Misled by EA and Vendor re Cavity Walls - renegotiate offer?

FreeBear

notrouble said: Which would you prefer? Solid walls? Insulated cavity walls (with all the inherant potential structural problems)? Or uninsulated cavity walls (potentially colder)?

Insulated solid walls, unless done "right", can be a source of serious problems. If EWI, great care and attention must be paid to the details around window reveals & roof junction. Internal insulation, an air gap should be left, and again, attention to window reveals, and both floor & ceiling junctions is required.

How to determine if the walls are solid brick - Look at the pattern of bricks externally. there should be a series of headers & stretchers (fancy way of saying bricks laid at 90°). Measure the depth of the window reveals inside - A solid double brick wall will be around 150mm to the window frame (overall, 230mm total wall thickness). The age of the property can also give an indicator to the wall type.

As for the EPC being an indicator, there is a house a few doors down. Built in the late 1920s using local brick. the EPC claims it is "timber framed with single skin brick facing"...

Nope. Cavity wall on the lower half, solid brick (double thickness) on the upper half.

eddddy

Peggster1979 said:

My question is if the survey confirms it is a solid wall construction how strong are our grounds to renegotiate price?

You can use any grounds you like for attempting to renegotiate the price.  It's entirely up to the mindset of the seller whether they will get involved in renegotiation.

Since you specifically asked about this before making an offer, and the seller would have given incorrect information - the seller might (or might not) feel a bit embarrassed, so might be a bit more flexible because of that.

For future reference, if the brickwork is visible, the bond can often indicate the type of wall:

• Stretcher bond usually indicates a cavity wall
• Flemish bond usually indicates a solid wall
• English bond usually indicates a solid wall

If the brickwork isn't visible (e.g. it's rendered) , you can try measuring the thickness of a wall at a doorway or window openning. If the wall is over 260mm thick, it's likely to be a cavity wall.

Doozergirl

My opinion is that the vendor is going to find it antagonistic. In 15 years on this forum I have never come across someone that thought it was a particular issue.  

I'm keen to see houses insulated, but £10k of work on insulation is not going to save £10k in bills in any reasonable timeframe.   A lot of the housing stock in this country is uninsulated solid wall. 

If you can't tell by looking at the house, then I don't see why you expect the vendor or the estate agent to know.  It's obvious to those who do and evidently not to those that don't.  

The prime area of heat loss is the roof, that's where you'll see payback.  Insulating the walls internally is something I'd do if the plaster needed to come off already, not because of a whim.  I'd certainly not entertain a price reduction for it being a perfectly normal British house.  

Peggster1979

Doozergirl said:

If you can't tell by looking at the house, then I don't see why you expect the vendor or the estate agent to know.  It's obvious to those who do and evidently not to those that don't.  

We are complete novices at building construction but what I couldn't understand was why the EPC was stating it would cost £14k to insulate the walls and a quick google search shows Cavity wall insulation is about £1k.  Also, a  google search shows how to identify solid walls.  I would expect an experienced EA to know this and surely the vendors would know?  They had the property re-plastered when they moved in 20 years ago so I wondered why they wouldn't have considered some sort of insulation then.

I guess I'm not put off by solid walls I'm wondering if there is an opportunity to renegotiate our offer based on being given the wrong information but at the same time grateful to receive opinion on whether or not this could be perceived as petty.

stuart45

The bonding of the brickwork will often tell you whether it's cavity or solid, but I've worked on houses which have Flemish bond showing formed from snapped headers and are cavity walls, and Stretcher bond showing which are solid walls(although some surveyors seem to think these are finger cavity walls)

pinkteapot

Just ask. Worst that happens if they say no is you buy it at the original price. They’re not going to refuse to deal with you anymore.

Doozergirl

You're being petty.  You have no contract, so you can try to renegotiate if you like for any reason you like but they equally can refuse that.  People don't wilfully lie about cavity vs solid wall construction because most people don't care.  Even older houses only have a tiny cavity that won't insulate well.   If you desperately want a well insulated house, you need a new one or one that has been recently retrofitted.  

If the walls were re-plastered 20 years ago then you're needlessly touching them now.  It will take decades to payback against the bills and that isn't reasonable for the vendor to pay for.   It's an upgrade, not something expected on a (Victorian?) house. 

We're self building our own heavily insulated house at considerable cost, so I'm more passionate about these things than most, but we currently live in a house with uninsulated cavities and it's fine - much improved since we insulated the loft but it isn't a new house and I don't expect it to be.  

Cavity insulation comes with its own risks - damp - google it - and I have never felt compelled to put it in this house as a result, although I have put internal insulation into dozens of houses when they've *needed* re-plastering already.  

There is payback period on these things.  If it was good for internal insulation then people
would be doing it all the time.  They're not.  

No one was thinking about insulation 20 years ago.  It's only been about 20 years since they started putting it in new builds! 

McKneff

If you tried to renegotiate 10k off with me, i would just be telling you to jog on and put
My property back on the market.

Simple as that

comeandgo

The price the property was set at would reflect the condition and build of the walls.  I would also suggest you walk on if you came back with a lower offer, what other price reductions would you try for.  

bouicca21

Peggster1979 said:

I would expect an experienced EA to know this and surely the vendors would know?

I had a bit of a smile when I read this.  The only EA that I know is basically a hustler, pardon, salesman.  I doubt he knows anything at all about construction, since his previous experience was centred on selling flat pack furniture.