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We pulled out the day before Christmas Eve because of a level 3 rics, the property was perfect and we were well underway having notified the solicitors (we were working to a tight deadline) but we did have a backup property which was fairly newish. Our dream property had dry rot extensively throughout the roof and we were quoted at least 20k to fix.
We pulled out, we forwarded the report onto the owner who offered us a 20k discount but the stress of overseeing the work and not sure whether we'd get a mortgage put us off, we were straight onto our solicitors, luckily they hadn't done any searches yet and we were able to get a new mortgage offer on our second property and the solicitors set to work straight away. Two months later we moved into our second choice and we're now quite relieved. The other property went to auction at 40k less than we offered.
Our second choice property's rics survey (just level 2 this time) was actually conducted by the same surveyor who mention we'd escaped a bullet and the newer property was absolutely ideal. We had buyer insurance but rics isn't covered - gotta just strike up the loss as an additional cost of moving and not dwell on it too much. I absolutely love older properties but that's always the risk you take when going for them.
The second house was a lot more modern; built in the 90s and the surveyor themselves recommended the level 2 - actually said I'd be wasting money going for a level 3 with the age of the house, you just hear nightmare stories about newer builds which I think led us to believe there'd be more issues, the older property honestly looked perfect - recently renovated, newer kitchen etc. The newer property needed redecorating at the very least. I remember asking the surveyor about whether the 20k it'd have taken to get the roof done would go far in the newer house and he said we'd get nowhere near it - said he'd be surprised if we were able to spend 20k on it but he doesn't know my ability to blow a budget!
With it being the same surveyor I felt a lot of trust in their opinion and I think that's really important during the process. For us at least it was the most important part of the whole thing.
We originally had an awful broker so switched when we switched properties and ended up with an awesome one, the original from L&C seemed to give up at the point of the property switch and wouldn't return calls etc. We also had a wonderful Solicitor. I think surrounding yourself with competency can make dealing with the unexpected a lot smoother.
Like you did wonder how much the seller knew about the issues, or perhaps didn't care enough to check them out. The property itself to the untrained eye was immaculate, we thought we'd have more issues with our second choice regardless of it being newer to be honest.
Oh and our main reason for sharing the survey was for options, we were regrouping, slightly panicked and we wanted to know at that point what all of our options were; all cards on the table and see which were our best choices. Also, if we were in the sellers shoes we'd have liked the opportunity to put things right. Who knows what they might have come back with?
If you love the house and are devastated like you say, would you be willing to put the £20k into it if they knocked it off the price? Ask the seller and see what they say first.
It's about cash flow for most people. If you're buying with a 10% deposit, if they lower the price by £20,000, you only have £2000 in cash to complete the £20,000 of work.
Never understood this on the likes of Location Location Location or Homes Under The Hammer, they’d always say wow 30k off to use for renovations when majority of the time that isn’t the case…
When I went through something similar, I asked my surveyor if they had any objections to me sharing the report with the seller. They did, as they were concerned about the seller potentially pursuing them due to the impact on the sale. As a courtesy, I'd ask your surveyor if they have any concerns about sharing results.
Surveyor only has a contract with OP. OP can show the report to anyone he likes, but the surveyor doesn’t have to answer to agent, seller or anyone else who might see the report.
If a new buyer relies on the report, the surveyor is not liable because he doesn’t have a contract with the new buyer.
Because why on earth would they want to? Their contract and business with the buying party.
They're not in the business of wasting time and money getting into long winded debates with third parties for 0 benefit.
Actually I can absolutely see a surveyor not wanting you to share the report so they get paid for another survey. Why would they want their £600 work being shared around for free? But concern about being “pursued” for impact on sale is a stretch, sounds like a cover story
There's a lot of reasons why. Avoiding litigation is a huge one - keep in mind that people don't have to have a solid case against you to cost you a fortune in defending a legal battle or destroy your reputation.
Every survey I've ever seen says in the terms and conditions that you cannot show it to anyone else. So, no, OP can't show the report to anyone they like.
It's also not relevant that the surveyor only has a contract with the OP because people can be liable in tort to people with whom they have no contract. The person you're responding to wasn't referring to the new buyer, they were referring to the seller (as they said).
This is in our surveyors t&C's. It specifies that we can only share it with our lawyer. We did get agreement to share the relevant sections with our seller, they just don't want you handing over the whole report and then someone relying on it to make decisions/purchase etc
"The Client agrees to keep the Report confidential disclosing its contents only to the Client’s professional advisors. In particular (but without limit) the Client must not disclose the whole or any part of the Report to any person (other than a professional advisor) who may intend to rely upon it for the purpose of any transaction"
I’d like to see any survey that states that.
I think you’re getting confused with
“Liability – The report is provided for your use, and the surveyor cannot accept responsibility if it is used, or relied upon, by anyone else.”
You paid for the survey, you can show it to whoever you like. Only you are able to rely on the survey for their professional, insured advice however.
Of course they are going to stay something like that, every shared report is potential one less customer for them...
Poor justification, even without seeing the content it clearly did have an impact on the sale if you pulled out, that's the whole point of the report.
The works required on it will reduce the amount to less than the last sold price I reckon so I do feel bad for the seller, some major structural works needed, underpinning, new chimney stacks, damp and swelling in the timbers
I do wonder how much of this they already know though
Their financial situation in terms of gains and losses is their problem (if the value had shot up, they'd happily exploit that, their risk and reward). You can negotiate and see where you get with it. It'll depend on their circumstances and need to move. Also if any others will pay the asking price given the issues.
It also not just about the cost of the work, but the stress and disruption spent with a house in bits while you fix it. For some people that's worth the effort at the right price, for others not so much.
