Indemnity policy over public sewer - conservatory

JonMitchell

andy444 said:

It's only really an issue if the extension is built over an existing manhole cover as the utility company will legitimately say that the extension is blocking ready access to the length of pipe. But as you say that the manhole is next to the conservatory then that's no problem. The chances of any extension having to be removed is miniscule.

What about in the case of a burst/cracked public sewer pipe, though maybe remote. It would still be an issue for buildover isn’t it?

andy444

There is a tiny chance that that might happen but there is also a chance that a vehicle could drive into a house but you wouldn't put concrete bollards in front of a house to prevent that happening as you know the chances of that occurance are so remote. 

If you're interested in 'rectifying' the problem you could look into diverting the path of the pipe around the conservatory if space and topography allows. I personally don't think it's a significant issue.

TheJP

I sold my last house that had this 'issue' which isn't really an issue. I didn't even have to pay for indemnity as the buyer was happy that the pipes were protected and the likely case of something happening was minimum. Indemnity will protect any cost that may happen and the utility company are very unlikely to tear down the conservatory.

What does your daughter think? As a parent its easy to get very involved and almost ruin the experience of buying a house for your daughter. I had this experience with my ex's parents. They criticised every little thing.

Doozergirl

JonMitchell said:

andy444 said:

It's only really an issue if the extension is built over an existing manhole cover as the utility company will legitimately say that the extension is blocking ready access to the length of pipe. But as you say that the manhole is next to the conservatory then that's no problem. The chances of any extension having to be removed is miniscule.

What about in the case of a burst/cracked public sewer pipe, though maybe remote. It would still be an issue for buildover isn’t it?

We've told you to get a CCTV survey.   You can actually look into the pipe!  

JonMitchell

Doozergirl said:

JonMitchell said:

andy444 said:

It's only really an issue if the extension is built over an existing manhole cover as the utility company will legitimately say that the extension is blocking ready access to the length of pipe. But as you say that the manhole is next to the conservatory then that's no problem. The chances of any extension having to be removed is miniscule.

What about in the case of a burst/cracked public sewer pipe, though maybe remote. It would still be an issue for buildover isn’t it?

We've told you to get a CCTV survey.   You can actually look into the pipe!  

As mentioned, my daughter is waiting to hear back from few survey co about carrying out the survey. I agree you can look into the pipe and its condition, but guess no one will know when the pipes will ever burst...just being paranoid

Section62

andy444 said:

There is a tiny chance that that might happen but there is also a chance that a vehicle could drive into a house but you wouldn't put concrete bollards in front of a house to prevent that happening as you know the chances of that occurance are so remote. 

There's a difference here.  If you have home insurance and a vehicle drives into it then the insurance will pay to restore your home to how it was previously.  You don't need to install bollards (which usually wouldn't work anyway) because the risk can be mitigated in other ways. E.g. by paying a relatively small amount of money to be protected against the risk.  Most people would consider it prudent to have home insurance to cover other (greater) risks, so effectively the vehicle/house/crash is insured against at no net cost.

With the built-over sewer issue the risk is different.  The primary 'event' has already happened in terms of the sewer being built over.  The insurance is protection against the potential consequences of that situation which already exists - and specifically the impact that situation might have on the homeowners finances.

The constraints in this case are the coverage of the policy - E.g. whether it will compensate you for the loss of value and amenity of the property if (in worst case) the water company require demolition of the building and you cannot reprovide that space within your boundaries.

In some cases the impact will be purely financial (loss of value of the property), but in other cases it could affect the viability of living in that property.  E.g. if you need a 3-bed house and the 3rd bedroom was in the demolished extension, then living in the property going forward may not be feasible.

A car crashing into your (insured) home will not permanently reduce the number of (bed)rooms you have.

The build over issue is all about risks, and limitations on what you can do with the property going forward, within the constraints imposed by the terms of any indemnity policy.

Fortunately the risks can be assessed relatively easily - a CCTV drainage survey can give a very good guide to to probability of blockage or collapse.  It is quite easy to see whether there is good access to the sewer if it needs to be worked on.

And that is the principal difference - there is no similar technique available to determine whether the guy who will be driving past your house at 11:42pm on June 6th next year will have spent the last 10 hours in the pub and could barely walk, let alone safely guide his car past your house. (other reasons for crashing into houses are available)

Doozergirl

JonMitchell said:

Doozergirl said:

JonMitchell said:

andy444 said:

It's only really an issue if the extension is built over an existing manhole cover as the utility company will legitimately say that the extension is blocking ready access to the length of pipe. But as you say that the manhole is next to the conservatory then that's no problem. The chances of any extension having to be removed is miniscule.

