contract and survey question.

markusadam

we have accepted an offer on our house and have had an offer on another house accepted.


we had a homebuyers survey done on the property we are buying on monday and we are waiting for a survey on the house we are selling.


we are with solicitors that let you track the sale and purchase on the internet.


it say's that the contract was sent out to us today and one sent to our buyer.


does this mean that our survey we paid for was ok? and that our buyer had a mortgage valuation done and not an internal one?


from lisa

Tiger_greeneyes

The contract is nothing to do with the survey - the survey is for your mortgage and the contract is for the legal side of things, and is sent from one solicitor to another. They're entirely separate things, for entirely separate purposes, in other words.

When the surveyor has completed the survey, they dictate it for typing. Once it's typed up, the surveyor will sign it (usually electronically) and it will be sent to the mortgage centre. The mortgage centre do their bit and send you out an offer of mortgage - together with a copy of your survey report. It's best at this stage that you make sure your solicitor has received a copy of the report too, it saves any delays if they don't get one.

I'm not sure what you mean in your last sentence - about your buyer having a mortgage valuation done and not an internal one...

'Mortgage valuations' are just lender-speak for 'survey'. Ie, it's one and the same thing. Properties are always inspected internally for mortgage valuation (surveys) purposes, or lenders won't entertain releasing funds on the property.

Madjock

It's not necessarily the case that an internal inspection is always required. Some lenders instruct drive-bys depending on the property and the area. It's even possible now for lenders to do an online survey for some properties, which doesn't involve a valuer getting out of bed, let alone inspecting the property.

Tiger_greeneyes

It's not particularly commonplace to carry out a drive-by.

Some of the instances whereby a drive-by would be used is for a new-build where the surveyor has seen other properties in the same development; portfolio buyouts - where one company is buying a portfolio from another company and need a rough idea of current value; the council-tax banding was done via drive-by too. In some cases where there's only a tiny percentage of mortgage required, the lender will commission a drive-by to make sure the house is suitable security.

I'm sure there's other instances that I can't think of at the moment - but the above is just a rough idea.

For the average property purchase though, they're pretty much always inspected internally.