House we are buying needs new roof, rewiring and new boiler, should we ask for money off?!

CulBul85

We had our offer of £15,000 over the asking price accepted on a house. We have just had the surveyor out and he said it needs a new roof a new boiler and rewiring. We are going to have to get quotes for all of the above. We completely maxed out to get this house as we have been looking for over a year and have been outbid every time.

Am I right in thinking that we should negotiate the price seen as the above problems will cost us a fortune? In the last few weeks the market has seriously slowed down so I’m hoping we’re a good position to renegotiate price. 

Any opinions welcome, thank you.

Chandler85

Do whatever you want, the vendor might accept or reject your proposed renegotiation.  A market slowing means prices aren't going up as much, did you offer with the condition that your offer goes up with the market rate, I seriously doubt it, so if the market had gone up 5% since your offer, and now has stagnated, your offer would still be 5% lower then if the property was sold today (in theory).

I somewhat doubt a normal surveyor would have said all that, more likely they said the roof was coming to the end of it's life (every property I have ever bought has claimed this), at best that the boiler is x number of years old and may need replacing (with the usual spiel about not being a Gas Safe Engineer) and also that the wiring looks old/ new/ dated etc (with the usual spiel about getting an Electrician to check it).

You could pay for an Electrician and Gas Safe Engineer to give you a report and also get a roofer to look at the roof, then you would know the situation exactly, costs and all.

user1977

Can you clarify what you mean by it "needing" any of these things? i.e. is the roof currently leaking, does the boiler currently work, is the wiring faulty? They may all just be "nice to haves". 

Assuming the house didn't appear to be in pristine condition, wasn't it priced in accordance with its condition? What did your surveyor value it as?

donutandbeer

You can ask and your vendor can refuse. I have made offers before on houses that I guess would need rewiring and already factored that price into my offer. Other buyers might have as well.

Roof I would think maybe not that easy to spot unless it’s literally falling apart. 

Boiler - I almost always ask how old the boiler is (or at least look at it and sort of guess) when viewing houses. So cost of new boiler would also have been factored in my offer.

That being said - if you won’t be able to afford the house otherwise then you just have to ask. Maybe the vendor will agree to go half way, but maybe they will try to relist the house or go back to other offers. 

RelievedSheff

Presumably you walked around the property with your eyes open so would have seen that the roof wasn't new, the boiler wasn't new and that the wiring was a similar age to the house?

On that basis, I don't believe that you have any basis to reduce your offer. You have chosen to pay over the asking price for the property based on what you saw at the time of the viewing.

CulBul85

RelievedSheff said:

Presumably you walked around the property with your eyes open so would have seen that the roof wasn't new, the boiler wasn't new and that the wiring was a similar age to the house?

On that basis, I don't believe that you have any basis to reduce your offer. You have chosen to pay over the asking price for the property based on what you saw at the time of the viewing.

It always baffles me how people can be so rude “ presumably you walked around the house with your eyes open”  What is the need in that?!! 

Unfortunately I’m not a roofer or electrician so I wouldn’t have a clue about what needs doing hence getting a survey! 

CulBul85

donutandbeer said:

You can ask and your vendor can refuse. I have made offers before on houses that I guess would need rewiring and already factored that price into my offer. Other buyers might have as well.

Roof I would think maybe not that easy to spot unless it’s literally falling apart. 

Boiler - I almost always ask how old the boiler is (or at least look at it and sort of guess) when viewing houses. So cost of new boiler would also have been factored in my offer.

That being said - if you won’t be able to afford the house otherwise then you just have to ask. Maybe the vendor will agree to go half way, but maybe they will try to relist the house or go back to other offers. 

Thank you for your response it’s been an extremely stressful year trying to secure a property in our town. We love this house but I do feel it is too much for us If there are thousands of pounds worth of stuff to do. 

We did ask about the boiler and that is 20 years old so we knew that would need doing. I just wanted to know if it was standard practice to ask for reductions because we’ve never done this before thanks again for your response

RelievedSheff

CulBul85 said:

donutandbeer said:

You can ask and your vendor can refuse. I have made offers before on houses that I guess would need rewiring and already factored that price into my offer. Other buyers might have as well.

Roof I would think maybe not that easy to spot unless it’s literally falling apart. 

Boiler - I almost always ask how old the boiler is (or at least look at it and sort of guess) when viewing houses. So cost of new boiler would also have been factored in my offer.

That being said - if you won’t be able to afford the house otherwise then you just have to ask. Maybe the vendor will agree to go half way, but maybe they will try to relist the house or go back to other offers. 

Thank you for your response it’s been an extremely stressful year trying to secure a property in our town. We love this house but I do feel it is too much for us If there are thousands of pounds worth of stuff to do. 

We did ask about the boiler and that is 20 years old so we knew that would need doing. I just wanted to know if it was standard practice to ask for reductions because we’ve never done this before thanks again for your response

You don't need to be a roofer to see if a roof is recent or not. Similarly you don't need to be an electrician to see that wiring is not new nor a gas fitter to see that a boiler is not new.

None of these items should be a surprise to you that they have been flagged in the survey. They are all pretty standard items picked up on almost every survey of a house over 10 years old.

The survey we had on our previous house said that the roof needed replacing. We lived in that house for 13 years and never even had to have any work done too it. 3 years on from us selling it is still has the same roof.

The surveyor is covering their back.

You have chosen to offer over the asking price based on what you saw during your viewings. I'm afraid if I were the seller and you tried reducing your offer based on that I would be telling you where to go and be remarketing the house.

You should have factored in the boiler replacement in your original offer given you knew how old it was.

babyblade41

If you are maxed out just buying this house then how are you going to afford any problems it may or may not have ?

The price you offered would have taken into consideration the state of it at the time, so either the house is extremely over priced to start with & you may have reasons to ask or it has been priced accordingly & valued at the price you offered

DE_612183

Have you offered too much ( £15k by your own admission - but I guess it depends on what the offer is ) and are now regretting it?

You can revise your offer - you only have the house to lose.

powerful_Rogue

CulBul85 said:

donutandbeer said:

You can ask and your vendor can refuse. I have made offers before on houses that I guess would need rewiring and already factored that price into my offer. Other buyers might have as well.

Roof I would think maybe not that easy to spot unless it’s literally falling apart. 

Boiler - I almost always ask how old the boiler is (or at least look at it and sort of guess) when viewing houses. So cost of new boiler would also have been factored in my offer.

That being said - if you won’t be able to afford the house otherwise then you just have to ask. Maybe the vendor will agree to go half way, but maybe they will try to relist the house or go back to other offers. 

Thank you for your response it’s been an extremely stressful year trying to secure a property in our town. We love this house but I do feel it is too much for us If there are thousands of pounds worth of stuff to do. 

We did ask about the boiler and that is 20 years old so we knew that would need doing. I just wanted to know if it was standard practice to ask for reductions because we’ve never done this before thanks again for your response

Just because a boiler is 20 years old, does not mean it needs replacing. House I sold last year the boiler was 16 years old, serviced and worked. I certainly wouldn't have entertained revised offer based on that.