What's reasonable to ask of vendors for inspections?

David_Aldred

Hi,
Please consider having a truly independent inspection of the property throughout by using one of the Freelance or Consultant surveyors of the Property Care Association, a list of which can be seen on the Property Care Association (PCA) website under the heading of find a member and then selecting Freelance or Consultant (the rest are contractors looking for work).

If you think the vendor and their legal advisors are going to take any notice whatsoever of you doing your own survey and then asking for a drop in price to reflect whatever figures you come up with I think you may be in for a bit of a shock. Also without being rude you are spending hundreds of thousands of pounds and you need to get this aspect of your purchase negotiations right or it will cost you dearly.

This being the case you wouldn't ask an electrician to defend you in court and likewise you do not have the qualifications, professional indemnity insurance, knowledge or expertise to know what you should be looking for with regard to do a competant survey in the detail required to save you thousands of pounds in your purchase negotiations and even I am still learning about this very complicated subject matter after doing this for more than 20 years.

You say this property is at the top of your budget range well that is exactly why you need to employ somebody who will give you an unbiased professional opinion on all the matters of timber, dampness, cavity wall ties etc throughout the property along with provisional budget costs for you then to go back to the vendor with in your purchase negotiations.

Access for any surveyor is always limited by what the vendor will provide because the surveyor will be a guest in the vendors home. If the vendor has nothing to hide they will make as much access available as they can but in a fully furnished home access will always be restricted to some extent. It is easy for the Chartered surveyor to write remove all obstructions but that may simply not be possible when a property is occupied and even some unoccupied properties can be severely limited unless you want to start hacking through feature laminates and hardwood panelling for instance.

If there is a paper trail of evidence to support a view that there are problems within areas unable to be accessed at time of visit the specialist surveyor has to place the client on notice of the risk and the client then must make a balanced decision as to whether to budget for a worst case scenario or anything less in their purchase negotiations.

Time and again on this forum we see people who will quite happily pay hundreds if not thousands of pounds to a Chartered surveyor who describes the property wonderfully but then passes all liability onto others with their inspections such as electrical, gas, drains etc such that the client may wonder what they have paid all that money for.

Their client is usually directed by the Chartered surveyor straight into the hands of a dpc contractor who says they will look "for free" so they can get work from their inspections often as a result of misdiagnosis in the case of dpc work. In truth I don't think many people are even aware that true independent specialist surveyors in these subjects exist and even when they do find such exist they are reluctant to pay for them to inspect because they compare them with the contractor and their quickie free survey for their own gain.

Anybody who has had a truly independent specialist survey undertaken for dampness, timber and wall ties will appreciate what value for money these surveys are taking at least half a day on site to inspect and a full day to write up with drawings, photograhs, and report specifically written for that property covering everything internal and external you can think of that impacts upon dampness and timber problems. If a chartered surveyor were to spend that long upon their reports they would costs well over a thousand pounds yet be totally lacking in the nitty gritty detail the client is looking for.

For more information regarding these issues of dampness, timber decay, cavity wall ties please look at my other postings on this forum which may be of help.

Kindest regards, David Aldred Independent damp and timber surveyor

pelethecat

Thanks for all this advice. I'm definitely not about to try to do any of the work myself!
To be fair, the surveyor seems to have been as thorough as he can without taking up floorboards and exposing timbers, but I need quotes from suppliers in order to have some numbers on which to base a reduction in my offered price.
What would you imagine would be a reasonable ballpark figure for an independent specialist survey for the damp? It's a two and a half bed late Victorian mid terrace in the south west.
Thanks!