Propoerty marketed as a 3-bed but in fact a 2-bed with loft room

kakasha

Hi all, my partner and I are in process of buying a property. It has been marketed as a 3-bed and we ended up paying just over £20k above the asking price as we have fallen in love with it immediately.

We have just received the property valuation and it came up almost £30k below the price we're paying. So we called the agent and told them about it - to what she's replied that this might have been due to the loft conversion being just an attic room rather than a 3rd bedroom... not sure if she really meant to reveal that to us!

We looked at the offer again and it does say it's a 3-bed house, however, in the description it only mentions 2 bedrooms and a loft room.

The loft room has two windows, looks like it's been done to a good standard, no door just a spiral staircase that you enter through the 2nd bedroom - which is relatively good size. The master bedroom is massive and I have seen similar houses in the area that simply had that master bed slashed into two to make the property a 3-bed (but the 3rd bedroom is tiny).

We really don't know what to do. We've already been really unlucky, lost two houses what cost us a fortune in solicitor fees, and this house we're buying now we simply love. We do feel like we're overpaying for it a bit due to the fact we used to think this was a 3-bed but everything is going really smoothly with this one and we're concerned that if we try to negotiate the price down, we might loose the dream house...

What are your thoughts? Thanks

Pixie5740

Is it usual to enter one bedroom through another? That would have rung alarm bells for me. Has the loft conversion been done properly, to whatever building regulations were in place at the time it was converted?

Have any comparable 2 bedroom properties been sold recently, if so how do their prices compare to your offer on this property?

I think a lot of people have wobbles about paying too much when buying property, it's only natural. Do you love the house enough to justify spending £30k more on it than the lender's valuation because you're going to have to stump up that extra £30k on top of your deposit.

hazyjo

Doubt very much that staircase would meet fire regs. Probably doesn't have today's approval. If converted recently, it's basically nowt more than boarded loft space. If decades ago, it's more likely to be classed as habitable - up to you if you risk the lack of fire regs though!!! They're there for a reason!!!


Jx

blues

Been through a similar experience recently. The loft room (3rd bedroom) wasn't signed off to building regs so wasn't officially a bedroom. We got a surveyor in to tell us what work was needed to get it up to building regs and the costs involved. We then negotiated the price with the vendors. We love the house so are happy to do the bit of extra work needed.

Just be aware you are only buying a 2 bed house and if you don't get the room up to building regs, you'll only be selling a 2 bed house, so don't pay over the odds for it.

kakasha

A local agency has just added a 2-bed house on the same street, similar standard and the asking price is £10k higher than the asking price for the property we're buying. The prices in the area are going up quickly and since last year they've increased by an average of 13% (according to Zoopla). There are some major developments planned for 2015 that I know about which will probably make the location even more desirable.

@blues - I think we are going to try to follow your suggestion and see what the vendor says.

mrginge

My thoughts are that you've forgotten that it's not your money your buying the house with. Putting a stupidly high offer in to secure a 'dream' house is fine when you're a cash buyer. But you're not.

How much does the 30k represent in percentage terms?
Do you have an extra 30k available?

davidmcn

Leaving consents aside, it's not much use as a 3rd bedroom when it's entered via another bedroom and doesn't even have a door.

Errata

davidmcn wrote: »

Leaving consents aside, it's not much use as a 3rd bedroom when it's entered via another bedroom and doesn't even have a door.

I doubt it complies with building regs either because the spiral staircase with no door will very efficiently draw any fire up from the room it exits from to the room above that it enters.

smifffy1989

walk away sounds horrendous

JimmyTheWig

First question - can you get the mortgage that you need to buy the place at the price you've offered with a LTV based on the valuation? If not then proceeding with the offer price isn't an option.

The valuation, itself, doesn't really change anything. It's not like it has identified damp that you didn't know about or other issues that were unseen by you when you made the offer. The valuation is lower than you were prepared to pay due to the loft room not being a bedroom. But the loft room is still exactly the same as it was when you viewed it.

So what has the valuation told you that you didn't already know.
* It's told you that the loft room isn't suitable as a bedroom due to fire regulations. Did you know that already? Were you planning on using it as a bedroom? How would it affect things if you didn't use it as a bedroom?
* It's told you that when you come to sell the house others may not value it as highly as you have. You're probably going to lose about £30k in the buying/selling process. Is that an issue to you? If you're planning on living there for a couple of years then that's really quite significant. If you're planning on living there for the next 60 years then that's only £500 a year which becomes much less relevant.

If this is your dream house that you plan to live out the rest of your days in, the fire safety of the loft room isn't important to you, and you can afford it then no reason not to carry on as you were.
If not, you've got a problem.

kakasha

mrginge wrote: »

My thoughts are that you've forgotten that it's not your money your buying the house with. Putting a stupidly high offer in to secure a 'dream' house is fine when you're a cash buyer. But you're not.

How much does the 30k represent in percentage terms?
Do you have an extra 30k available?

We made an offer 5.8% higher than the asking price. £30k makes 7.5% of the price we've offered to pay for it.

We have large deposit but getting the building regs to make the loft room a bedroom will probably cost us quite a lot (I've no idea but estimating about £15k?) which we don't have.