Japanese knotweed again!

Cyril

This stuff was on Sarah Beenys programme the other day and it was not easy to remove, it was horrendous and they had contractors in to dig it up, they then had to burn the stuff and the owner was told it may have to be redone for anything up to 7 years.

She was also told this stuff effects foundations of buildings and is highly undesirable.

Personally having seen the programme I'd leave well alone.

olly300

devotee wrote: »

How much do you suggest? And what do you suggest that once they know the estimate to the works, where do we stand then?
There are 7 flats in the building, two of us have their own gardens, the rest is communal, about 100 ft long. I was thinking to ask for 5-7k discount to account for the future knotweed treatment. Is that fair?

You could easily end up in a situation where the knotweed is in your own little garden as well as the communal garden.

I would personally lose the money you spent on the survey and pull out unless they offered you a bigger discount.

kentmum1973

If it is found in a garden, does it need to be reported to the council? Would it appear in environmental searches? I am just thinking about terrace housing, where it is possible that a house five doors down might have it in their garden, but unless the surveyor looks at every garden within a 100m radius how would anyone know it was close by?

devotee

Thanks everyone. I guess I need to wait to see what amount of it was found and how far it is from my garden.
Our problem at the moment is time scale. I've exchanged on my property and we are due to complete in a week or two. The property we are buying is now empty and no chain and we can move in on completion.
We have spent quite a bit of money on it, mortgage survey, building survey, damp and timber survey, solicitor, broker etc and apart from that there is not much available to buy, especially in such a short time.
So I guess the price will have to be negotiated, just not really sure how big a discount to ask for?

puddy

daveyjp wrote: »

IT IS NOT RESISTANT TO GLYPHOSATE.

http://www.ceh.ac.uk/sci_programmes/documents/JapaneseKnotweed.pdf

As I said lots of scaremongering out there and saying it is resistant to weedkiller doesn't help anyone.

What you do need to do is spray often - 5-6 times a year for 2-3 years.

that is not normal weedkiller and shouldnt be used by the average person with their watering can

cajef

puddy wrote: »

that is not normal weedkiller and shouldnt be used by the average person with their watering can

Of course it is normal weedkiller it can be bought at any garden centre or online even Amazon sell it.

daveyjp

puddy wrote: »

that is not normal weedkiller and shouldnt be used by the average person with their watering can

Glyphosate is also known as Roundup - readily available for anyone to use.
http://www.google.co.uk/products/catalog?q=roundup+5l&rls=com.microsoft:en-US&oe=utf8&rlz=1I7GGIH_en-GB&safe=active&redir_esc=&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbm=shop&cid=4533330333710146178&sa=X&ei=eKo3TorEEsrJhAfLw-2YAg&ved=0CDEQ8wIwAA#

puddy

not at the strength you need it for this stuff

Mojisola

The nub of the problem is that you are relying on the owners of the communal garden to pay up to eliminate it completely from their property. If they don't, you will be stuck with a longterm problem in your garden and will have difficulties when trying to sell.

devotee

Mojisola wrote: »

The nub of the problem is that you are relying on the owners of the communal garden to pay up to eliminate it completely from their property. If they don't, you will be stuck with a longterm problem in your garden and will have difficulties when trying to sell.

Well not really, the communal garden belongs to all flats, including the one I'd be buying, but in addition to that I'll have a private garden as well.