Buyers solicitors refusing indemnity policy

delirious

Section62 said:

delirious said:

I explained that my understanding is that with it being the original back wall of the house, it will be an invasive inspection involving removing the plaster where the steel work is, checking the brick work supporting the ends of the steel work, and that will then need replastering, re decorating and will involve quite a bit of money and will not necessarily be a quick process. 

Break the situation down into parts.

Exposing the steelwork doesn't take long, and quicker if you can DIY it.

The inspection is quick, once you've got an inspector with availability.

Making good takes longer, but isn't necessarily on the 'critical path' to completion.


Agreeing who pays for what will be the hard part, but one option to meet the buyer part way would be suggesting that the responsibility for making good will be theirs to do after completion. You'll be stuffed if the buyers pull out after the inspection, but if not you'll be transferring the cost of making good to them, and removing that part of the work as a source of delay to this transaction.

If that doesn't work, then as you suggested in an earlier post, you aren't in a tearing hurry to sell. So get the making good done along with replacement doors, then remarket at the higher value you anticipate, and with a property free from BR irregularities.

If you are a gambling person and considering the 'call their bluff' advice, then why not consider a gamble on a higher sale price possibly leaving you up after deducting the cost of the works?

Thanks for that, a really useful way to look at it. As it goes I’ve emailed a couple of people to get ideas of costs and timescales to have the work opened up and then re-finished after inspection, and have also sent an anonymous email to the councils building control dept asking them for idea of timescale. 

Doozergirl said:

If you use an 'approved inspector', you can have it sorted in a matter of days.  

I'm not actually convinced that local
authority would take that long, but an approved inspector definitely wouldn't.  

I spoke to an approved inspector today and they advised that because the work had already been completed, it would be the council that would have to do the building regs inspection as only the council can issue the regularisation certificate

delirious

UPDATE

Buyers phoned estate agents this morning and said if we don't get building regs they are pulling out.

I spoke to building regs on the phone this morning and they have advised that it's not as simple as getting the opening checked, but in fact we will need to make the entire conservatory conform to building regs. So, they will want to check the foundations to make sure they're sufficient for the solid roof, the want thermal calculations for the kitchen and conservatory, they want a heat detector installed in the kitchen that links to a fire alarm (though our smoke detectors are battery powered??) and they will need us to cut a hole in the plaster where the steelwork is to measure the steel.

So I got the distinct feeling of opening a can of worms if we go ahead with the buyers wishes. Seriously tempted to just tell them to pull out if that's what they want to do.

delirious

Having spoken to my wife, we’ve decided we cannot fulfill the buyers request. We cannot afford the expense of making a conservatory conform to building regs and our solicitor has said the buyers solicitor will still want building regs even if we put upvc doors in, so we e have told the estate agents to let the buyers walk. 

If they want to spend an extra £50k to get a similar house in our area then that’s up to them and I genuinely wish them luck.

Now we just need to decide whether to investigate doing the work but in our own time before putting the house back on the market, or try for another sale first in the hope that the next solicitor will accept an indemnity policy. 

Doozergirl

As soon as you put doors in, the conservatory does not need to conform.  Only the support opening that you made and the doors you put in.  

The first post I made on this thread was about this very issue.   You have turned the conservatory into an extension simply via the fact that there are not external quality doors in place.  With doors, it remains an outbuilding and exempt from building control.  

Like our buyers last year, they lost two sales, both a long way down the line because the conservatory did not conform as an extension.  Put the doors back in, it does not need to conform.   They've just successfully sold with doors in place to the third buyers, but it extended the process by several months when I'd told them what they needed to do before Christmas.   

lookstraightahead

delirious said:

Having spoken to my wife, we’ve decided we cannot fulfill the buyers request. We cannot afford the expense of making a conservatory conform to building regs and our solicitor has said the buyers solicitor will still want building regs even if we put upvc doors in, so we e have told the estate agents to let the buyers walk. 

If they want to spend an extra £50k to get a similar house in our area then that’s up to them and I genuinely wish them luck.

Now we just need to decide whether to investigate doing the work but in our own time before putting the house back on the market, or try for another sale first in the hope that the next solicitor will accept an indemnity policy. 

Aren't indemnity policies useless?

Definitely sort your house out before putting it back on the market, especially if you are going to rely on an indemnity policy.

saajan_12

Would the build have passed BR at the time? The buyer was expecting to buy a (partly) 7year old property, which met 7 year old standards.. that comes with 
a) lower chance of physical damage and injury vs a property built with typical 2014 materials but meeting lower standards
b) lower chance of resulting costs and hassle to remediate the building
c) lower chance of resulting damage to contents
d) lower chance of resulting injury
e) enforcement costs for lack of BR certificate

The indemnity only covers (e) ie if it is actually enforced, but that is unlikely anyway. It doesn't address the costs if the building is actually more unsafe than the buyers bargained for (ie a-d). So depending on how far it actually was from BR standards at the time, its not necessarily unreasonable to demand remediation. 

Whether you do it is a matter of negotiation - seems you don't want to, so if the buyers don't give in, you go your separate ways and start again. 

delirious

saajan_12 said:

Would the build have passed BR at the time? The buyer was expecting to buy a (partly) 7year old property, which met 7 year old standards.. that comes with 
a) lower chance of physical damage and injury vs a property built with typical 2014 materials but meeting lower standards
b) lower chance of resulting costs and hassle to remediate the building
c) lower chance of resulting damage to contents
d) lower chance of resulting injury
e) enforcement costs for lack of BR certificate

The indemnity only covers (e) ie if it is actually enforced, but that is unlikely anyway. It doesn't address the costs if the building is actually more unsafe than the buyers bargained for (ie a-d). So depending on how far it actually was from BR standards at the time, its not necessarily unreasonable to demand remediation. 

Whether you do it is a matter of negotiation - seems you don't want to, so if the buyers don't give in, you go your separate ways and start again. 

Thanks for your comment. 

As has been said already, the timeframe for any risk of enforcement for the lack of building regulations has long passed, so the concern the buyer will have is the risk that the works were not done safely. However, the works have not failed in the slightest in the past 7 years and there has been not a single mm of movement in either the wall above the opening or the plaster around it. 

That being said, I can understand a buyer being concerned but they've not even instructed a structural survey which, in my opinion, should alleviate concerns.

However, they did actually pull out of the purchase on Friday so we are now considering our options before deciding to re-list the house.

lookstraightahead

They would have needed a structural engineers report, not a structural survey.

ive only skimmed through. We've just bought an old house, andour vendors paid for a structural engineers report prior to putting it on the market. They gave us this for info, which we passed to our structural surveyor when he surveyed the property. Might be something to consider.

delirious

lookstraightahead said:

They would have needed a structural engineers report, not a structural survey.

ive only skimmed through. We've just bought an old house, andour vendors paid for a structural engineers report prior to putting it on the market. They gave us this for info, which we passed to our structural surveyor when he surveyed the property. Might be something to consider.

A structural engineers report is usually provided at the end of a structural survey as far as I'm aware.

lookstraightahead

delirious said:

lookstraightahead said:

They would have needed a structural engineers report, not a structural survey.

ive only skimmed through. We've just bought an old house, andour vendors paid for a structural engineers report prior to putting it on the market. They gave us this for info, which we passed to our structural surveyor when he surveyed the property. Might be something to consider.

A structural engineers report is usually provided at the end of a structural survey as far as I'm aware.

Yep that would be logical if the surveyor suggests an engineer - but if the vendor knows the surveyor will pick up on things, it's useful to have to pre-empt some obvious concerns.