difficult situations for the vendors

cookie_monster_2

Having recently had a survey done on a property I am hoping to buy, issues came back and we were told to get a full survey into the wall ties.


We did this, and paid for it. However, when the surveyor turned up, he made the vendor aware he would need to take a brick out or drill a hole - both of which he wasn't too keen on. We both completely understand this.


The surveyor has called and said with this in mind he will give us a refund for the survey as he was unable to carry out a full report which is what we paid for. He did say that the clear horizontal cracks were only evident where the wall ties were - he used a metal detector thing to check. He said it's leading him to believe there is clear wall tie corrosion but obviously he can't say for certain.


He was incredibly nice about it all but has said that now we're in a difficult situation. TOO RIGHT!


What do we do now?


We've had so much time and money spent on surveys and extra reports and we love the house. It's a 3 bed 120 year old stone semi - with an extension on the back for a kitchen, utility and bathroom. The extension was built in the early 1980's.


Aargh...


I don't know if I am ranting or what but any advice is greatly appreciated.

ClareTeaches

Have you/the EA spoken to the vendor about this? Do they realise that realistically they need to allow the invasive survey in order to sell the property? How committed are they to the sale?

It sounds like they didn't have any advanced warning about the invasive nature of the survey, so made a knee-jerk decision, perhaps without understanding the consequences.

yoshiyella

It would suggest to me that work needs doing to it - could you ask for a worst case scenario price to fix it and then decied what you want to do or what would you have done if the surveryor had carried it out and found issues - renegotiate the price? pull out? still buy it at current price?

Nobbie1967

Assume they need replacing, get a quote for the work and negotiate with the vendor.

bmunky7

Could the surveyor or a suitably qualified tradesperson give you a worst case scenario for fixing the problem if it does exist? That way you could decide if this is something you would be willing to take on or if it's a complete deal breaker. If the cost isn't too excessive you might still consider buying the house and getting a reduction in price then doing the work once you are in. Not ideal obviously though!

eddddy

Nobbie1967 wrote: »

Assume they need replacing, get a quote for the work and negotiate with the vendor.

... and once you have the quote, the vendor may decide to let the survey go ahead - rather than dropping the price by the quote amount.

cookie_monster_2

Surveyor has agreed to give us a worst case scenario price but says, realistically, this could change and would only be an estimate as he really needs to investigate further.


I have asked to speak to the vendor directly regarding this through the estate agent.


It isn't a no dealer for us depending on how much it is. I have no idea what we're even talking about though? A couple of thousand? Tens of thousands? Who knows.


The survey we had done initially came up with quite a few problems and we didn't ask for a price reduction - we think the house is at a fair price BUT we're not willing to take on a huge expense such as this without negotiating.


We're supposed to be exchanging contracts soon... such a pain as we just assumed we were worrying about nothing and everything would come back fine.

patricia..xx

We bought a house with wall tie corrosion. It came up on the survey and I phoned round for 3 quotes, as it was a typical 3 bed semi I was happy the estimates would be rightish.

They all mentioned that it is often just the wall that faces west that has a problem due to prevailing weather. Total quotes were approx £1,500 from memory. We got it done as soon as we moved in, it was only the west facing wall and as that was mainly windows it was about £400 to fix from memory.

So I would say its not a deal breaker, but you may want to get some quotes and negotiate. I got the impression that a surveyor knows pretty well there is a problem from looking, and fishing out a wall tie would only help prove a problem. So if the vendor doesn't want to negotiate get the invasive bit done.

silvercar

The vendor is going to have this problem with any buyer, unless they are lucky enough to get an idiot who doesn't survey. This is the vendor's problem and they need to allow access.

cookie_monster_2

excellent, thanks everyone


patricia - thank you very much - knowing it could be so little is making me think it shouldn't be as big as a problem as first thought. did you inspect it further after your initial survey?


the wall is an extension round the back and it faces north/north east.


it's very complicated this buying an older property.

cookie_monster_2

Quick update:

Vendor refusing to meet with us to discuss the situation. They are now saying either proceed or nothing.

........ I didn't expect this to cause a relationship breakdown and now we have no idea what to do.