Rising Damp Found On RICS Survey

jhorne17

Visited the house i have agreed to buy and offer accepted to measure for blinds etc to find rising damp on 2 walls.
The sale has been signed but no monies exchange or a move date. RICS survey shows damp on the report. Where do i stand?

I have told the solicitors to hold the sale as i want it inspecting, i've been told if i pull out at this point i loose the £600+ i've spent and will also have to pay a cancelling fee.

Thanks
Joe

need_an_answer

You need to weigh up the cost of rectifying the damp against the cost of pulling out of the sale..

You will need to pay your solicitor for their work thus far plus as you say any cancellation fee as per their terms and conditions.

When you say the sale has been signed what do you mean?

Presumably you have signed the contract but it has yet to be exchanged with the buyers solicitor...yes technically you can still pull out before exchange but its best to check whats involved with the damp situation before you jump to any decisions you may regret later

A solicitor should be happy for you to hold whilst you gather further information,however be mindful how long you keep everyone holding especially if you are part of a chain.

Doozergirl

Rising damp is incredibly rare.

You need to look at what is actually there and read a few of the threads regarding damp on this board.

Most cases are a bit of botched or lapsed maintenance and very simply and cheaply dealt with by removing the source of the issue - usually the DPC being breached by something outside. You almost certainly don't need an injected DPC or expensive waterproof plaster and the fix is likely to cost less than the £600 you've already spent.

babyblade41

As Doozergirl says ..I don't by rising damp.. and again in most cases it's finding the source.

The house I bought in January was a wreck.. damp everywhere .. found most of the sources apart from. one, but now located that as well.

Easy cheap fixes , a surveyor would have gone nuts .. I could have repapered the whole house with their report

Don't be too alarmed and walk away from a sale before investigating, it should be relatively easy and ask the surveyor

csgohan4

babyblade41 wrote: »

As Doozergirl says ..I don't by rising damp.. and again in most cases it's finding the source.

The house I bought in January was a wreck.. damp everywhere .. found most of the sources apart from. one, but now located that as well.

Easy cheap fixes , a surveyor would have gone nuts .. I could have repapered the whole house with their report

Don't be too alarmed and walk away from a sale before investigating, it should be relatively easy and ask the surveyor

what were the causes of your damp?

babyblade41

csgohan4 wrote: »

what were the causes of your damp?

Found all the easy ones fairly quickly

The one which I couldn't find believe it not was an aerial cable going into the wall externally ,,

The thing was everything else around could have caused it and possibly contributed like broken guttering etc but took ages to figure it out . I think I was damp blind and should have realised earlier

Constantly looked at the offending wire and thought "no" that won't cause so much damage .. but it did

spannerzone

Often it's poor ventilation / lack of extraction in bathrooms and kitchens.... my old house had mild damp walls, installing a positive input venitlation fan in my loft solved my (and many other people's) problems.

Many professionals don't really believe rising damp exists, it's often damp coming in due to poor maintenance, ventilation etc. < link >

The people that really believe in it are the professionals that happen to sell a solution to the problem!

A damp cellar might be something of concern though.

Slithery

babyblade41 wrote: »

The one which I couldn't find believe it not was an aerial cable going into the wall externally.

And that is why you should always put a small downwards U on a cable that runs vertically from above before feeding it into an external wall

babyblade41

Slithery wrote: »

And that is why you should always put a small downwards U on a cable that runs vertically from above before feeding it into an external wall

Exactly.. but as we don't use aerials I took it out and chopped it up... bloody aerials are a Bain