FTB House Purchase Process

Zoyya

Bigphil1474 said:

Those ceiling tiles may contain asbestos, or may not. Depends how old they are. They aren't original though. It's really down to price, and your budget. If the price reflects the condition and you have some money left to put right what is wrong, then no problem. Ceiling tiles like that in reasonable condition i.e. not crumbling apart, can usually be removed in one piece and fairly easily, so personally I wouldn't worry too much about it. The best advice I would give is be prepared to pull out if the survey identifies too many issues for you to resolve. Might be tempting to go ahead now you've spent that money, but the house could be a money pit and you could be worse off in the long run.

Thank you very much for your valuable input. True esp if it's a very old house

Zoyya

jj_43 said:

Your surveys will highlight this or that, perhaps this or that, and suggest you get another survey and probably scare you out of a purchase. If you think there is asbestos you need to get a asbestos survey. 

Does the asbestos survey needs to be done separately. I was thinking to get a L3 Building survey as it's an old property and for my peace of mind on the offer I have made.

user1977

Zoyya said:

user1977 said:

GoogleMeNow said:

A coal mining report may well be needed.  Stoke-on-Trent was a former coal mining area and there still some old mine shafts around, but your surveyor will advise you whether this is recommended or not.

You don't need the surveyor to advise you, just plug the postcode into the Coal Authority's site and it tells you whether it's an area where coal reports are recommended. In any event the solicitors will do this if necessary.

Did not know there is a website to check..thank you for pointing me to it .. just checked and it does say on the coalfield

Similar to millions of others. Not an issue though (99% of the time).

Zoyya

Grizebeck said:

Don't ask the estate agent,  they should never be relied on

True .. They recommended a Independent surveyor but I am skeptic to get it done from ones they recommend

Zoyya

timehastoldme said:

Is the chain completed? Is the house owner also buying a house? I wouldn't book a survey until the chain is settled.

We used Dunford Penrose and they were great.

Definitely go and view again, make sure you're happy before you spend too much money, do snagging checks, how many sockets, what's the water pressure like, is it different in the evenings to mornings. It's a lot of money, so worth triple checking.

Thank you very much for recommendation. I have booked level 3 survey with them now

Zoyya

Hi Everyone

It's me again with an update! I got the L3 survey report last week and it freaked me out like anything. so I decided to withdraw my offer stating my reasons and estimated cost for repairs being around £18K. EA has now came back with lower price - 60K (offer price was 73K) . I am very naive and would really appreciate if someone can suggest what will be the best to do? I am happy to share the report here if that is alright to do?

RHemmings

Zoyya said:

Hi Everyone

It's me again with an update! I got the L3 survey report last week and it freaked me out like anything. so I decided to withdraw my offer stating my reasons and estimated cost for repairs being around £18K. EA has now came back with lower price - 60K (offer price was 73K) . I am very naive and would really appreciate if someone can suggest what will be the best to do? I am happy to share the report here if that is alright to do?

Other people will be able to advise better than me. However, I'd like to know what the required repairs are. If the survey (which are often said to be posterior covering exercises) says £18K costs and you've had a reduction of £13K, then to me that looks like it could easily be a good deal. But, it depends on what the actual repairs are.

More experienced people will be along to over-rule me too. 

Zoyya

RHemmings said:

Zoyya said:

Hi Everyone

It's me again with an update! I got the L3 survey report last week and it freaked me out like anything. so I decided to withdraw my offer stating my reasons and estimated cost for repairs being around £18K. EA has now came back with lower price - 60K (offer price was 73K) . I am very naive and would really appreciate if someone can suggest what will be the best to do? I am happy to share the report here if that is alright to do?

Other people will be able to advise better than me. However, I'd like to know what the required repairs are. If the survey (which are often said to be posterior covering exercises) says £18K costs and you've had a reduction of £13K, then to me that looks like it could easily be a good deal. But, it depends on what the actual repairs are.

More experienced people will be along to over-rule me too. 

Thank you ! I have shared the report in the below link. 

RHemmings

I have read your report. All 46 pages of it. As a FTB, this is the kind of report I fear receiving sometime after Thursday when my own L3 Building Survey should be carried out. 

I'm a bit disappointed with the seeming lack of care taken in the report. E.g. there are bits which appear to include typos that result in a sentence where it's not sure if it's a positive or negative. And, the frequent mentions of 'woodwork' near the start of the document turn out to seem to be 'woodworm' later on.

There seems to be an awful lot of posterior covering in this document, but the woodworm, lack of fire breaks, and some other issues worry me. Perhaps a bit excessively. Also the lack of a visible damp course and excessive damp lower down worry me too. 

If you get £13,000 knocked off the price then this would pay for some but not all of the repairs to be made. But, there are a number of areas such as getting a damp and timber specialist in where the quoted price is for a survey, and not for any subsequent repairs. 

The photos of the roof and other high up areas such as the guttering are presumably by a drone, and I found those quite informative. I'm a FTB and don't know, but I'm guessing that while before on this forum there have been discussions about surveys which said the roof needs to be fixed and several decades it's still standing, this report certainly makes me think that some work needs to be done on the roof. And, woodworm treatment. And, at least investigation of what the situation is with the damp course and low-down damp. I'm hoping that those more experienced will comment as I will learn from them too. 

I apologise for not being able to give a more useful response. 

Zoyya

RHemmings said:

I have read your report. All 46 pages of it. As a FTB, this is the kind of report I fear receiving sometime after Thursday when my own L3 Building Survey should be carried out. 

I'm a bit disappointed with the seeming lack of care taken in the report. E.g. there are bits which appear to include typos that result in a sentence where it's not sure if it's a positive or negative. And, the frequent mentions of 'woodwork' near the start of the document turn out to seem to be 'woodworm' later on.

There seems to be an awful lot of posterior covering in this document, but the woodworm, lack of fire breaks, and some other issues worry me. Perhaps a bit excessively. Also the lack of a visible damp course and excessive damp lower down worry me too. 

If you get £13,000 knocked off the price then this would pay for some but not all of the repairs to be made. But, there are a number of areas such as getting a damp and timber specialist in where the quoted price is for a survey, and not for any subsequent repairs. 

The photos of the roof and other high up areas such as the guttering are presumably by a drone, and I found those quite informative. I'm a FTB and don't know, but I'm guessing that while before on this forum there have been discussions about surveys which said the roof needs to be fixed and several decades it's still standing, this report certainly makes me think that some work needs to be done on the roof. And, woodworm treatment. And, at least investigation of what the situation is with the damp course and low-down damp. I'm hoping that those more experienced will comment as I will learn from them too. 

I apologise for not being able to give a more useful response. 

Thank you very much for taking the time to read the report. You can imagine the horror on my face after seeing the report. I know some surveyors exaggerate some minor problems but as a naive FTB in a new area, where you barely know people,it is scary to even think about taking a project that has major repairs in it. I am all in for some doer upper / modernisation mini projects but if it's a big one I dont want to take it even if I get it for a half price.  In my opinion they are more for the experienced buyers or people who are into buy , repair & sell scheme