Potential structural issues after purchasing GII listed house help!

oldswanste

Hi all, not sure how much detail to go into initially but I think I'll start with the question I need answering so it doesn't get lost in my ramblings. If anyone can help but needs more information then please let me know.

We have recently purchased an older (Georgian) propert which we had a level 3 survey carried out on prior to purchase. The surveyor picked up no structural issues or signs of structural issues but we are experiencing things that make us think otherwise. 

The question.
My question is, if the property does have structural issues, do we have any avenue to reclaim any repair cost from the previous owners, the surveyor, our insurance company etc?

The details.

The house is a Grade II listed, Georgian, 4 storey with basement, ground, first and second floor. It's a very tall and imposing house and my wife a children fell on lo e with it the moment we saw it. It was finished inside to a very high standard in terms of the decoration and furnishings. When we viewed the house there were freshly painted rooms and antique paintings on the walls with a grand piano in the drawing room. We were blow away! 

We purchased the property for £500,000 and I can ho entry say this is the very extreme of what we can afford. Normally I'm quite a reserved person and don't like to stretch when it comes to finances but some health issues in recent years has made me look at life a little differently and whilst I wouldn't say this was an impulse purchase (we asked so many questions and had all the right surveys carried out). It's definitely nota house I would have considered purchasing a few years back.

Anyway, prior to purchasing we had a full, level 3 survey carried out and whilst this did pick up things like a fee missing tiles on the roof, elevated moisture readings in the basement and reports on damaged or inoperable sash windows. There was no reported signs of structural issues.

Since moving in we have had our confidence knocked. The 1st morning, my son used his shower and it overflowed in the shower tray and leaked into hallway below damaging the ceiling. This is when we discovered that his bathroom has a macerator fitted rather than a standard soil pipe fitted to the stack. His macerator was switched off and we now know the reason for this. If it is switched on, the pump continuously runs even if no water is running.

We then discovered that our bathroom in the master bedroom also has a macerator.

After resolving this we then decorated the hall and also painted the living room and dining room to get the house ready for Christmas just gone. Like most people we hadn't seen our families for a long time during Covid  so wanted to all get together.

After painting my other son had an issue with his shower in that a flexible pipe connected to the trap of his shower tray split and this leaked through to the newly decorated dining room below ruining the ceiling and walls.

After having several plumbers out the entire bathroom floor was taken up and the plumber discovered joists with notches taken out of them that are greater than 50% of the joist depth!! He told us this was a structural issue and we needed to have it inspected.

The house does not have a family bathroom as a traditional Georgian house might  I stead, it has 4 bathrooms each with an ensuite so, this work to install these ensuites was done in recent years. We knew this before moving in and as we couldn't find too much information on this work prior to purchase, we insisted on the current owners providing an indemnity policy to cover us for this.

After living on the house for several months we are now noticing cracks in the walls and ceilings. Floorboards are loose under the carpets and very springy in so.e rooms. If you softly jump up and down in some rooms, everything shakes. 

The house has some retired arches which ate original to the design and feature on every floor just off the stairs. We have noticed cracks in these arches and previous repairs. We're not sure if these cracks are new or ifs simply because we are tuned into them but we are finding new ones all the time.

The stairs rising to the 2nd floor are also now creaking and the stringer appears to be coming away from the wall. A crack running the entire length of the top two sets of stairs has started to develop exposing a previously repaired caulk line. The underside of these stairsets are cracked where the plaster meets the wall.

We love the house but are now petrified that we have invested all of our savings into something that we will not likely see a return on unless we invest further. We have no idea were to start with putting this right. 

Any help would be massively appreciated. Happy to post pictures etc if required.

Thanks for taking the time to read and thanks in advance for any help received.

user1977

Can you evidence that your surveyor ought to have spotted any of these points within the scope of their inspection? That's how you would pursue any claim against your surveyor. But it sounds difficult if some of the issues have taken you months of living there to notice them.

You'd only have a claim against the vendor if they had given you misleading answers to enquiries relevant to these points. Did they?

Nothing sounds like it would be covered by normal buildings insurance risks (other than fixing damage caused by flooding).

Woolsery

Buying a house as old as that warranted engaging an experienced listed buildings surveyor rather than a generalist. However, things like springy floors and cracks are very common and don't always mean the place is falling apart. Our last house had a very springy dining room floor, which had no rot and didn't deteriorate further in the 21 years we lived there. I expect it's still springy 14 years on!

It's surprising the surveyor didn't pick up the macerator toilets, or you for that matter. They are usually easy to spot.

Section62

oldswanste said:

The house does not have a family bathroom as a traditional Georgian house might  I stead, it has 4 bathrooms each with an ensuite so, this work to install these ensuites was done in recent years. We knew this before moving in and as we couldn't find too much information on this work prior to purchase, we insisted on the current owners providing an indemnity policy to cover us for this.

Who advised you to accept an indemnity policy?

Does the policy include cover for rectification of defective/unlawful work, or only for 'legal' costs?

If the previous owners had modifications made to the house without listed building consent then that should have been a huge red-flag that they may have taken other shortcuts including the work being bodged. A good solicitor should have advised you of the limitations of an indemnity policy with listed buildings.

Some of the defects you describe are the normal kind of things you expect to see with older properties, andit could just be a case that the previous owners had work done to hide the (normally expected) minor faults.  Older buildings tend to move around a fair bit, and people who are aware of this would know that cosmetic repairs are relatively pointless as the underlying issue will come back sooner or later.

youth_leader

Have you looked to see if the previous owners applied for listed building planning consent for any works? 

