Pursuing previous owners for costs

TheCyclingProgrammer

macman wrote: »

When you buy a new house for, say, half a million quid, your consumer rights are considerably less than if you had bought a £10 toaster at Argos. Your chance of success in such a claim is precisely zero.

Though a fairer comparison would be to say when you buy a house, you have about the same rights and expectations as if you'd bought a well used toaster off somebody with 6 previous owners and no knowledge of the previous owners.

Davesnave

societys_child wrote: »

. . . bear- traps

They must've worked then. No bears.

shortcrust

I could understand this if the OP had moved in last week, but two years ago?! And they concede that the previous owner probably didn't know. People, eh.

onomatopoeia99

Gloomendoom wrote: »

I keep uncovering WTFs in my house. I'm sure there more yet to be discovered, I wouldn't be too happy if I was held responsible for them should I sell the house.

Me too! I'm getting rid of them a room at a time as I refurbish, and it's a long slow process. Most of them are relatively minor (though the kitchen was awful). Also had to get the chimney taken out of the roof because the previous owners had removed four feet of the stack in the loft, from above the ceiling up to the point where it met the top of the roof, and were supporting the remaining top two feet and pots with a pair of horizontal wooden beams bolted through the rafters that the brickwork rested on.

Given the pots were still open, when it rained, the rain came through them and into the loft! The surveyor did point all of this out at some length in his report and was pretty scathing about the whole thing :rotfl: so I just got a roofer in to remove the chimney and actual put roof in its place.

The reason they'd done all this is because they'd re-arranged inside to create a bathroom and to do this they'd taken the back of the chimney out where it was behind the fireplace. So I have a massive built in fireplace thing dominating one end of the lounge which has no flue upwards (so there was nothing supporting the stack in the loft.

Niv

Right, where do I start with !!!!!!'s:

• Short bit of downpipe missing meaning kitchen wall was getting penetrating damp and had done for quite some time based on the amount of damp in the kitchen - the downpipe was on the floor - why was this not fixed?
• Garden neglected over around 10years
• Random stuff found in garden including; cd's, plates, cutlery, broken cat carrier, numerous dog toys
• wall paper on lime plastered walls...
• ceiling in one room falling in (should have been fixed before completion but wasn't)

To be fair, for the above I did spot much of this before I moved in, and in part, is probably how I managed to afford the place as it must of put many people off


Things not spotted

• water was only heated from an immersion heater (so much underwear in airing cupboard I did not spot this)
• radiator in one room was simply leaning next to valve (looked fixed properly) so when turned on trickle over night, flooded the room!
• none of the toilet cisterns functioned properly due to leaking ball valves (would have been nice if she told me on moving day so I didn't flood the room below...)
• Some power cables in kitchen well chewed by a rodent
• lots of old poison left laying around kitchen (as in, this was a historic issue not recent - a few years ago I would say)
• Kitchen units very questionable on the inside (yea yea, I probably should have inspected insides more)
• No insulation in kitchen ceiling so room is freezing in winter (am rectifying this)
• a number of light fittings had worn wire causing shorts / general failure
• One room had a 4 bulb fitting and didn't work, the bulbs were halogens so didn't have a spare knocking around but thought there was something not right with the fitting / electrics as the previous occupant used a floor standing lamp to light the room. Turns out all bulbs had blown and just didn't bother replacing them!
• Boiler was sited in such a way that I could not be serviced
• waste pipe behind a wall had not been fitted properly so leaked and soaked through wall

To be honest the list goes on. Its a fun project overall, but some of the bodges and things not addressed means there is plenty to do

jimfromcov

phill99 wrote: »

How many more times are there going to be posts on here because of a new homeowner failing to undertake their own due diligence?


Sweet Mother of God.

I severely doubt "due diligence" extends to removing plasterboard and skirting boards during survey works. I can understand frustrations over posts about non-working boilers, sockets not working, guttering falling off - all visible to a non-intrusive survey, but who is going to let a surveyor pull their house apart whilst trying to sell it?

phill99

jimfromcov wrote: »

I severely doubt "due diligence" extends to removing plasterboard and skirting boards during survey works. I can understand frustrations over posts about non-working boilers, sockets not working, guttering falling off - all visible to a non-intrusive survey, but who is going to let a surveyor pull their house apart whilst trying to sell it?

So now tell us how you are going to prove that the previous owner is responsible for the works that you have uncovered and that he is bound to compensate you.


I'm sat on the edge of my seat in suspense.

jimfromcov

phill99 wrote: »

So now tell us how you are going to prove that the previous owner is responsible for the works that you have uncovered and that he is bound to compensate you.


I'm sat on the edge of my seat in suspense.

If I knew that, Phil, I'd never have had to post on the forum now, would I?

I was asking if there was a precedent, that's all, and am all but resigned to the fact that I will have to pay for it. If you had the chance to reclaim a couple of grand for someone else's fault, i'm sure you would want to too. But i suppose you have x-ray vision and would have spotted the problems before buying the house so i'll bow to your infinite wisdom for now.

Davesnave

jimfromcov wrote: »

I was asking if there was a precedent, that's all, and am all but resigned to the fact that I will have to pay for it. If you had the chance to reclaim a couple of grand for someone else's fault, i'm sure you would want to too.

There are precedents, but like your case, they are probably one-offs, so of no assistance. People buying an older property are likely to run into hidden lash-ups of indeterminate age. It goes with the territory.

Any claim, however, is always going to beg the question, "Did you have a structural survey?"

Nowhere have you said you did, so you appear to fall at that 'due diligence' hurdle staight away.

Sometimes, invisible problems can also be known about or suspected by surveyors without invasive surgery.

For example, on the estate where I once lived, wrong materials used below DPC were having an effect on external wall stability, which was starting to show-up around the turn of the century. I sold my house in 2008, knowing that it had this problem. I might not get away with that now, because such matters become shared knowledge among local surveyors.

After that sale, I moved into a rented house on another estate which was more up-market and had always appeared to me a fine and dandy place to buy. It was only after being there for a while that I realised subsidence was a huge issue, which "We never talk about."
Futile. Anyone buying there and using a local surveyor would be advised to get a structural engineer in.