Selling house - subsidence & pinned and Home buyers survey

redman1989

Hi All,

Any advice would be great - we are about to sell our house (first time we've ever sold) and it's an old Semi detached house on a very steep road.

About 10 years ago we bought the house and noticed it did have hair line cracks but wasn't too fussed. a year or so later we decided to get a survey on the property which noted Slight subsidence as we have a great insurance we got the house pinned immediately.

Since then nothing else has occurred in terms to cracks, we have re-plastered 2 rooms and no further hairline cracks have appeared. Although my concern in the rooms we have not plastered they are still present and are very old (about 1mm thick) I did polyfiller over these but you can see where i had done so.

My worry is the buyer wants to do a home buyers survey which is fine but i was wondering what should i show the person doing the survey? I have documents from when the pinning was done? I don't want him note issues that have already been rectified.

Thanks,

Bossypants

You won't need to show the surveyor anything. The surveyor will make a note of what they see and highlight it to the buyers (and/or lender), who will likely ask you to provide whatever information you have on it. There's also a possibility that the lender might require a structural engineer's report, the cost of which the buyers may try to pass onto you.

There are too many variables here to really make a sensible comment, basically you need to let the surveyor come and do what they need to do, then deal with any queries/concerns the buyers might have as a result.

eddddy

redman1989 wrote: »

...we got the house pinned immediately.

Do you mean underpinned?


You'll have to fill in a TA6 property info form, which asks:

Has the seller made any buildings insurance claims?
Please give details:

Also, if it was underpinned, it would have need building regs approval - so the buyer's solicitor's searches will find that.

And a competent surveyor may well spot signs of structural repairs and underpinning.


TBH, I think a prospective buyer might be quite angry if they paid legal fees and survey fees - and later found out that you hadn't mentioned the underpinning.

Ask your EA's opinion about the best time to mention the underpinning. (Maybe if somebody starts to sound very interested in the property.)


(And hopefully you haven't changed insurer and 'forgotten' to mention the underpinning to them.)

Tom99

You will have to declare the insurance claim on the TA6 form so I would provide as much detail as you can about the claim, copies of all the reports you will have had done at the time, the building work specification, the completion certificate and any guaranteed on the work.

I sold a house which had a subsidence claim and I made sure the prospective purchasers had all of the above information before any offer was accepted, that way you don't run with a purchaser for 8 weeks only to have them pull out because you were not upfront.

redman1989

Sorry i meant underpinning!

We have accepted an cash offer on the property which was lower than asking they viewed it once and not once did they ask about anything that would have led me to talk about the underpinning, it just didn't come up in the conversation, it's nothing i would willingly hide as if anything due to the age & location of the house it would have been something i would have mentioned as reassurance to the cracks.

We have not changed insurer and with the same, with the "forgotten" it was the second viewing we had if you think i intentionally didn't mention anything, it was 10 years ago and something i had completely forgotten about, I responded to questions that had been asked as they were more focused on the area and what cosmetic things had been done to the property.

Everything will be declared on solicitors forms, but I personally wouldn't be angry if we bought a property and a question that I didn't ask wasn't divulged.

i'll ring the EA now and ask them to pass it on.

Slinky

Mention it early so the purchasers can factor this into their thoughts. I laid it on thick with the EA that we have no Corgi installation certificate for the boiler and that we have a build-over agreement with the water company where a foul sewer runs near the corner of our extension, in case they would be put off by such things. By being up front it makes you a more credible seller.


ETA our onward purchase the surveyor found out about the underpinning of our new house by talking to the neighbours.

Seanymph

Ours has historical subsidence. I think it was on one of the forms when we bought it.

It wasn't even that sort of movement, it was the original concrete flooring which broke up somehow and they raised the floors in some parts of the building - ropey insurance job - but it's insured, no problems, and I have all the certificates from back in 1980 or something that got passed to us.

The estate agent said not to worry about it - mention it if we are asked about the steps as you go through the property, but otherwise it's not really relevant.

I'm not sure to be honest, it didn't both us in the slightest (I had a pile of bricks once that was falling into a canal and had all sorts of work!) - so this is a nothing, but I do wonder if it will put others off.

It's that balance - I don't want to make something a problem that isn't by announcing it and I don't want to find it becomes a problem late int he process........

redman1989

was the underpinning of your new purchase an issue for you?

Same for me Seany - I i'm in two minds, i'm going to declare everything honestly on the forums with the solicitors but i don't want to start kicking up a fuss if it may not be a fuss down the line, i mean it's a solution to the issue that occurred as it's not TOO old you would expect that the quality of work would be of a decent standard and lasting also.

The Estate Agent said similar, mention if if/when we are asked,

Slinky

Older underpinned subsidence can be less of an issue than newer, certainly in terms of getting insurance. Ours occured 27 years before the purchase, a lot of insurance companies decline to quote where the underpinning is less than 25 years ago.

Tom99

redman1989 wrote: »

The Estate Agent said similar, mention if if/when we are asked,

Since it is bound to come out into the open when you complete the TA6 form why hide it from potential purchasers?
Some purchasers may take it in their stride but others will be immediately put off and pull out with you both wasting weeks of time. Your house then has to go back on the market and will appear stale.

CARRYONFILM12

Never got my head around the difference between settlement and subsidence.