Office conversation flat, lenders won’t lend

eamyers

Our flats are converted office buildings in Hertfordshire. They are part of the shared ownership scheme. I’m trying to sell but like everyone having trouble.

My neighbour is trying to sell at the moment too and their property is the same as ours. One living room window and 2x bedrooms with internal windows that face into the atrium and do not open. 

My neighbours property was most recently under offer but in the last week the buyer has been unable to get a mortgage, this is the 5th sale to fall through. 

The sales fell through previously due to ventilation concerns (despite all properties being fitted with mechanical ventilation) 
the most recent sale has fallen through due to a lack of natural light in the properties. 

I’ve looked up on building regs concerning “adequate natural light” but cannot find specifics. 

People are finding themselves unable to remortgage too, due to the aforementioned problems and a saturated market of lenders. Wondered if anyone has advice? We plan to contact citizens advice, the housing association and also thinking about taking legal action as we’re living in properties that we simply cannot sell. Others have managed it but as I mentioned, unable to find a lender now as the market is saturated (estate agents terminology not mine). 

Thank you 

user1977

Legal action against whom?

artyboy

I don't have any advice I'm afraid, but my sympathies for your predicament. I'm in a certain 'garden city' and so many old office buildings in a part of town have been converted. Frankly they look soulless places to live but I get that needs must with property right now.

I just wonder if what you're facing now could be the tip of a bigger iceberg where conversions have not been done to a conventional enough standard for lenders...

Doozergirl

artyboy said:

I don't have any advice I'm afraid, but my sympathies for your predicament. I'm in a certain 'garden city' and so many old office buildings in a part of town have been converted. Frankly they look soulless places to live but I get that needs must with property right now.

I just wonder if what you're facing now could be the tip of a bigger iceberg where conversions have not been done to a conventional enough standard for lenders...

Almost certainly. 

I've tried to warn people off these whenever I've spotted them as they can often be identified just by the floor plan. 

I know that permitted development rights allow people to convert office building without going through the formal planning process, but what I cannot get my head around is how they also seem to contravene the most basic of building regulations for straightforward houses, let alone a building with added risk like a block with multiple residents.  

You have my sympathy, OP, as it's always felt luke mis-selling to me.   

eamyers

user1977 said:

Legal action against whom?

The housing association for selling flats that are now unsellable due to not meeting building regs

Vannaa

They're not unsellable, buyers just can't get a mortgage. My parents has a RTB with the same problem, they sold to a housing association.

Emily_Joy

eamyers said:

user1977 said:

Legal action against whom?

The housing association for selling flats that are now unsellable due to not meeting building regs

Many old houses do not meet current building regulations. It doesn't mean it was illegal to sell them a while ago. You can still sell to a cashbuyer or an investor that will just let it and never visit the property.

FreeBear

Doozergirl said:

artyboy said:

I don't have any advice I'm afraid, but my sympathies for your predicament. I'm in a certain 'garden city' and so many old office buildings in a part of town have been converted. Frankly they look soulless places to live but I get that needs must with property right now.

I just wonder if what you're facing now could be the tip of a bigger iceberg where conversions have not been done to a conventional enough standard for lenders...

Almost certainly. 

I've tried to warn people off these whenever I've spotted them as they can often be identified just by the floor plan. 

I know that permitted development rights allow people to convert office building without going through the formal planning process, but what I cannot get my head around is how they also seem to contravene the most basic of building regulations for straightforward houses, let alone a building with added risk like a block with multiple residents.  

You have my sympathy, OP, as it's always felt luke mis-selling to me.   

Building Regulation standards are much lower when doing a refurbishment (such as an office conversion). So you can get away with lower levels of insulation and cheaper windows.

Modern industrial.commercial buildings are rarely suited to accommodation in my opinion - Many of the buildings have a design life of 50 years thanks to the use of reinforced concrete and RAAC.

silvercar

The fact that the bedroom windows don’t open would be a red flag for me. Were they classed as a bedroom when you bought? 

user1977

eamyers said:

user1977 said:

Legal action against whom?

The housing association for selling flats that are now unsellable due to not meeting building regs

Didn't it meet building regs when you bought? You don't say that in the OP. Your solicitor will (or ought to) have checked that at the time - and if they failed to do so, your more obvious remedy would be against your solicitor.

What do your current solicitors say about it?

ComicGeek

I've worked on projects with developers who have similar designs, with all windows looking out onto internal atriums - we haven't undertaken the ventilation design ourselves but I really can't see how they met basic Building Regulation standards even with the lower bar for conversions. 

They also tend to be the very large office buildings, as the deep floorplates which work well as office space really don't work well when converted into flats - so result in very large numbers of flats per building in addition to the poor layouts. The most recent one we had was nearly 400 flats, of which around half had no window direct to outside at all - the same developer had another couple of large conversions in the area, and added up to nearly 1000 flats with poor insulation, electric heating, high energy bills and poor EPC ratings. 

The developers seem to be mostly selling them to overseas purchasers for renting out now.