re-inspecting house before exchange & electricity testing

pichon

Hi,

We are looking to move into our first house we're buying in the beginning of August, hopefully, and we received forms and info about exchange from solicitors today.
The solicitor strongly advises us to re-inspect the property before exchange as when the contract is exchanged, there is no turning back.
We don't know whether it's a standard procedure or it's just a cautionary thing that solicitors usually say.

The full structural survey raised category 3 on electricity:

<<Mains electricity is connected to the property with the meter and distribution board located in the under stair cupboard off the rear reception room. There is no last/next test date notified on the distribution board and the distribution board appears to be rather old. As the property is tenanted regular checks on the electrical installation are made. The NICEIC Electrical Industry regulators recommend a full test on tenanted property every five years. If there is no recent certificate available a test by a qualified electrical contractor is advised. Category 3 applies here>>

The property has been a letting property for a long time (definitely more than five years) and the estate agent told us that the vendors were getting quotes for electricity testing in May but that was the last thing we heard on this front.

Should we pursue this too?
We don't know what is reasonable request and what is being fussy, and what's standard practice in the whole process.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

G_M

pichon wrote: »

Hi,

We are looking to move into our first house we're buying in the beginning of August, hopefully, and we received forms and info about exchange from solicitors today.
The solicitor strongly advises us to re-inspect the property before exchange as when the contract is exchanged, there is no turning back.
We don't know whether it's a standard procedure or it's just a cautionary thing that solicitors usually say.
Cmmon sense. The law says the seller must hand over the property at Completion in the condition it was in at Exchange. Not when you visited 5 weeks earlier!


The full structural survey raised category 3 on electricity:

<<Mains electricity is connected to the property with the meter and distribution board located in the under stair cupboard off the rear reception room. There is no last/next test date notified on the distribution board and the distribution board appears to be rather old. As the property is tenanted regular checks on the electrical installation are made. The NICEIC Electrical Industry regulators recommend a full test on tenanted property every five years. If there is no recent certificate available a test by a qualified electrical contractor is advised. Category 3 applies here>>

The property has been a letting property for a long time (definitely more than five years) and the estate agent told us that the vendors were getting quotes for electricity testing in May but that was the last thing we heard on this front.

Should we pursue this too?
We don't know what is reasonable request and what is being fussy, and what's standard practice in the whole process.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

Solisitor is making sure you are aware of the risks of buying a property without having had the electrics tested, or seeing a test report. That's his job. Up to you whether you want to follow up.

Any reason to be concerned about the electrics?
How old is the house?
How old are the electrics?
What kind of Consumer Unit (fuse box) is it? 1950s? 1990s? Last year's bodel?
Has the owner done obvious dodgy DIY on the electrics?
What style plugs and sockets?
Does everything work?

AdrianC

You'll note that it's only recommended that let properties have the electrics inspected. The vast majority of houses go from one decade to the next without the electrics being so much as glanced at. What they're telling you is no more than you could have told yourself from a quick glance - the fusebox/consumer unit/distribution board is not the most recent (rewirable fuses?), and there's no sticker on it to say it's been checked.

If you want more information, then pay an electrician to give you a full check-over once you've moved in.

pichon

Thanks for so helpful replies.
In our letting years of over a decade, electricity has been regularly tested by landlord so we thought it was required by law. The house was built circa 1900 but it's been a rental property for a long time and it shows. It's dated and pipes outside the house look quite shabbily done. The consumer unit and electricity, we don't know how old it is - just know it looks quite old.
The vendor said the gas was tested this year but no certificate provided yet.

GoldenShadow

Electricity was a 3 here. My uncle came and checked it (electrician) before exchange and it was actually all fine.

AdrianC

I can kinda see why it's always flagged as 3 if it can't be proven to be good/current.

Can you imagine the repercussions if it was flagged as 2 (or ungraded), and a place turned out to be a bodged death-trap? "Oooh, but we weren't warned..."

AlexMac

Another visit seems reasonable just to have a poke round and start planning carpets, decor, curtains etc, but unless you want to open a can of worms by trying to chisel a few quid off the price on the strength of a series of tests of the electrics, plumbing, boiler, gas pipes etc, I wouldn't bother.

If the house was built 100 years ago and the only problem revealed by the survey was that the elctrics aren't brand new, it sounds like you're buying a good place. As I've said here before, late Victorian houses are incredibly durable and forgiving, but I'd bet money that unless the place was re-wired in the last couple of years, any report would just confirm that it's not compliant with latest regs... like a majority of homes in the country!

It may be worth getting an elctrical test for peace of mind, and even replacing the consumer unit, but as recently as 4 years ago, I was living in an early 19th Century conversion with a 50+ year old plug-in wired fuse-box instead of modern trip-switches; and everything worked.

But that's for after you move in; when you start moving the kitchen or bathroom around as you almost inevitably will, an electrician will be needed anyway. A mandatory landlord's gas safety check will confirm only that- not wheter there's another few years left in the boiler, but if that ain't broke....

It might be worth paying for cheap home emergency cover on the plumbing and other installations for the 1st year at least; our latest 1980's home is much newer than anything we ever owned , but we had three unconnected plumbing leaks in our 1st year here so that paid off. And having had to replace six boilers in as many houses in the past 10-15 years I'm sanguine about them being an almost inevitably disposable item!

So in terms of your Q "what is reasonable request and what is being fussy, and what's standard practice in the whole process"; there's no standard practice; some people get a full structural survey, gas and electrical tests, others wander round with a builder relative (as we did), many do nowt- but I wish you sucess in the new home; I miss the original features of my many old Victorian wrecks... but not their draughts and out-of-plumb walls!