Is our house now unsaleable ..Help!

LannieDuck

Further to HHarry's post above, can I suggest that you get up in your loft and take a couple of photos now so that if they cause any further damage you'll have evidence that it wasn't pre-existing?

Hootie01

Hubbys just seen they have put the steel in already. Can we do nothing now I wonder.
Going to the council for nine.


Update. Have called council and they are not responsible. My neighbours are using a approved inspector JHAI Limited. The council inspector said they have broken the party wall agreement and there's nothing they can do. So we can put a letter through the door asking them to stop work as they have not served party wall notice

csnann

Where do you live? I read this at 8.40 am and you say you have spoken to the council already, they wouldn't be open here until 9am.

moneyistooshorttomention

Make sure you do do that letter and keep a copy.

Are you sure you cant find the money for an injunction? Have you checked how much it would cost?

A quick bit of googling earlier revealed that, if someone goes ahead and does work they should notify you of under the Party Wall procedure (but they don't) that you can claim off them after the event for any damage they do.

ciderboy2009

Find a local Party Wall Act surveyor & ask them for advice/assistance - your neighbour will be responsible for the surveyor's bill

moneyistooshorttomention

ciderboy2009 wrote: »

Find a local Party Wall Act surveyor & ask them for advice/assistance - your neighbour will be responsible for the surveyor's bill

It could be an idea to contact a suitable surveyor - but I cant recall seeing anything anywhere that said the neighbour will pay for that - in the event that its work they have already started.

The neighbour should have done this in advance and it would be up to them to cover the costs of that surveyor (ie a jointly agreed one) or those surveyors (ie one each) BUT I read that as something for "in advance". This scenario is now in process of unfolding - so I have my doubts as to whether the cost would be covered now.

Certainly - if damage is caused and not put right - then I would be claiming for the costs of the surveyor I would employ to assess said damage, as well as the costs of putting the damage itself right.

Now I come to think of it - there is a possibility for a free chat over the phone with a surveyor. I've done it myself and I seem to recall that I accessed this via a phone number I think I got from the RICS website. In my situation - I found the surveyor I got put onto by them pretty helpful. So that might be worth considering.

POPPYOSCAR

csnann wrote: »

Where do you live? I read this at 8.40 am and you say you have spoken to the council already, they wouldn't be open here until 9am.

Our council offices open at 8.30am


I am more surprised by the early start from the builders!

Davesnave

Hoploz wrote: »

I would monitor the next few days and see if they fix it. Re the debris in the cavity, not much can be done about this and it probably isn't a huge amount. I suspect they will fix the hole with a new block pretty soon. If no change after a few days and it looks like they've forgotten it then I would talk to the neighbour

Marktheshark wrote: »

It does not need to be a huge amount, just enough to clear the damp course and they have a rising damp issue up the wall.

SailorSam wrote: »

Although that's true, i'd be surprised if there's not lots of houses where the brickies have accidently dropped bricks & mortor down into the cavity as they've been working.

I'm not going into the rest of this matter, but I think the cavity argument is a bit of a red herring.

I should be very surprised if there is any cavity between two terraced houses built in the 1950s. Surely, it wouldn't be serving any function applicable in those days. Sound decoupling? Doubt it!

Perhaps if someone thinks I'm wrong, they may explain why it would be there, because I can't think of a reason!

moneyistooshorttomention

The way I read that comment about the cavity was that I was thinking of the Victorian terrace house I had as my starter house. When I got up in the loft there were a couple of bricks missing from the wall between myself and one of my neighbours. Looking through the gap where the bricks were missing, I could see another wall of bricks in behind "my" row of bricks and with no missing bricks at that point.

I took it that (even though these were Victorian houses) that there was a gap of some sort of a few inches in between my loft wall and their loft wall. I don't know what the construction would have been lower down in the house - in between my hallway and their sitting room the other side of that (ie as to whether it was just one brick thickness or no).

It may have been something to do with the fact that those houses used to have fireplaces/chimneys - and so perhaps some sort of chimney breast thing. I didn't know.

martindow

If the council is not helpful I would phone a party wall surveyor - Google a local one - and ask them what to do. They will have come across situations like this and know what can be done.

Normally the person doing the building is responsible for paying the bills of PW surveyors. The surveyor will know if this is still the case after work has started.