuse: it’s cheap, it’s fair to both sides, and builders who refuse it are telling you something.

The two versions

HO/B, Building Contract for a Home Owner/Occupier who has not appointed a consultant. You deal with the builder directly: you define the work, the builder prices it, the contract records it. This is the version for most renovations, bathrooms, garden buildings and smaller extensions where no architect is administering the job.

HO/C, Building Contract for a Home Owner/Occupier who has appointed a consultant. The same shape, but a named consultant (architect, surveyor or project manager) oversees the works, checks quality and values payments. It pairs with a separate JCT Consultancy Agreement for appointing that consultant. Use it when your architect is running the contract on site.

Both are sold by JCT (via its online shop and RIBA Books) for roughly £20–£30, on paper or as a digital fill-in. There is no licence issue with using them, that’s what they’re for.

What the contract pins down

The form is short but covers the points 90% of disputes grow from:

• The work, described by reference to your drawings, specification or a written list, all attached
• The price, fixed, with VAT shown, and a stated list of anything provisional
• Payment, either a single payment on completion or stage payments you fill in; there is no automatic right to a deposit
• Timing, start and finish dates, working hours, and how the date moves for genuine delay
• The site, access, toilets, storage, and who insures what while work is under way (the builder carries injury and damage liability; you notify your home insurer)
• Changes, instructions must be priced, and you can ask for a written quote before deciding
• Finishing, the builder must correct defects that appear within three months of completion, at no cost
• Fallout, a built-in disputes clause including adjudication, so there is a private, quick route to a binding decision without court

That defects window is shorter than the six or twelve months in bigger JCT forms, one reason larger projects step up a form.

Home Owner vs Minor Works

If your project has structural work, a long programme, or you want a fixed weekly figure for late completion, the Minor Works form is worth its extra complexity, our builder contracts guide covers it clause by clause. For everything smaller, the Home Owner form beats a builder’s one-page “terms” comfortably, mostly because it was drafted to be fair rather than to protect one side.

Filling it in without a solicitor

You don’t need one. The traps to avoid are practical, not legal:

1. Attach the documents. The contract is only as good as the drawings and specification it references. “Work as discussed” defeats the point.
2. List provisional sums honestly. Anything not yet designed (the kitchen, the landscaping) should carry a stated allowance, so the final account holds no ambushes.
3. Fill in the payment schedule. Stages tied to milestones, not dates, and always slightly behind the value of work done.
4. Both parties sign both copies before work starts, not during week two.

The bottom line

For the price of a takeaway you convert a handshake into enforceable rights, over price, programme, defects and disputes. Pair it with sensible vetting and the payment discipline in our contracts pillar, and you’ve removed the conditions most disputes need to grow.

This guide is general information for homeowners in England and Wales, not legal advice.