MMD: Should Jeremy and Kirsty come clean?

trejoy

If the buyers surveyor said everything was ok, then he`s the one that will get sued. Say nothing but don`t hide it, once the contracts are signed, it ain`t their problem

lancsfamily

The legal and moral aspects to this seem quite different. Legally, Jeremy and Kirsty are under no obligation to tell the buyers about the crack, but they are still legally responsible for the house. If contracts are exchanged in three days' time (there's no guarantee that this will happen), then the crack becomes the buyers' problem.

Morally, the buyers have undertaken to buy the house as it was when they visited it. Whatever fault caused the crack was present when they agreed to buy it, so they effectively agreed to buy it with the fault. This is reinforced by the fact that Jeremy and Kirsty have already moved out of the house (into their "new pad"), so it would be understandable if they no longer felt responsible for the problem.

Either way, there's no point in plastering over the crack. I would want to know more about what caused it.

janbanan

Can't believe how many approves of Jeremy and Kirsty's deceitful (fraudulent?) actions, or how they live with themselves. As long as it's someone else's problem - everything is fine? It's not a problem if you can push it onto someone else?

Pure greed.

snowdog

janbanan wrote: »

Can't believe how many approves of Jeremy and Kirsty's deceitful (fraudulent?) actions, or how they live with themselves. As long as it's someone else's problem - everything is fine? It's not a problem if you can push it onto someone else?

Pure greed.

It does seem quite heartless but I don't think it's particularly deceitful or fraudulent, going by the letter of the law like that, & it's only a hypothetical situation which makes it very easy for people to be over-simplistic in their answer.

Personally, I think I would be keen to go ahead with the transaction but I would certainly want to side with the buyers in doing everything I could to take the surveyors to task (& possibly to court) for doing their job so badly.

Maybe I'd be secretly relieved that it hadn't rained a week earlier. I'm not sure. I assume I wouldn't be moving if it weren't the best thing for my family & me at the time & I would have to put them first.

I'm pretty sure I'd feel genuinely bad for the buyers & want to help them deal with the problem if I could.

But hey, if there was a clear-cut answer it wouldn't be a moral dilemma, right?

aloiseb

In my, perhaps bitter, experience, when this sort of thing happens the seller is always in Mustique, and uncontactable, when a problem arises, and you can't even get hold of his/her flipping solicitor.....

And I'm sure any claim to the surveyors would be met with "we were unable to access the floor / ceiling/ roof/ bay window/ porch due to the presence of carpet / paintwork/ articles in the loft area / lack of access point/ nesting protected bats"

Face it, the whole house-buying thing is a big shambles, and nobody honest and well-meaning ever comes out of it unscathed!

Havign said that, I think i would feel like Kirsty (guilty) but my husband would probably make sure we behaved like Jeremy. It's dog eat dog out there.

Klara_2

I cannot believe all this legal comudgeoning that is going on here, yes obviously you have to protect yourself legally, but is everyone who has replied here a lawyer in that the law stands above common decency and politeness.

Of course you should tell the new buyers what the situation is and deal with the matter from here, a probable, decent out-come would be to split the price of any repairs, however as there appears to be an awful lot of selfish people out there they might even back-out.

I do realise that the issue can be clouded over depending on where you asre going to live, have you made an offer on another house etc, but as this was not mentioned I presume that it is not important to the issue.

So take the moral high ground people, be the better person, it might sting in the short term but you will feel better in the long run.


yup I know it is a bit preachy but politeness is a bit of a bug-aboo for me :cool:

Bea1_2

First of all I would call my solicitor to see where I stand legally and ask if I should/could claim on my insurance for the repair given the really short notice for the 3 day deadline prior to exchange and completion. I think by law a solicitor would have to disclose that information to the buyer if it's disclosed to him/her, not sure about that. I would not want to jeopardize the sale but neither would I want to mislead the buyers at the 11th hour.

I would be inclined to tell the new owners and try and find the best way to sort it out in the hope they would not withdraw from the purchase because that's the main concern at this juncture. Jeremy and Kirsty have already bought and moved in to their new place - bridging loans or rich parents?
If it's the former then they are spending a lot of money and would want the sale to go through at almost any cost so sorting it out is number one priority.

Platti

I'd say tell them, I wouldn't have thought that this far down the line they'd pull out. If they're friends they'd appriciate this much more than finding fresh plaster on the ceiling when the probems reoccurs.

Bea1_2

I'd say tell them, I wouldn't have thought that this far down the line they'd pull out. If they're friends they'd appriciate this much more than finding fresh plaster on the ceiling when the probems reoccurs.


But people do pull out at the last minute just before Exchange of Contracts. People panic, especially newbie buyers...

stephenraine

I think failure to disclose would mean you are breaking the following law under the fraud act 2006

Fraud by failing to disclose information
A person is in breach of this section if he-

(a) dishonestly fails to disclose to another person information which he is under a legal duty to disclose, and

(b) intends, by failing to disclose the information-

(i) to make a gain for himself or another, or

(ii) to cause loss to another or to expose another to a risk of loss.

All the solicitor would have to do to make this applicable is to get the seller to sign a disclaimer stating that since the time between the survey and the exchange of contracts there has been no change to the property, eg damage etc. Sign this dont disclose the crack, turns out to be a serious problem, you could end up in prison.