Would you get in touch with the previous owners of your newly bought house re:issues?

JustAnotherSaver

Just wondered about this one & wondered what others thought.

The survey brought up damp issues in one room. Got the wallpaper off & saw it was bigger than the survey suggested. Got someone out to look at it which said it was bigger still.

There was a big water stain in the bedroom which suggested leaky roof. Had a roofer out who coincidentally said he'd been to the property 2 years previous & said they'd not acted on his advise for whatever reason. Anyway he said the leak had since been repaired & the stain was just an old problem.

Talking to someone today who knew of the previous owners. Said that they'd tried sorting some issues out without success.

It made me think ... We have the address of where the previous owners have moved to which was given to us by the EA right at the start of the buying process.
When we had a viewing, the owner (one of them) was very pleasant. We didn't see the other owner as they were out. It made me think about writing to them to ask if they could help just to advise us as to whether they'd had any work done regards the roof/damp, when this was. Had they already tried methods suggested by tradesmen etc which we would end up trying to begin with but they could save us time & money by saying - we already tried that, it didn't work etc. Also to help us not be conned by tradesmen saying you need to do XYZ, when in actual fact they may have already tried that.

I don't mean a whinging letter - you sold me a dud, i want my money back, but just a letter to see if they could help advise as to what had already been done etc.

Or would you simply not bother & just start throwing money at the problem, even if what you try may have already been tried?

G_M

They are unlikely to respond in writing- indeed they'd be mad to do so, except to deny all knowledge.

They won't know if you are considering legal action - so will never admit in writing they had knowledge of a problem.

A friendly phone call (maybe about mail you've received from them?) and a chat, and then lead into a question about the damp atthe same time reassuring them you are NOT complaining, just seeking information so you can discount any investigations they've already done....

JustAnotherSaver

I don't actually have their phone number, only the address. I know one of them is on facebook but that's a bit stalker-ish so i'd be reluctant.

I can see your point though. I guess we'll have to discount the previous owners then & just see how things pan out by going our own way.

olgadapolga

From the vendor's perspective:

The buyers of our house emailed me about an issue with the house I sold to them. I ignored the email. Primarily because the email was sent more than a year after we'd sold the house and as far as I was concerned the house was not my problem anymore. The secondary reason was because they had behaved in such an awful way during the sale that I didn't want to help them.

Thrugelmir

JustAnotherSaver wrote: »

The survey brought up damp issues in one room.

So you were of "issues" before you brought the property?

JustAnotherSaver

olgadapolga wrote: »

From the vendor's perspective:

The buyers of our house emailed me about an issue with the house I sold to them. I ignored the email. Primarily because the email was sent more than a year after we'd sold the house and as far as I was concerned the house was not my problem anymore. The secondary reason was because they had behaved in such an awful way during the sale that I didn't want to help them.

Bit of a difference though.

I'm asking about contacting a month or so afterwards, not a year.

Plus i actually like helping people if i can. If someone came to me a year, 2 years, 5 years etc afterwards & said hey i'm looking to see if you could help me in any way, then i would help (if i could). I know not everyone is like that, but i'd like to think some are.

Thrugelmir wrote: »

So you were of "issues" before you brought the property?

Yes but this is no told you so because that isn't helping anything.

There is a problem which we would like fixing. We're more than happy to pay for it ourselves. We';re not out to point fingers. We just want to fix it as best we can.
What we don't want to do is try method 1, method 2, method 3 etc if the previous owners have already tried those methods but they've failed.

We're interested in when the leak on the roof was & if it really has been properly sorted. If not then we'll pay for someone to fix it, even though it's on the join with the neighbour - we will pay as we just want it done.

It'd just be helpful if they could aid us in not wasting any time, but i see G_Ms point.


I've been told some interesting info today about how they have tried things in the past that haven't worked as well as other things including from professionals who've been to the property previously. It would've been nice to hear from them to see what has been done so we don't waste any time/money.

Soleil_lune

This may not be what you want to hear, 'justanothersaver 'but if I were the seller, I wouldn't want to know. Dare I say it: they were probably 'friendly' to you, because they wanted to sell their house to you - and for NO other reason. They were not your 'friends,' you meant nothing to them, they just wanted you to buy their house.

