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

Doozergirl

Surrey_EA wrote: »

I would expect a solicitor to be highlighting which elements within the property did not have the required paperwork, and pointing out what the implications were.

Most buyers go through the house buying process so infrequently that most don't know what they're looking for in the paperwork sent by their solicitor.

Absolutely. They suggest that paperwork exists but that the vendor didn’t have a copy, but if they were actually saying that there was nothing (which not what I read), then anyone who visits this board with any regularity still knows what the implications are.

They needed to be able to reconsider if the loft conversion was fit and to have opportunity to speak to their surveyor again or make further investigation.

They may well have decided to continue anyway, but if they needed a mortgage, this purchase at the least needed a BCA certificate or an indemnity policy.

If buying without a mortgage, they needed to understand the implications for the next purchaser.

It is negligent not to do so. I do think that they somehow thought that the search had revealed BCA though. Maybe it did!?

Doozergirl

AdrianC, no disrespect, I can see it’s well meaning but you don’t half talk out of your backside sometimes.

Doozergirl

Do you have a mortgage, OP?

Rob-123

Doozergirl- that is how I took that statement. I’m not building and law savvy, I didn’t know all about planning permission/building certificates and what they all are exactly, that if something isn’t signed off you can’t call it a bedroom. I read the documents and it seemed my solicitor didn’t raise any concerns, that it sounded like documents were there but not needed to be provided. I took the statement that the documents were there, but my solicitor knew the age of the certificate was over a certain amount of years and didn’t need to see it. Whether that was niave I don’t know.

Not that it is relevant bobobski but it was £1200 on the purchase and £800 on the sale, roughly.

AdrianC - I have to say the way the way the solicitor was saying they needed a copy of the survey, I though part of the survey they would have to adhere to, and the fact it was under the title ‘issues for your solicitor’.

I have spoken to another solicitor today and provided them with all my documents, and they have said I don’t have any copies of the searches. I have report on title, correspondence etc, but I have no searches I was ever given, as I am not a conveyancer I didn’t even know I needed copies of these.

AdrianC

Doozergirl wrote: »

...but if they needed a mortgage, this purchase at the least needed a BCA certificate or an indemnity policy.

Did it? The lender don't seem to have insisted on this.

B'sides, all an indemnity would do is say "We'll pay for the costs of any enforcement action" - which isn't going to happen anyway. What would that add to the OP's situation?

Rob-123

Yes doozergirl, we have a mortgage

Surrey_EA

AdrianC wrote: »

Did it? The lender don't seem to have insisted on this.

B'sides, all an indemnity would do is say "We'll pay for the costs of any enforcement action" - which isn't going to happen anyway. What would that add to the OP's situation?

Because the solicitor has messed up. The solicitor will also have acted on behalf of the mortgage lender, and therefore has not only failed in their duties to fully advise the OP correctly, it would seem to me they have not also completed their responsibilities on behalf of the lender, as laid down by the Council of Mortgage Lenders.

The mortgage lender obviously doesn't visit the property, they send a surveyor to carry out a valuation to assess the lending security. The surveyor has highlighted where the property has been altered and asked the solicitor to verify the correct permissions and documentation is in place for these alterations, and it would appear they have not done so effectively.

Doozergirl

Rob-123 wrote: »

Yes doozergirl, we have a mortgage

Then your solicitor has failed in their duty of care to the lender. If there is no indemnity policy then it is black and white; by failing in that duty, they are negligent.

(Crossed with SurreyEA who explains better)

Doozergirl

AdrianC wrote: »

Did it? The lender don't seem to have insisted on this.

B'sides, all an indemnity would do is say "We'll pay for the costs of any enforcement action" - which isn't going to happen anyway. What would that add to the OP's situation?

a) The solicitor acts for the mortgage lender and has therefore been negligent.
b) How many times do you have to be told that this isn’t true? I’ve said it enough times to rebuff that on many previous posts and it has been picked up in this thread already. There is no limit to potential enforcement action, regardless of the actual chance of it occuring.

Also:

They would not have to meet the current regulations, it could be regularised or the council may simply say that they aren’t interested and will not enforce.

Those sweeping changes to the regulations on thermal efficiency that you talk about apply mostly to new buildings and also the entire house. Only a tiny part applies to loft conversions. The actual required insulation from the beginning of the century to now in a loft conversion amounts to an improvement in uValue of 0.02; an additional 10mm of solid insulation. We were certainly putting in enough to satisfy both updates anyway before updates. Nobody is going to trip over themselves over 10mm.

Rob-123

I guess my question now is, where do I go from here?