Indemnity policy - chimney breast removal

Bibbitybob

Morning all,

I'm not sure whether this forum or the house buying would be best for this question, apologies if I've posted in the wrong place

We are buying a house with a view to doing it up, living in it a while and then selling and moving on. It didn't flag as an issue in our valuation report (although I'm aware that this isn't a structural survey), but we believe that a chimney breast has been removed downstairs. There is a tiny chimney breast in the room above (by tiny I mean no more than 2ft wide, never seen one so small before!) and a couple of cracks in the wall below. There are no building regs certificates. We have flagged the issue with our solicitor, who has arranged for the sellers to pay for an indemnity policy.

Now my real question is this...as we have a view to moving in the future we would like back dated (or whatever the official term is!) building regulations certificate for the work so that the same issue doesn't happen when we come to sell.

Is it simply a case of calling the council, getting building regs in (at a cost?) with one of the following two outcomes...

1) they say it's fine and give us a certificate
2) they say it isn't fine and that we need to reinstate the original chimney breast, at which point we claim from the policy to get this work done

...or have I misunderstood how it works?

Thanks in advance

DVardysShadow

You have almost totally misunderstood. The insurance is against the council enforcing Building Regs and is conditional against you not informing the council, thus turning a possibility into a strong probability.

If you want to deal with the actual construction problem, you should get a price to do the job and negotiate with your seller.

macman

How has the remaining chimney breast upstairs been supported?

Doozergirl

If you want to rectify the issue then you need to have it adequately supported to a standard which complies with building regulations and have building control sign it off.

Or you remove the remaining chimney breast altogether, in which case building regs I don't think even need to be involved as there is nothing left to be structurally supported!

Neither woulld be a particularly expensive job.

The policy itself only covers you against enforcememtn action from the local authority. If your intention is to deal with the issue properly then I would suggest that you ask for a contribution towards rectifying it rather than making them pay for an indemnity policy which will never ever be claimed off because the problem will be gone.

By the sound of it though, no one has actually checked to see that it is adequately supported. Once you've bought the house I suggest speaking to building control, not before though. If it's a house that needs renovation which you are prepared to take on then I suggest you take this on as part of it and renegotiate the cost of fixing it - if indeed it isn't already supported correctly.

macman

Doozergirl wrote: »

If you want to rectify the issue then you need to have it adequately supported to a standard which complies with building regulations and have building control sign it off.

Or you remove the remaining chimney breast altogether, in which case building regs I don't think even need to be involved as there is nothing left to be structurally supported!

Neither woulld be a particularly expensive job.

But removing it (or the remainder) is structural work and must have BC approval. And if it's a party wall then a Party Wall Notice must also be served.

Bibbitybob

DVardysShadow wrote: »

You have almost totally misunderstood. The insurance is against the council enforcing Building Regs and is conditional against you not informing the council, thus turning a possibility into a strong probability.

If you want to deal with the actual construction problem, you should get a price to do the job and negotiate with your seller.

Aah, that's what I was worried about. I was aware that a policy couldn't be taken out if the council were informed PRIOR to taking out the policy, but if I understand correctly you're saying that once the house has completed if we ring the council and ask them to look, and they enforce building regs we won't be covered because we'd have asked them to check?

My confusion over this is because I asked my solicitor the very same question and she assured me that the policy would cover if we called the council out.

macman - we don't know. The sellers are saying that there has been no building work done in the 40+ years they have lived there, so I'm assuming that it has been supported in some way. The only signs that suggest it might not be supported adequately are some very small cracks - I'm assuming that if there was a big problem there'd be big cracks and the survey would have noted it as an issue too
(but of course I'm not expect and could be being a bit naive there!).

To be honest this is being bought at a decent price as a project so we're not too fussed about doing the work, I think my main worry is the issues it could cause when we come to sell. I suppose we'd just take out an indemnity policy the same as the seller has this time, or pay ourselves to get building regs in and do whatever work is necessary to get a certificate.

ormus

after 40 yrs, its unlikely to be going anywhere. i would just bite the bullet and get the work done if required.
it wont cost that much for such a small stack on top.
i wouldnt bother with all that indemnity nonsense. more expense and trouble than its worth.