Am I being an idiot?

movilogo

No one can advise you on this situation. We don't know your love for the property and appetite for risk. Only you can answer this. 
If you don't buy, consider how long it would take to find a property you like. 

Stormchild414

Oooo markin. They had just made me feel better and you put my concerns front and centre again
i guess I will have to delay what I want to do and do the things I have to do.  

SavingPennies_2

Stormchild414 said:

Oooo markin. They had just made me feel better and you put my concerns front and centre again
i guess I will have to delay what I want to do and do the things I have to do.  

Exactly - you mentioned you have already factored costs in, so if the costs you have factored in are for new carpets (for example) this money should be reserved for essential stuff. Of course ideally you want to have money for both your "needs" and "wants", but at the very least you need a reserve fund for the "needs" when purchasing a house, and there will almost always be some of them that crop up, especially with an old house.

TheJP

eddddy said:

Stormchild414 said:

The owner won’t have the issues checked nor let me organise at my expense as may delay sale.

That's the bit that sounds a bit worrying - as long as what you've been asking for is reasonable. Is the owner trying to hide something?

To avoid a protracted discussion about all this stuff, if you want, you can start by phoning round to find appropriate tradespeople who would do a boiler inspection, wood burner inspection, and electrical safety check - then just phone the EA and say you need to agree dates for each of them to visit. 

It would be interesting to know at what stage the sale is. The seller may be thinking this is a tactic late in the sale to get a reduction. Surveys would usually be done at the start/mid point of the sale, however if they are ready to exchange and all of a sudden requests for additional surveys would make any seller a little dubious of the intentions.

@edddy advice is sound, however based on the age of the house and the work you want to do you'll probably be best re-wiring the house anyway and you could have the boiler serviced. Again as someone else asked, did you check if the boiler works? The house i bought last year had a boiler that was 22 years old, had been relocated in the house and wasn't serviced and it was fine. We put a new one in as we wanted a different system.

Stormchild414

Yeah. Thanks. Just to reassure, I live in old solid property now and it’s the quirks and idiosyncrasies of older properties that I like. I’m not moving in with no money or flex, I’m selling my property and moving to reduce mortgage and allow me to retire before I’m dead.  it was my perspective (? Wrong) that boilers, electrics and fireplaces were the basics due to safety. If I’m spending all my spare capital making the place safe to live in, it negates the whole point of me moving.    

I maybe just being a bit of an old woman but it’s the not being able to check stuff that’s worrying me

TheJP

Stormchild414 said:

Yeah. Thanks. Just to reassure, I live in old solid property now and it’s the quirks and idiosyncrasies of older properties that I like. I’m not moving in with no money or flex, I’m selling my property and moving to reduce mortgage and allow me to retire before I’m dead.  it was my perspective (? Wrong) that boilers, electrics and fireplaces were the basics due to safety. If I’m spending all my spare capital making the place safe to live in, it negates the whole point of me moving.    

I maybe just being a bit of an old woman but it’s the not being able to check stuff that’s worrying me

All understandable. What stage is the sale at i.e. How long ago was your offer accepted and has the queries all been answered etc?

SuseOrm

Stormchild414 said:

I never considered that at all so really grateful to get other perspectives. 

I honestly didn’t know that getting boiler serviced annually wasn’t normal practice. At least this allayed my concerns somewhat.

I almost wish I hadn’t got a survey done,  I was v happy until then!

To be honest that’s why I didn’t get a survey done because I thought whatever it says,  does that affect whether or not I’m gonna buy this house and given that there is nothing else on the market in this budget,  in the street and that a lot of the positives weren’t available elsewhere knowing the houses faults was only ever going to upset me so I decided to find out after I bought it instead of before hand because let’s face it I can fix them over the next 20 years it does not have to be done tomorrow.   Rome was not built in a day.  

maisie_cat

Our old cottage is late 1800s and because it was a probate we had no paperwork at all, everything "unknown".
We were concerned that a whole host of problems would use all our savings but it hasn't been as bad as we thought it might be.
The obvious damp turned out to be leaking guttering and the place being left cold and unventilated for 10 months, guttering replaced and fixed.
The original lime plaster has been replaced with gypsum so we do have some blown elements that will need fixing over time, I'm removing it as I go along.
The wood burner did in fact have paperwork, the family found it when they were clearing. The electrics with no paperwork turned out to be fine.
We did have to replace the geriatric 1960s Rayburn, it did technically work, but when removed was falling apart.

Stormchild414

So all searches are done. Not exchanged. The survey I got done straight away and I posed the questions about 3 weeks ago  responded this week to say they wouldnt get serviced.   The wood burner installed recently but won’t/can’t provide certificate. No co or smoke alarms.  I can get that stuff done it’s just starting to ring alarms. Wasn’t sure if I should reduce offer to account for it or whether I was over reacting

newsgroupmonkey_

It sounds like you're not really invested in the property if you're prepared to lose out based on those frankly minor points.

Maybe it's time to pull the offer and look elsewhere?