Offer accepted, property inspected - what now?

chaotic_j

Hi,

Had an offer accepted on property sold under 'best and final offers' we offered 4% over the initial asking price then another 0.6% to make sure we wouldn't miss out by a small amount.

I had two thorough viewings and the only main concern we decided on was structural integrity - nearby trees and evidence of previous roof leak. It's a 3 storey late Victorian 6 bedroom villa, on an end of three similar properties and so may have shallow foundations.

I paid a structural engineer to look around with me - all went very well he used his spirit level everywhere outside and said remarkably there was pretty much no movement. The tree he advised to simply prune regularly.

He did pick up on some movement at the back next to bathroom window - gap filled in with mastic and there was some stepped cracking half way up the wall. He said as the back catches the sun it was probably thermal expansion of the stone and so nothing serious at all.

Inside I'd asked him to pay particular attention to one of the attic bedrooms where the roof had apparently leaked through to another bedroom below and been papered over etc (attic bedroom floor was previously boarded up to reduce heating costs so it made sense they wouldn't have been aware of the leak until it went through)..

I'm instructing our solicitor to proceed, but if I ask the solicitor to request guarantees etc. to any work done to the roof will this be OK? I don't want to risk losing the house at all, but it would be nice to know if there was still a guarantee in place and/or if the work had been done properly.

The structural engineer said it was likely a lead valley that had leaked as if laid all in one piece, thermal expansion and contraction can cause cracks.. obviously it isn't leaking now so something must have been done.

He said it wouldn't require stripping the roof if it needed looking at again, it could be lined with some other substitute material (which sounded like a bit of a bodge to me..).

Thanks in advance,
chaotic_j

G_M

Well I only found one question in your post:

if I ask the solicitor to request guarantees etc. to any work done to the roof will this be OK?

Yes.

glasgowdan

G_M wrote: »

Well I only found one question in your post:
Yes.

There's a question in the subject line which sets the scene.

Davesnave

If the lead flashing has been repaired, then it could leak again in a different place, so there might not be a specific guarantee covering the whole valley.

Lead flashing can be replaced with glassfibre panels made for the purpose, but I wouldn't recommend these for an attic bedroom, as they are much noisier in rain than lead.

Thanetia

What's the chain situation? Not much point instructing your Solicitor to do a whole load of digging into the property background until this is confirmed.

Then, yes they will make enquiries and request guarantees etc - but I'm never convinved how much worth a guarantee is from a contractor who did work for someone else. Anticipate that the roof will need an inspection by someone to confirm its state and give you some peace of mind. You need to apppreciate that an old property is going to need some level of ongoing care and attention so make sure you budget for this.