Buying a house with no building regs for extension

lovehackney

Hello,

I'm at the (hopefully!) Final hurdle of buying a house. The only outstanding enquiry is regarding planning permission and building regs for a rear extension.

The rear extension was completed c.27 years ago. The seller does not have any documentation to confirm planning permission was obtained or a building completion certificate.

I understand that normally, you would take out an indemnity policy and that would take care of this (I am not personally concerned, however I am taking out a mortgage thus need it for the lender). However, the seller has contacted the council already.

What are my options in this scenario? Our solicitor has referred the matter to the insurance underwriter, I guess hoping they are happy to insure regardless as I believe the council don't take action for breaches or planning after 4/10 years, and equally building regs after 10-15 years. So despite no regs/ permission, is there even any risk ?

If the insurer refuses the indemnity policy, what's next ?

I've looked at a letter of regularisation, but something completed nearly 30 years ago won't comply with current building regs - will this advise the property needs to be brought up to scratch before it can be sold ? This also seems strange to me as the entire house, not just the extension, won't comply with regs (its a victorian house).

Further complicating matters is that the property is in the Hackney Local Authority, which had a cyber security breach in 2020 and since that has not had complete electronic records - so do we have a case to say that the absence of records does not mean the absence of permission?

Thanks in advance for any help.

trakky14

I would be very surprised if there were any major issues, it was a long time ago. We're selling our house that was previously 2 cottages and extended over 20yrs ago, we have no paperwork etc for it either. The solicitors asked a lot of questions and we had to do an indemnity for it but the lender of our buyers was happy (eventually, it took weeks!). They have to do their due diligence and check but I'm sure it will be ok. I think our extension had planning but definitely no building regs etc.

lovehackney

Thank you, I hope thats the case - although nervous at anything that has to go back to our lender for approval given the change in the mortgage market (our rate is from June).

Best case scenario is the insurer agrees to still underwrite the policy, its the plan B if that doesn't happen that I'm not sure of... 

Section62

lovehackney said:

...

If the insurer refuses the indemnity policy, what's next ?

I've looked at a letter of regularisation, but something completed nearly 30 years ago won't comply with current building regs - will this advise the property needs to be brought up to scratch before it can be sold ? This also seems strange to me as the entire house, not just the extension, won't comply with regs (its a victorian house).

Further complicating matters is that the property is in the Hackney Local Authority, which had a cyber security breach in 2020 and since that has not had complete electronic records - so do we have a case to say that the absence of records does not mean the absence of permission?

The vendor/you would need to get a certificate of lawful development and regularisation.

The regularisation process assesses the building work against the regulations that applied at the time of construction, not the current standards, although the BCO wouldn't ignore anything which was obviously unsafe.

Have Hackney's planning and BC records been compromised in totality? Or just ones which were 'live' at the time of the attack?  Would you be claiming that retrospective consent was possibly applied for and obtained in 2020?  I don't know the detail of the Hackney attack, but I'd be surprised if it was so comprehensive that nothing remained of records dating back to pre-internet days.

Bendy_House

What would an indemnity insurance policy actually cover a buyer for in such a case - a 27-year-old extension?

lovehackney

Section62 said:

lovehackney said:

...

If the insurer refuses the indemnity policy, what's next ?

I've looked at a letter of regularisation, but something completed nearly 30 years ago won't comply with current building regs - will this advise the property needs to be brought up to scratch before it can be sold ? This also seems strange to me as the entire house, not just the extension, won't comply with regs (its a victorian house).

Further complicating matters is that the property is in the Hackney Local Authority, which had a cyber security breach in 2020 and since that has not had complete electronic records - so do we have a case to say that the absence of records does not mean the absence of permission?

The vendor/you would need to get a certificate of lawful development and regularisation.

The regularisation process assesses the building work against the regulations that applied at the time of construction, not the current standards, although the BCO wouldn't ignore anything which was obviously unsafe.

Have Hackney's planning and BC records been compromised in totality? Or just ones which were 'live' at the time of the attack?  Would you be claiming that retrospective consent was possibly applied for and obtained in 2020?  I don't know the detail of the Hackney attack, but I'd be surprised if it was so comprehensive that nothing remained of records dating back to pre-internet days.

Regarding the cyber attack - I believe the council have incomplete historical records, not just for 2020. Its not just limited to buildings control, but for example many of the usual property searches you undertake are incomplete and thus many / most buyers in hackney take out indemnity policies for the missing ones, as the council is unable to complete the searches.

OK, I feel a bit better about the regularisation being against the standards at the time.

However, and the next poster mentions this - what is an indemnity policy (or a letter of regularisation) actually insuring me against anyway? If the council can't take action over anything- why would the lender care ?

silvercar

Nobody is going to take action on work done 27 years ago! 

Section62

lovehackney said:

However, and the next poster mentions this - what is an indemnity policy (or a letter of regularisation) actually insuring me against anyway? If the council can't take action over anything- why would the lender care ?

With an indemnity policy the lender has got a box ticked at someone else's expense.

With a regularisation certificate the lender would have a reasonable degree of confidence that the building they are securing the loan on doesn't have an extension with serious defects that could affect the value of their security.

user1977

I wouldn't be concerned about a lack of consents for something that old, and the lender won't either.

The standard forum of contract in Scotland assumes you don't need to worry about planning or building control consents for anything over 20 years old - yes, different laws compared to England, but v similar principles, so that gives you an idea of what approach solicitors and the market take.

Though of course that assumes it really is that old, which is often difficult to evidence if there's no paperwork! 

lovehackney

Thanks all.
To be clear, I'm not fussed about the consents but my solicitor is, on behalf of the lender.
I guess I'll wait and see the outcome of the underwriter agreeing whether to still offer the indemnity or not, before any next steps.

Section62

lovehackney said:

Thanks all.
To be clear, I'm not fussed about the consents but my solicitor is, on behalf of the lender.
I guess I'll wait and see the outcome of the underwriter agreeing whether to still offer the indemnity or not, before any next steps.

I'd assumed because the solicitor was going to the insurance underwriters that the lender had already flagged up an issue... but is that actually the case, or is the solicitor just working hard to sell you an indemnity policy on the off-chance the lender asks about the extension?