Should I buy a property that has no building regulations for the loft conversion?

vec001

Hi All

I wonder if you could help me? I am a first time buyer that is about to buy a property. When i first seen the house on rightmove it was advertised as a 5 bedroom house and was under offer - Since then the offer has fell through and the house has been re-advertised as 3 beds to the first floor and 2 attic rooms and a shower room to the 2nd. I have been to see it, loved it and put an offer in, which has now been accepted.

I have had the home buyers survey done and this has come back fine but mentioned that it "assumed" the loft conversion was done to building regulations / standards - after requesting the information from the vendors they dont have them. Her father done the conversion in the 1990s - (the last offer fell through as they didnt have these documents). I asked them to get a builder to come round and look at it but they said a builder had already looked at it and it was structually sound - however this is just word of mouth and there is again, no documentation confirming this from him.

Can anyone please advise me on how i should proceed with this? i undertsand that i am buying a 3 bed house with loft converstions and the price reflects this - I am more worried about any re-sale issues without these documents

Thanks - any help would be mucho appreciated:)

abankerbutnotafatcat

If you only pay what it is worth without the loft conversion then you'll be ok as far as resale goes because you can either sell it on on that basis or do the loft conversion properly and sell it on at the higher value that would attract. I'm in the same position. Our solicitors made us acknowledge that it wasn't a proper loft conversion and that if we use it as a bedroom we are invalidating our insurance.

The only thing i'd add is that even if you think the majority of the work has been done it could be that getting it done to regulations may not work out much cheaper than doing a loft conversion from scratch - that's why you shouldn't pay more than it's worth without the loft conversion!!

vax2002

I would be very surprised if you could get a lender to lend on the house without a very detailed costly structural survey

BobQ

Speak to the local council's buildings regulation department. If they were approached by the owner or builder and asked to approve the work they should have a record of either saying it was not required or of granting it.

A bigger issue could be planning permission, and you can ask the Planning Department similar questions. In fact if they were involved the plans may be available of the local authorities planning portal.

The fact the owners have lost the plans is not significant. What matters is whether they obtained BR approval (which would have been required) and whether they obtained PP (which may or may not have been required depending on the circumstances.

BR would probably have been needed if you were making the loft into bedrooms with proper access stairs for fire regs or if you were increasing the volume of the house via a dormer window. If you just have velux windows and its for an office it might not have been required in those days.

If there are no records, I would not buy it unless the LA say it was not required or you are prepared to rectify the situation.

abankerbutnotafatcat

We had no issue with the lenders. The valuer confirmed the value as the purchase price.

BobQ

abankerbutnotafatcat wrote: »

The only thing i'd add is that even if you think the majority of the work has been done it could be that getting it done to regulations may not work out much cheaper than doing a loft conversion from scratch - that's why you shouldn't pay more than it's worth without the loft conversion!!

I agree but also bear in mind that if the conversion been done without the approval and you move in, the regulations are likely to have become more stringent and if the local authority is not aware of the work they could require significant parts (like a dormer window) to be removed which could be quite intrusive to have done when you have moved in. Similarly if load bearing girders were required this could be quite difficult to install retrospectively. Having lived in a house during a loft conversion its not fun I can assure you.

abankerbutnotafatcat

BobQ wrote: »

I agree but also bear in mind that if the conversion been done without the approval and you move in, the regulations are likely to have become more stringent and if the local authority is not aware of the work they could require significant parts (like a dormer window) to be removed which could be quite intrusive to have done when you have moved in. Similarly if load bearing girders were required this could be quite difficult to install retrospectively. Having lived in a house during a loft conversion its not fun I can assure you.

Yes, but wouldn't that be exactly the same as if a house was bought with a completely unconverted loft? My advice was buy as if it has no loft conversion.

BobQ

abankerbutnotafatcat wrote: »

We had no issue with the lenders. The valuer confirmed the value as the purchase price.

The lender only needs to be sure it can get its money back. Its fair for the lender to assume that the building is constructed to the standards needed for BR approval. If not your solicitor is likely to flag this as a problem.

Obviously if these are not bedrooms then it will have been easier to have avoided the need for BR approval. But if you then used them as bedrooms there could be questions to answer were there a fire.

BobQ

abankerbutnotafatcat wrote: »

Yes, but wouldn't that be exactly the same as if a house was bought with a completely unconverted loft? My advice was buy as if it has no loft conversion.

Difficult to say without knowing the state of the place and what needs to be done. Your advice may be good if it just needs a few fire doors to be installed.

It may not be the same as having an unconverted loft. Dismantling some of the construction and re-instating it correctly might be trivial or not depending on what needs to be done. Say there is a dormer and it needs to be moved? It really depends on the situation. Or there is a structural problem with the current conversion? You are probably right but the OP needs to know what the problems are.

But I also wanted the OP to appreciate that if he moves in with a few kids, doing a loft conversion is very disruptive.

paddy's_mum

It is for them to get the appropriate documents. Why should you be put to the trouble and expense of doing their job for them? They've already taken a massive short-cut by ignoring the law. What else within the property might be suspect ....?

Care to bet that this is the reason the first sale fell through? One wonders how many sales will collapse before these chancers twig that they're on a hiding to nothing.

abankerbutnotafatcat

BobQ wrote: »

Difficult to say without knowing the state of the place and what needs to be done. Your advice may be good if it just needs a few fire doors to be installed.

It may not be the same as having an unconverted loft. Dismantling some of the construction and re-instating it correctly might be trivial or not depending on what needs to be done. Say there is a dormer and it needs to be moved? It really depends on the situation. Or there is a structural problem with the current conversion? You are probably right but the OP needs to know what the problems are.

But I also wanted the OP to appreciate that if he moves in with a few kids, doing a loft conversion is very disruptive.

Thanks, my main point was to let OP know that it won't necessarily be cheaper to get the loft conversion up to regulation standard than to do the whole thing from scratch which was something that I hadn't appreciated before I was in the buying process for my property.

I hadn't considered that if structural changes had been made to the external building then it could actually cost more than starting from scratch.

In my property there were no external alterations; the existing roof space had been boarded out and made habitable with a conventional window. The required changes are for it to meet fire regulations.

I have read that once an alteration has been in place for a certain length of time it is accepted whether it met building regulations at the time or not. If this is true I presume it's a very long time. Do you know any more about this?