Mining Report - NOT at risk of coal mining subsidence from Entry

jase_31

How do people here feel about buying a property with a mine shaft reported within 20 metres on the initial report, however the more the secondary interpretive report states the entire property is NOT in the zone of possible ground movement of the subject mine entry and is NOT at risk of coal mining subsidence damage from its presence.

davidmcn

I'd prefer to buy a property further away...

Probably depends how common a problem it is in the neighbourhood, sometimes it's safer to be near a mapped mine shaft rather than one where the report says "we think there are mine shafts around here but nobody knows where they are".

[Deleted User]

Can't see there being any problem. The local mining museum is built on top of 2 mine shafts.

fed_up_and_stressed

I'd stay the hell away. Especially if there were comparable properties without a giant hole within 20m. Resale value would be peanuts.

fed_up_and_stressed

Deleted_User wrote: »

Can't see there being any problem. The local mining museum is built on top of 2 mine shafts.

Doesn't mean they'll never be any issues. My uncle by marriage lived in a street where a house that had stood at least 50 years disappeared down a mineshaft.

Subsequently the entire streets houses are unmortgageable

Irratus_Rusticus

Twenty metres? On the other hand most of County Durham is one big coal mine and folks there buy and sell houses okay. Quote from "The threat of abandoned mines on the stability of urban areas" by BARRY G CLARKE, MICHELLE WELFORD & DAVID B HUGHES based on case studies from Scotland and the Durham coalfield:-

"...ground movements due to old mine workings are a hazard in urban areas and can remain so for some considerable time after the workings have been abandoned. The risk of these ground movements occurring is difficult to predict and is probably very low given the amount of development in former coalfields but, nevertheless, the risk is there."

Nobody will give guarantee no matter how thoroughly plugged or capped...

Try get an insurance quote for subsidence, maybe?

Kat88

Where I live it would be impossible to buy a house without a mineshaft. I was originally sceptical but decided as long as the shaft was treated and capped, it's not an issue as the mining authority take responsibility for any subsidence. Needless to say people have lived in this area for centuries and there have been no issues at all. I really wouldn't worry about it at all, and I don't think it affects re-sale in areas where they are so common.

[Deleted User]

Old mine workings all over under my town but not worked since the 1950s.

It is an ex mining town after all.

cajef

There are towns and villages in the west of Cornwall where no one would live if they were worried about old mine shafts and workings, the area has them everywhere, some known and a lot uncharted.

Andypandyboy

Mortgage companies are becoming risk averse to this it seems. I know of a case in an old mining town where the records of whether the shaft was capped were unclear. Although the mining report clearly stated that no risk existed as did the further report which was commissioned.

Houses in that row have been bought and sold numerous times over the years without issue. A mortgage was agreed via Halifax, two weeks before exchange, they pulled it citing the mine shaft as a risk too far. That was over a year ago, a sold sign keeps going up, and then going down. It seems unsaleable, when it was once sought after. If things can change so quickly I wouldn't risk my capital.

Grabs39

I bought an ex-council house (in Tyne and Wear though about 200 yards from Co Durham ). It was built in 1935 and would have been for the miners at the time. They wouldn't dig a mine under the houses they'd built, and if there was a pre-existing mine if it were to subside chances are it would have done so at some point in the last 80 years! My surveyor said it would be fine. Interestingly there's a huge field near here which the survey says is contaminated land. From what I can tell it was just a slag heap - so now just more green space for dog walking

As others have said, depending on the area it's a possibility that you would come across that with all houses.