Building survey advice

Catty212

We have had a building survey done on a house we were planning to purchase, it's come back and isn't great.

It mentions isolated progressive subsidence due to poor foundations in the garage and outbuildings at the rear of the house, issues with the roof flashings, chimney ventilations and new central heating, issues with ventilation under the timber in the floor, mention of previous woodworm amongst numerous other things. We also have very limited details of work thats been carried out, no paper work etc.

We dont have much scope for extra cash to pay for a lot of work to be carried out (especially garage etc), where do we stand? Can we request sellers do the work? Or are we wasting our time?

We are first time buyers and havent really got a clue what we do next.

marliepanda

Catty212 wrote: »

We have had a building survey done on a house we were planning to purchase, it's come back and isn't great.

It mentions isolated progressive subsidence due to poor foundations in the garage and outbuildings at the rear of the house, issues with the roof flashings, chimney ventilations and new central heating, issues with ventilation under the timber in the floor, mention of previous woodworm amongst numerous other things. We also have very limited details of work thats been carried out, no paper work etc.

We dont have much scope for extra cash to pay for a lot of work to be carried out (especially garage etc), where do we stand? Can we request sellers do the work? Or are we wasting our time?

We are first time buyers and havent really got a clue what we do next.

You can request they do the work I suppose but they can also refuse.

Best option would probably be to revise your offer in light of these issues. It depends if the issues were factored into their initial pricing or if they are 'news' to the vendors.

andy.m_2

You can request that they do the work, you can revise your offer (although you most likely wouldn't be able to add the cost of work to the mortgage) or you can start to look at other places.

Or you can do all 3 and see which one works out for you.

Slip to outbuildings isnt the worst thing in the world to be fair ad if you are tidy with the spanners then the other items are reasonably easy to fix at your leisure. Roof flashings I would trust to a pro roofer and factor to pay anything from £500 to £1500 depending on how muc lead they need to use.

Hoof_Hearted

Our first house had a number of problems missed by the surveyor. We were in your position of having very little money left over and it was a lot of worry, stress and disruption.

Unless you are really up for it, consider looking elsewhere.

Gonzo33

If you haven't got a lot of money left over to do the repairs required and the vendors don't agree to get the work done or knock the costs (make sure you get estimates yourself) then I would walk away.

Catty212

Thanks for the replies.

Sorry to sound thick but do we go through out Solicitor to request them to do work or the EA?

We have had a builder look at a garage and he believes it will need rebuilding thich won't be cheap ... we love the house, but think the fact we're getting married in 11 months and living in a building site would drive us mad

cattie

I have always gone via the ea when requesting re-negotiating on price or a request for work to be carried out as a result of bad news on a survey.

daveyjp

One of the first properties we looked at as FTBs came back with a long list of problems, we continued looking, found something else and walked away from the problem property.

phoebe1989seb

We have always bought 'project' houses and despite DH not being a tradesman, but merely very good at DIY, we have always done a huge amount of the work ourselves just bringing in trades for electrics, plumbing etc. Over the years we've taken on some very big projects, but never anything with subsidence - although if it's only in the garage and outbuildings it wouldn't be a deal-breaker for us.......if the money was available to do that and the other remedial works.

That said, living on a building site is not for everyone - we are currently going into our 10th week without hot water or central heating (wouldn't be so bad if the weather was good!) due to having our boiler removed to allow an extension to be built :eek: We've done large renovations with a small child in tow too, but we seem to thrive on it - as I said, not everyone is so keen to take on the challenge

Whatever you decide, hope it all works out for you

Catty212

Thanks for all the posts - we pulled out of the puchase and I actually feel relieved. At another time Im sure it would have been different, but thi year is traumatic enough