Road and sewers unadopted and no management company, should I walk away?

lilsweetie

The house we have been looking into purchasing has come back as unadopted road and unadopted sewers. Spoken to council who say roads themselves are built to adoptable standards but they can’t adopt until the sewers are adopted and that the developer never entered into a section 38 agreement. water company won’t speak to me about it until an adoption agreement has been signed, house is over 8 years old now, vendor didn’t even know roads and sewers are not adopted and has never paid or been asked to pay maintenance charges. Awaiting response from their solicitor to enquiries about this but they are dragging their feet.

Wondering if I should cut my losses now, I don’t see any other answer returning apart from they are not adopted and will be in ‘the future’ I rang the developers myselves and they kind of said this to get me off the phone.

G_M

so no water or sewerage charges?


Sounds ideal!

lilsweetie

I’m sorry?? Why would there be no water or sewage charges?

G_M

"vendor didn’t even know roads and sewers are not adopted and has never paid or been asked to pay maintenance charges."

davidmcn

G_M wrote: »

"vendor didn’t even know roads and sewers are not adopted and has never paid or been asked to pay maintenance charges."

I don't think the fact that the local bit of the sewer is unadopted makes a difference to your water charges. You're paying the same amount if your sewage ends up being treated by the water company.

lilsweetie

Yes it doesn’t make a difference to water bills but I think G M already knew this and just fancied giving a sarcastic response. It’s such a shame this forum is supposed to help when people like myself, first time buyers, need help yet all that seems to come back is silly replies 90% of the time. I came on here for some advice regarding unadopted roads and sewers and would be grateful if anyone has any experience in having this problem in their purchase.

ethank

Have you approached the original developer?

Splatfoot

We lived in a private unadopted road with sewers not owned by the water company. We used to pay our charges to a solicitor. If the sewers aren't yet owned by the water company, how do they charge you? It was a few years ago now so I can't remember all the details but it didn't cause us any problems.

lilsweetie

Yes, they said they just hadn’t got round to it etc but it would be adopted at some point, I think as I wasn’t buying a new property of theirs they weren’t too interested in helping me.

lilsweetie

Thank you splatfoot very helpful, was it maintenance charges you paid to a solicitor I take it? I’m thinking of popping a note through the door of the last house to sell on that road and ask if they know anything as when I asked the lady who’s moved out of the house she looked at me blankly and said she never had a clue about them being unadopted. She’s now moved into a new build, I’m buying her house that she part ex’d for the new build.

[Deleted User]

If you are getting a mortgage the decision may be taken out of your hands. I have just had one of these where the lender capped LTV at 75% for unadopted roads where there is no management company. I did manage to re-place the case but you may end up buying something that is harder to mortgage. If it is harder to mortgage that will have an impact on its value.

Have you checked with your lender that they are happy to lend in these circumstances? The solicitor would generally be the one to report this to the lender