JUST a few days ago, families had been choosing bedrooms and looking forward to celebrating the Royal wedding in their new council flats.

But now their dream homes have been turned into a water-damaged mess by thieves, just days before they were due to move in.

The properties on Oxford’s Rose Hill estate will have to be repaired – at an estimated cost of £100,000 – after copper pipes worth just £20 were ripped out of six flats in the three-storey block in Lambourn Road.

The raid left water gushing out of the plumbing system, and means ruined walls, ceilings, kitchens and floors will have to be stripped out to allow the timber-framed building to dry out.

It is a carbon-copy of a raid on another Oxford City Council development, in Cardinal Close, earlier this month.

Damage could delay completion of the Rose Hill flats by two to three months.

The flats are the last of 38 properties in the £5.8m Rose Hill development, the first new council houses in the city for 20 years.

Clerk of works Kevin Dawson said tenants had been given a guided tour of their new homes on Friday.

He said: “We had kids here earmarking their bedrooms. How do you tell them it’s not going to happen?”

Mr Dawson said he had been joking with families about watching the Royal wedding in their new flats.

He added: “Now the floors, walls and kitchens have all got to come out. You cannot see the extent of the damage until you physically open up the fabric of the building.”

The development, which replaces post-war ‘Orlit’ homes, includes eight one-bedroom properties, 12 two-bedroom, 16 three-bedroom and two five-bedroon houses.

Homes feature a host of eco-friendly features including solar panels, state-of-the-art heating systems and high levels of insulation.

Thieves broke into the block, on the corner of Lambourn Road and Ashurst Way, sometime over the weekend and used a brick to smash a ground-floor window.

Contractors discovered the damage when they arrived for work on Monday morning.

Bruce Thompson, the city council’s planned operations manager, described the damage as “pure vandalism”.

He added: “When we came in on Monday morning it was just raining inside.”

He said detailed assessments were being made of the extent of the damage but said the emotional cost was to the tenants.

“A lot of people will be upset,” he said.

“People were looking forward to a life-changing event of moving into a new property. For some it is the first home they will have had.”

Tony Evans, operations manager for contractor Lovell, said: “It’s just so disappointing that vandals would cause such awful damage to these beautiful homes.

“It makes me particularly sad that they would pick on affordable homes that are designed to benefit the community.”

Dehumidifiers were brought in yesterday to help dry out the flats and plasterboard walls and ceilings. Damaged kitchens will be ripped out.

Anyone with any information should call police on 08458 505505 or the Crimestoppers hotline on 0800 555111.