Please help: Mis-sold house, who’s at fault?

Rob-123

AdrianC wrote: »

And what to do if one doesn't exist? You'd be happy watching the sale fall apart, and the vendor stomp off, !!!!ed-off that they've got to do a load of remedial work before you'll let 'em back in the shop?

Or a near-on-useless indemnity will get sold?

It would have given me the option to find out if the vendors were happy to get it inspected by the council before I proceeded. If they weren’t happy with this then to me they are hiding something to do with the work and red flags would have probably made me walk away from the purchase.

It certainly would have been better to know that there definately wasn’t a certificate, and because I didn’t know, i’ve now got to get all this work done. Otherwise the room will remain freezing cold and unusable, and we would encounter problems when selling.

getmore4less

Surrey_EA wrote: »

That's a seriously poor excuse. They're either lying in the hope you'll go away quickly, or incompetent.

The council could take enforcement action if they really wanted to. They won't, but theoretically could.

Secondly, the existence of a completions certificate provides you with confirmation that the conversion was carried out to a satisfactory standard.

Would the council if asked go a little further than just give the list of work but add that if not completed by a certain date they will consider enforcement.

Surrey_EA

getmore4less wrote: »

Would the council if asked go a little further than just give the list of work but add that if not completed by a certain date they will consider enforcement.

Unless the work that has been carried out is fundamentally unsafe, it is highly unlikely any council is going to take action.

ReadingTim

Rob-123 wrote: »

UPDATE

The council surveyor carried out an inspection on the loft conversion yesterday afternoon. The following is a list of work which needs completing before they will sign it off:

• Fix insulation backed plasterboard (approx 40mm) to existing bedroom ceiling and en-suite ceiling
• Replaster ceilings
• Fix Celotex insulation board (approx 50mm) to back of both eaves storage doors
• Install (approx 300mm) insulation to both eaves storage floors and board this out
• Slide Celotex insulation (approx 50mm) up pitched wall between eaves storage and bedroom, gaining access from eaves
• Insulate wall between eaves storage and bedroom with Celotex (approx 50mm)

My solicitor has received my formal complaint, and phoned me yesterday. She said she can’t understand what the problem is as the council can’t enforce anything now and that is why she didn’t advise us of no certificate during the conveyancing process. I told her that I’ve been told the insulation that is on the approved plans has not been installed and the surveyor has told us this is why it is so cold.

I’ve told them this is now high priority for us as we can’t use the room this time of year because it is so noticeably cold, and that we want it signed off for when we ever sell the house.

So, by happy coincidence, all of remedial works to permit sign-off will have the welcome side effect of retaining heat in the room, given they're all insulation related... seems like a win-win position for you; but if you're hoping that the solicitor will foot the bill for this, you're still very much mistaken.

Dunno how much you paid for conveyancing, but your complaint is unlikely to yield more than a couple of hundred quid in compo. Not sure how many sheets of celotex that'll buy you - somewhere between 4 and 8 I reckon.

Rob-123

ReadingTim wrote: »

So, by happy coincidence, all of remedial works to permit sign-off will have the welcome side effect of retaining heat in the room, given they're all insulation related... seems like a win-win position for you; but if you're hoping that the solicitor will foot the bill for this, you're still very much mistaken.

Dunno how much you paid for conveyancing, but your complaint is unlikely to yield more than a couple of hundred quid in compo. Not sure how many sheets of celotex that'll buy you - somewhere between 4 and 8 I reckon.

Hi ReadingTim

Yes all insulation related! The surveyor had the approved architect plans from 2005 and said the insulation installed is less than is on the plans. So it seems the builders haven’t followed it, not sure whether the previous owners knew about this and therefore didn’t have it inspected for that reason.

You sound like you know alot more about conveyancing than me! So why is it that you say I will have no luck with the solicitor paying more than £200 in compensation?

ReadingTim

Rob-123 wrote: »

You sound like you know alot more about conveyancing than me! So why is it that you say I will have no luck with the solicitor paying more than £200 in compensation?

