Would this bother you?

iheartbristol

Oh for crying out loud, finally managed to see the plans - it's a three bed house that's extended at the top over a double garage. The original 3 bed house is being reinstated and then the garage and the rooms above are being converted into another 3 bed house. Not flats! Grrrrrrr; makes me wonder what else they've gotten wrong in addition to the incompletes on the form and the vague mention of other things that we already know are wrong and haven't asked them because we found out independently.

sharpee

I personally (please note this is my personal opiniio) would be wary as to what other information they ahd not disclosed / gotten wrong. If getting all the correct facts means putting completion off for another month so beit.

I'd rather have all the correct facts and wait a month than rush a purchase and live to regret it.

ceegee

I don't like the sound of these "holes" and lack of information. Why won't they supply the information requested? Are they hiding something from you? If it was me, I'd want definitive answers to all questions and requests for information before I go ahead. If they have hidden anything else, or withheld any pertinent information it could be dodgy.

I know things were different 25 years ago, but the vendor of my home answered "not to my knowledge" to the question about whether or not there had been any problems with drains and sewers. What a cop-out that answer used to be. I had 23 years of sewage flooding in my garden before Wessex Water finally laid a whole new sewage system in the area. The vendors had had it previously too, it had been going on for years.:mad:

So I would be very cautious, but I have been badly burned by a vendor hiding information. The thing is, they could get away with it back then.:( The law was changed for a reason.........please get all the information you can!

casper_g

Can't see how splitting a house into two houses is any different from splitting it into two flats, from the point of view of those living nearby. Either one will result in an extra household living in the street, with an extra 1-2 cars.

Either way, it wouldn't occur to me to worry about it, and it probably didn't occur to the vendor that it would be a problem either. As already stated above, they may not even have realised themselves. I suspect your OH was just having some last minute anxiety about the purchase (which is natural enough, it's a big commitment) and fixed on the house opposite as something to worry about. If this is the only problem, get over it, move in and be happy!

JimmyTheWig

Sounds to me like they've done this deliberately. Knowing it was you who needed to exchange on this day I think they're trying to hide something.
It may be the building work that they're trying to hide. [But I'm not sure why this didn't come up on your solicitor's local search that you will have paid for.] Or it may be something else.

I would personally ring all the estate agents in the chain [particularly those local to the vendor's solicitor] and tell them that exchange won't be happening today because of what the vendor's solicitor has done. I would stress that if you're happy on Monday and exchange can be done by 3pm then the completion date can proceed as planned but if not completion will have to be put back another month.
You are making a big commitment here. Don't let anyone pressure you into doing so before you are ready.

DVardysShadow

JimmyTheWig wrote: »

You are making a big commitment here. Don't let anyone pressure you into doing so before you are ready.

And particularly, do not pressure yourselves over giving notice on your flat. One month's rent is neither here nor there against a bad purchase.

Davesnave

gnasher18us wrote: »

...I'm not sure it would make any difference if students were to live there.

The vast majority of students are hard working and very good neighbours! Looking at your previous employment as a solicitor, you must of been a student once!

I'm sure you was a good, quiet, neighbour in your student days!

Do I detect a hint of irony? :)

If serious, then you wouldn't say that if you lived in Selly Oak, or some other well-known student area, where every other house is in multiple occupation and the 'To Let' signs never come down. It does great things for the community, having such a transient population!

My daughter's just moved from a student house in a suburb of Bournemouth, where again, about twenty properties in the street are now owned by one landlord. She's a quiet girl and a model student, so she didn't particulary enjoy all the partying and people drifting from one house to another at all hours of the day & night. In the same road are a number of bungalow properties, occupied by those who probably thought they'd purchased a 'seaside home' .....and maybe they had 10 years ago, before the uni expansion.

No one's suggesting that students are inherently 'bad' or even uncaring, just that their lifestyle is often very different from that of the people they eventually become. Student landlords also aren't renowned for their high levels of property maintenance, especially in outdoor areas, the shortcomings of which usually impact on others more than they affect the house's occupants.

dodger1

JSR wrote: »

But revealing things like this is why your solicitor does a local authority search. Your vendors might not even know themselves if they're not paying attention to all the junk put through their letter box.

Yeh that's exactly what I thought.

gnasher18us

Davesnave wrote: »

Do I detect a hint of irony? :)

...Only a hint? :beer:
To be fair it never appeared that the street was a hotbed of students!

It certainly isn't one of the trashy student areas by the questioners own admission - the houses never seem to come up on the market for one!

This indicates a very steady community to me! :rotfl:

iheartbristol

Thanks Everyone

Due to my outstanding initiative, drive and cunning I managed to get all the information that we needed today. From what we can make out there is nothing outstanding. If there is anything else they haven't told us we'll never really know between now and exchange no matter how long we delay - if we backed out the next vendor could be worse.... The major problem is the drain in the back garden potentially being cracked (we already know it's blocked and there's evidence to say water's leaving out of it) and we've already budgeted for the worst case scenario: replacing the entire thing up to the manhole in the middle of the garden.

OH feels better about it being houses. Not sure why, I think it's just a feeling. However, last night when we thought it was flats we eventually made the decision to still go ahead..