Buying a 7 Year Old House Without a Warranty

Tuffers1875

Hi, my first post but I feel the need for some assurance. I'm in the process of buying a 7 year old house. It's on a small development of 12 houses. It had a 10 year warranty supplied by the builder but the builder went bust a few years ago and all warranties became void. I know a few of the residents through my business and they didn't bother to get another warranty to cover them for the rest of the term. One resident did buy a warranty and it cost him something like £4k. I'm buying the property without needing a mortgage. My solicitor said that if I did need a mortgage the property would have to have a warranty before I could buy it. I'm thinking of going ahead and buying it anyway. I did have a survey done on it a few months back. My only concern is if the footings etc are good.

What would you do?

propertyrental

Only you can assess the risk.

But for others reading this, always ensure any warranties are insurance backed. Then if the developer/whoever goes bust the insurance company steps in.

Olinda99

one consideration is if you want to sell it within three years i.e before the 10-year warranty period you might find a problem

sammyjammy

TBH a ten year NHBC guarantee (most commonly used in UK) doesn't really cover much,  if its 7 years old and its still standing I wouldn't bother.  Have a read of this New Home Warranties - What Do They Cover? - HomeOwners Alliance (hoa.org.uk)

subjecttocontract

Why can't the vendor get insurance and transfer it to you on sale completion ? That way you have insurance, you are not paying for it and you aren't just taking a chance that everything will be ok.

theartfullodger

I've probably bought 15-20 properties over the past 50+ years, none without any form of warranty.

Never regretted doing so.  Saved the extra cost of the warranties.

user1977

subjecttocontract said:

Why can't the vendor get insurance and transfer it to you on sale completion ?

Can you point us towards the "insurance" you're talking about? I doubt you can (easily) get cover for defects in a 7 year old property.

subjecttocontract

user1977 said:

subjecttocontract said:

Why can't the vendor get insurance and transfer it to you on sale completion ?

Can you point us towards the "insurance" you're talking about? I doubt you can (easily) get cover for defects in a 7 year old property.

Please refer to the insurance (warranty) mentioned by the OP in their opening post.

BarelySentientAI

user1977 said:

subjecttocontract said:

Why can't the vendor get insurance and transfer it to you on sale completion ?

Can you point us towards the "insurance" you're talking about? I doubt you can (easily) get cover for defects in a 7 year old property.

You can (under some circumstances) get a retrospective construction warranty to cover the remaining period of the usual 10 year new home warranty either when one wasn't given or is no longer valid.

Tuffers1875

Olinda99 said:

one consideration is if you want to sell it within three years i.e before the 10-year warranty period you might find a problem

We won't be moving again. Definitely not within 3 years.

Tuffers1875

subjecttocontract said:

Why can't the vendor get insurance and transfer it to you on sale completion ? That way you have insurance, you are not paying for it and you aren't just taking a chance that everything will be ok.

He has offered to pay for it but the way things have drawn out I doubt our buyers will wait for him to get a surveyor in and then issue a warranty/insurance. We want to exchange in 2 days time and complete in 11 days time.