Well, I arbitrarily reckoned you paid about a grand for the conveyancing, and see from the chain of e-mails that the argument centres around whether you were made fully aware of the implications of a missing piece of documentation. The solicitor knew it was missing, and told you the same thing. They didn't chase for it, you didn't tell them to chase for it, they didn't tell you to tell them to chase for it.

However, given the principle of caveat emptor prevails, and on the basis of the rest of the work being correctly carried out, I guessed a couple of hundred quid as a bit of a recognition that their service could have been a bit better, but not an admission of any sort of liability. It's that or a £50 "goodwill gesture".

Rob-123

ReadingTim, I can see where you’ve gone wrong now. The solicitor did not tell me that it was missing. I’m probably going to bore some people saying it again, but this is what we were told in the Report on Title before we signed the contracts:

‘Our search has revealed a building regulation for a loft conversion, however due to the age of this, the sellers solicitors have not provided a copy.’

As you can see, that is in no way telling us that there isn’t a certificate, or that the vendors have lost a certificate

ReadingTim

Rob-123 wrote: »

ReadingTim, I can see where you’ve gone wrong now. The solicitor did not tell me that it was missing. I’m probably going to bore some people saying it again, but this is what we were told in the Report on Title before we signed the contracts:

‘Our search has revealed a building regulation for a loft conversion, however due to the age of this, the sellers solicitors have not provided a copy.’

As you can see, that is in no way telling us that there isn’t a certificate, or that the vendors have lost a certificate

It is the failure to clarify that question which is the entire point! Your solicitor didn't do that. You didn't ask your solicitor to do that. They didn't think this was an odd response. You took at face value a nonsensical response that you didn't understand and failed to follow through.

Advisers can only advise. The client decides.

cte1111

"The previous owners applied for a final inspection (I assume they paid for this? I don’t know) and it has never been done.

So now it seems even more confusing how in 2016 no-one picked up that they were doing an elec rest on a loft that had been converted..?!

My solicitor however should have still informed me of no final certificate."

A similar issue cropped up when my parents were selling their house - they'd followed all the correct procedures for getting planning permission and building approval when having an extension done, but the final inspection had not been done. My Dad was very organised and even had a receipt for the final inspection but no date had ever been arranged. I rang the council and they looked up their files, and like in your case, agreed that no further payment was needed. Fortunately the eventual inspection was fine and the certificate was given with no remedial work needed.

I guess the point I'm longwindedly making is that this came up as the lack of completion certificate was picked up by the buyers' solicitor (or possibly my parents' solicitor) during the conveyancing. It was then passed on to the sellers (my parents) to deal with the issue, which happily we were able to do with minimal hassle. If not, then I guess it would have led to some renegotiation.

It does sound like you've got ground for action against your conveyancing solicitors. They have insurance for cases like this. The fact that the building work was so long ago that it would be unlikely that an enforcement action would take place is not the point. You as the buyer thought that your solicitor had checked that the building work met regulations.

I bought a house previously where an attic extension had not followed the correct procedures and was given the same explanation that as it was over 10 years old it was not a problem. I understood that that meant that it might not have been correctly reinforced / insulated and that it should not count as a bedroom. I bought the house with that knowledge in mind. We only used it for storage.

I hope you are able to get this sorted. Have you been able to get any quotes yet for the work needed?

Rob-123

Reading Tim - Why would I have needed to clarify this? I am not a solicitor, I have paid the solicitor a lot of money to do their job, one of which is to find out if there are any issues with the house that come up on the searches, be that water and drainage, or local search. They knew there was no certificate, and wrote what I’ve told you, how was I to know that them saying ‘there is a building regulation but the sellers solicitors don’t need to provide a copy’ was actually ‘there is no certificate’?!

cte1111 - many thanks for your comments. You’re right, the point is not that the council can’t enforce us to make the changes on the loft, the point is that we need to make these changes so that it is habitable as they were never done correctly. Like you say, we thought the solicitor had done the necessary checks and would have informed us if they found anything untoward.