A listed II will always cost you just to maintain.  I was very sad I had to sell mine when my husband died but my roof and windows both needed urgent renovation, beyond my means.

doodling

Hi,

A few comments:

1. Macerator disposal from bathrooms - almost certainly installed because installing "proper" plumbing would have been too difficult / too expensive / impossible without making changes which wouldn't have got past approval.  I hate the things and wouldn't have them in my house but to be fair, they do work most of the time.  Unless there is some way of installing proper plumbing (and if there is then it will probably be expensive, otherwise why the macerators?) then you're stuck with them.  The pump shouldn't run continuously - that needs fixing.
2. Joist notches - unless these are recent then that is just part of the charm of a grade II listed building.  Even if they are recent there is no-one you can claim anything from.  Get a structural engineer to look at them and if necessary propose a solution - localised strengthening can be achieved relatively easily if required without having to replace the joists (which you really don't want to do as you'll almost certainly need consent).
3. Indemnity policy - who does it indemnify against what and what conditions does it have?  You may need to carefully consider the conditions before trying to get listed building approval for any further works as the policy may require you to be circumspect in what you tell them.  Does the policy cover listed buildings - remember that you are on the hook for returning non-approved works carried out since the building was listed back to the "as listed" state?
4. Bouncy floors - that is generally par for the course for old buildings so unless there is actual permanent movement I wouldn't be too concerned.
5. Cracks - as per the floors - old buildings move around and this tends to lead to cracks opening and closing over the course of a year as temperatures and moisture levels in the air change.  There are things that can be done to minimise this (e.g. dry lining or completely re-plastering) but most of them can't be done to a listed building.  Any cracks you fill will probably open up again in a couple of years.
6. Creaky stairs - a proper carpenter might be able to fix this (at least for a few years).

Overall, I don't think you need to be petrified, a lot of what you are seeing is just minor movement in the building.  In terms of actions:

1. If you already have a bathroom in bits then see if you can have normal plumbing installed at a cost you're willing to stand.
2. Get a structural engineer to look at the joist notches (and anywhere else which is worrying you), get them to propose a repair if they think it is necessary.  If possible, try to find an engineer familiar with listed properties as any solution needs to be compatible (and ideally reversible).
3. Understand the extent to which the work done has got the relevant listed building consents.  This could be your biggest risk by far.  Before you talk to anyone about this, understand what your indemnity policy covers (and therefore what it doesn't) and what conditions it places on what you can tell people (telling the listed buildings consent people the wrong thing might invalidate the policy).

Hope this helps.

GDB2222

We had a new macerator fitted for £700-ish. Annoying as it is, that's not worth suing over. In any case, it may just be a jammed float switch.

The bouncy floors - was there no mention? If they had been mentioned, would you not have bought?

It sounds like a gorgeous house, and I hope this doesn't spoil it too much for you.

oldswanste

user1977 said:

Can you evidence that your surveyor ought to have spotted any of these points within the scope of their inspection? That's how you would pursue any claim against your surveyor. But it sounds difficult if some of the issues have taken you months of living there to notice them.

You'd only have a claim against the vendor if they had given you misleading answers to enquiries relevant to these points. Did they?

Nothing sounds like it would be covered by normal buildings insurance risks (other than fixing damage caused by flooding).

Thanks for the reply user1977. Yes I mean, the springy floors have presumably been there for years. There are cracks in walls and archways that show old signs of repair. For someone looking in detail I'm certain these should have been spotted. We started to notice these on an almost daily basis after moving in.

I don't think we will have asked tge vendors if there were cracks or bouncy floors specifically but it's worth checking back through my emails to see what was discussed.

Thanks again,

oldswanste

Woolsery said:

Buying a house as old as that warranted engaging an experienced listed buildings surveyor rather than a generalist. However, things like springy floors and cracks are very common and don't always mean the place is falling apart. Our last house had a very springy dining room floor, which had no rot and didn't deteriorate further in the 21 years we lived there. I expect it's still springy 14 years on!

It's surprising the surveyor didn't pick up the macerator toilets, or you for that matter. They are usually easy to spot.

Thanks for the advice Woolsery. We did engage a local Rics surveyor who had 40 years of historical buildings experience and was familiar with the direct area of our house. We paid for the level 3 survey which is the most in depth survey on offer. 

We have always lived in Old houses so we're pretty used to things cracking and needing to be repaired and  repainted. The cracks we're experiencing in this house though seem different and a little more sinister. After doing a bit of research, cracks forming in archways or above wi dows and doors are not a good a sign. After finding the joist that had been notched out too much in the bathroom it just makes me concerned that this could be the case under the floorboards in more locations.

Regarding the macerator toilets, we had only viewed the house twice before purchasing and didn't spot them in the two bathrooms they are fitted in. They are hidden behind boxing which has been tiled and siliconed in place

youth_leader

Do you think your surveyor would come back oldswanste to put your mind at rest?  My surveyor came back here after his L3 survey when I found the floors were rotten. Or do you think you need a structural surveyor? 

I do sympathise, my house was 1874. When my husband died I moved out of our bedroom to my daughter's old room, but I didn't sleep for weeks as the ceiling above me was making  'cracking' noises during the night.  So loud they'd wake me up. I still have many photos of it on my phone, I ended up wobbling about on a ladder marking the 'end' of the cracks.  Unfortunately not many builders in my area with heritage knowledge, they just wanted to build a false ceiling over it.  I just moved out of the bedroom in the end, and only opened the door for viewings!  

youth_leader

oops, transposed, it was 1847.