Some 12 years ago, we bought a house from a couple who treated us like Royalty on the 3 occasions we went to view the house. When we completed and moved in, we realised the house had many issues: the kitchen was in terrible condition with cupboards falling apart, one side of the conservatory was attached to the next door's extension wall, (which caused big problems for which we had to seek legal advice,) they did not cap off where the dishwasher fit, and when we put the tap on, the kitchen almost flooded, and the heating system needed £400 spending on it before our energy company would let us start a 3 star contract on it, and the boiler was on its last legs. And that was only half of the problems.

We had a moan at them when we saw them in town, but they just shrugged their shoulders as if they had no clue what we were on about, saying 'everything was fine' when they were there.

Basically, some people don't bother doing their house up, they will just leave it for the next owner to do.

The house is pretty much sold-as-seen. The surveyor did his job and presumably didn't uproot anything severe, so you don't have a leg to stand on. A damp wall isn't that bad, but will need treating before it spreads.

You can contact them if you like, but I would imagine the letter will go straight through the shredder. That's where I would put it, if it were me.

JustAnotherSaver

Soleil_lune wrote: »

We had a moan at them when we saw them in town, .

I do see what you're saying & i'm well aware that they needed to be nice to us for the very reason you gave, however we're not looking to do the above - moan at them.

ATEOTD we weren't forced to buy the house, but we have bought it & we need to put things right which we're prepared to do. It'd just be nice if we could get a little help along the way.

I guess perhaps i'm in the minority then. Maybe i'm too helpful towards other people & i should probably be less helpful than i am because it sounds like nobody wants to help anybody. I wonder when this attitude came in as i bet it wasn't like this 50-60 years ago.

I'm not having a go at you. I totally understand your POV.

I guess we'll just have to assume that these people are likely to be unhelpful folk & we should knock the idea on the head then.

LADYXXMACBETH

If the survey bought up damp I would expect buyers to ask questions before exchange or get a specialist to investigate before exchange. If a buyer contacted me after completion about an issue I would ignore any letters and then if they continued to contact me I could in theory accuse them of harassment. I don't think there is anything to be gained from contacting them, if anything they may not tell you the truth they are under no obligation to. You don't want them to say it is fixed then find it's a bodged job 5 years down the line.
If it was something that the blatantly lied about on the legal forms then you could sue them but the survey brought up damp as a problem and you still decided to buy the house. Buyer beware I guess. Sorry I don't mean to be harsh

marathonic

If I were a seller and people were ringing me about a house I used to own, I'd probably ignore them. Home ownership brings up all sorts of maintenance issues and each of us have enough in our current homes without worrying about past homes too.

Chances are your seller is trying to resolve issues in their new home. The last thing they want to do is deal with issues pertaining to their previous home. Sure, a quick query may be fine - but to have them dig out invoices to say what previous tradesmen have done would be asking a little too much (especially after moving all their belongings and not knowing what's stored where).

Anyways, any reputable tradesman should know what needs fixing without having to know what past work was done.

JustAnotherSaver

I do think we're getting carried away with ourselves here & blowing this out of proportion.

I am not asking them to take a week off work to dig into the archives for every last receipt they ever had, every phone number they dialled for a house related problem & the times of said phone calls etc.

ALL i was asking about was -

* Seen the wet patch on the wall in the bedroom. Just wondering if this is perhaps an old problem that has been fixed but has left a stain (under the wallpaper).
* ANSWER - we couldn't get it fixed / we got it sorted by doing this.

* I see the new plaster in the living room. Just wondering what actual work was done here (injecting, just new plaster etc), which builder was used (so i don't pick them!!!). Has anyone been out to check the floor?

* ANSWER - just plaster/proper damp treat, Bob the builder/can't remember. Floor ok/not checked.

Done.

Nobody is mentioning anything about getting paperwork & the like.


On the one hand i can see where you are all coming from. On the other i am amazed at how unhelpful peoples attitudes are. I don't mean towards me in this thread, but i mean just in general life it seems.

marathonic wrote: »

Anyways, any reputable tradesman should know what needs fixing without having to know what past work was done.

I agree, but have you ever heard of cowboys? And how do you know whether you've picked one until they've done the work & it's then too late?


Still. Thanks for the input everyone. Before this develops into 10 pages of the same thing, i'll just say that i wont be contacting them on the back of what's been said here tonight.