What about in the case of a burst/cracked public sewer pipe, though maybe remote. It would still be an issue for buildover isn’t it?

We've told you to get a CCTV survey.   You can actually look into the pipe!  

As mentioned, my daughter is waiting to hear back from few survey co about carrying out the survey. I agree you can look into the pipe and its condition, but guess no one will know when the pipes will ever burst...just being paranoid

Well, yes, because all house have drains and really, they're all at risk.   Having a build over agreement means taking CCTV footage of the affected pipe, before and after.  

There are so many things to go wrong in a house.  They can and they do, and you can't know what it will be much of the time.  

It has a conservatory - a building that probably has inadequate footings and isn't built to building regs anyway.  It's an old
house - that wasn't built with building regs either and now it's a century old to boot.    If we worried that much about everything we'd not leave bed, let alone buy a house.    You can only check so much.  

Section62

TheJP said:

I sold my last house that had this 'issue' which isn't really an issue.

It is an "issue", and you are misleading other forum members by suggesting otherwise.

It is however an issue in which the probability serious outcomes is relatively low, and the risk can be largely mitigated against if people take it seriously, make the appropriate enquiries, and put in place an indemnity policy to deal with the unavoidable risk.

TheJP said:

I didn't even have to pay for indemnity as the buyer was happy that the pipes were protected and the likely case of something happening was minimum.

Your buyer was not very wise.  By not getting you to pay a trivial sum of money they have exposed themselves to unnecessary risk.

TheJP said:

Indemnity will protect any cost that may happen and the utility company are very unlikely to tear down the conservatory.

Indemnity policies vary, and don't necessarily cover all risks.  Some outcomes cannot be insured against. (see my previous post)

From personal experience I would place the risk of a water company requiring an existing building to modified or demolished to be around two to three cases per annum in an area with a population of 200k.  Given not all properties within that area have public sewers within their boundaries, I would say that is a non-trivial risk.

TheJP

Section62 said:

TheJP said:

I sold my last house that had this 'issue' which isn't really an issue.

It is an "issue", and you are misleading other forum members by suggesting otherwise.

It is however an issue in which the probability serious outcomes is relatively low, and the risk can be largely mitigated against if people take it seriously, make the appropriate enquiries, and put in place an indemnity policy to deal with the unavoidable risk.

TheJP said:

I didn't even have to pay for indemnity as the buyer was happy that the pipes were protected and the likely case of something happening was minimum.

Your buyer was not very wise.  By not getting you to pay a trivial sum of money they have exposed themselves to unnecessary risk.

TheJP said:

Indemnity will protect any cost that may happen and the utility company are very unlikely to tear down the conservatory.

Indemnity policies vary, and don't necessarily cover all risks.  Some outcomes cannot be insured against. (see my previous post)

From personal experience I would place the risk of a water company requiring an existing building to modified or demolished to be around two to three cases per annum in an area with a population of 200k.  Given not all properties within that area have public sewers within their boundaries, I would say that is a non-trivial risk.

It wasn't an issue for me nor was it an issue for my buyer, im not misleading anyone just purely sharing my experience.

The risk is up to the buyer and in my case the due diligence they carried out was satisfactory.

Depends on what level of indemnity the buyer wants from the seller.

With everything there is always a degree of risk, i have only heard of one experience where a water company had to access a pipe that was built over with no agreement, the company did all they could to minimise disruption and covered the cost. Appreciate not all scenarios will play that way.

Section62

JonMitchell said:

As mentioned, my daughter is waiting to hear back from few survey co about carrying out the survey. I agree you can look into the pipe and its condition, but guess no one will know when the pipes will ever burst...just being paranoid

Wait for the drainage survey to be done. Have a look at the video and report and get a feeling for how many defects there are, and importantly what kind of pipe it is.  The surveyors may make recommendations for repair work - they usually err on the side of caution because even if they don't do repair work themselves they will put you in touch with a 'mate' who can.

As the property is end of terrace there's a good chance the property is either at the start of a run (in which case it might not be a public sewer after all), or at the end of a run where the sewer 'turns' to run out to a main sewer in the street.

If end terrace means you have good access from the street on at least one side of the property then in the event repairs are needed then it would be less of an issue compared to if the property was mid-terrace.

The building being a conservatory means it is non-essential space, and is relatively easy to dismantle (and possibly re-erect)

TL;DR -  don't worry about it until you have the results of the survey. Then only worry if the pipe is clearly defective.