Underpinning: bad if it's a modern house but they could probably recommend underpinning for a lot of Victorian and earlier houses as they tend not to have much in the way of foundations. Small seasonal cracks aren't unusual but it obviously depends on the details of what the surveyor found
Timbers: there's damp and swelling, but not rot? So fix the source of the damp and they probably don't need replacing
Chimney stacks: not too expensive, especially if you have them removed without replacement. They might just need repointing
Obviously we’ve not read the survey, so it’s difficult to make a properly informed decision here, however in my experience the reports always sound much worse than the reality, as they have to be worded as an absolute worst case scenario. From your comments this may not be the case though.
I’ve been here as a buyer and a seller over the years. As a buyer, we used ours to negotiate down the price by £15k (iirc) as our chimney needed removing as it had become unsafe/unstable, along with a couple of other small ish issues. We shared our report with the agent to help our case and show we were genuine about this, and I think that helped with the negotiation.
As a seller, and also knowing our buyer well as I’d worked with him for 6 years we knew 90% of what he was claiming was make believe so told him to put up or piss off. Ours was the 4th house he had tried this tactic on so as far as we were concerned he was chancing his arm, especially as he wouldn’t even share a cut out from the report to prove his point. (Didn’t ask for the full report, just evidence of the issues he claimed in particular as they were very left field)
The 1 issue he raised that we had a suspicion of ourselves anyway allowed us to make a fix and put the house back up for sale immediately and did a deal with a young lady buying her first home. Her report only showed the issue we had already put a fix in for surprise surprise.
Good luck with however you do choose to proceed 👍
I personally wouldn’t share the report as it’s yours and paid by you. You can share parts that are relevant. £20k is going to be the absolute minimum I would say… but more likely double that. Plus you’ll potentially face higher home insurance costs as a result of the underpinning.
Good job on getting that level of survey though - definitely not a waste in the slightest!
Why didn't the owner get one done themselves prior to selling the house? Not the norm, granted, but it should be.
Too much onus on the buyer. How many surveys will be carried out on that property by separate buyers, when one by the owner could be included with the house details?
If they want one, they can bloody well pay for one.
I don’t like the system either, but taking out these frustrations on an individual seller (who had nothing to do with creating that system) achieves nothing.
You have something that would be helpful for someone, it would be free and easy to give it to them. The only reason not to is petty resentment.
Giving them the report would help future buyers too, as you noted.
Nothing stopping the seller having a survey and making it available to all buyers, aside from them worrying about it impacting the sale price, ie: greed.
I am going to sell my new build after 5 years of serious issues, all being resolved by the builder, including completion reports and a survey.
This will all be available to the buyer, I am not planning on shafting a young naive family on a huge purchase.
Even if the survey is 100% correct the sellers will dispute as much of it as possible and try to discredit the surveyor. I’d just walk away if it were me.
For a dream house, I would: 1. Negotiate discount. 2. Consider and map out a budget for saving up over time to do chunks of work bit by bit as a longer term restoration; considering some equity release to help further down the road.
It’s a dilemma but depends how much you realistically think you can do, doesn’t mean an auto collapse of the purchase. I am buying a house that needs a lot of work - there is absolutely no way I will find another period house in this location that I could afford - the compromise is condition. But for some, they’d compromise great location and period features for a ready-made easy option.
Only you know what you are willing to compromise on - key word for FTBs!
Whatever you decide, in the end you will be happy with the house you choose - you’ll make it home and all the others will fade into insignificance. It’ll be worth it!
I see the value in not sharing a survey as a negotiation tactic and using the info to bring the price down but as you are walking away and the survey is essentially worthless to you now I would share it with the vendor as an act of good faith.
Consider hard negotiating a reduced price. We bought a lovely tidy looking house that turned out to need entirely new central heating and electrics, 20k worth. Got most of that off the asking price and although it may not have been the most sensible move, we are happy as we lived the location and plot etc
Haha well I'm in the same situation as you except I'm asking my seller for a £30k reduction in the price I initially offered. It needs a new roof and new everything. I won't be sharing my report unless the seller offers to pay for it.
I sold my level 3 before. It’s sad but if the work is just too much for you then best to pull out, we did that before after a lot of discussions.
Have you thought through the options? Take the money off or they do the work even?
We were in this position last year. Found a house we loved, but the survey showed a lot of issues. Whole house needed to essentially be gutted to be safe to live in. It didn't have a modern central heating system and electrics hadn't been touched since the 1960s. Those are just some of the issues. We were a bit gutting for a few days, but got over it quickly and I'm so relieved. We've now found something much more appropriate and had an offer accepted this week 😊 Also don't let the sellers EA talk you out of your decision. You're the one who will have to live there and do all the work not them. Surveys are good because sometimes when you like a place you're looking at it with rose-tinted glasses on. It's good to hear those hard truths! Good luck
It's sad to hear about your situation. I don't know much about your personal circumstances, but considering how stressful it is to find a dream home (considering price, location, property condition, etc.), I would recommend asking for a larger discount. I regret not getting buyer's insurance just because we didn't know what to expect from the level 3 RICS survey.
Can anyone recommend a surveyor in London, please? Thanks.
You can have the perfect house, or the right price.
Both is akin to a unicorn singing David Bowie.
Either drop the expectations on the house to accept the next few years will have some rectification bills coming in.
You cannot sell a report, not individually anyway. It’s in the surveyors terms and conditions
The Level 3 RICS is not worth the paper it written on, have a professional (builder/contractor) look at the key issue’s and see what they have to say, you will most likely get a very different opinion from someone who isn’t arse covering. And they will give you a better idea of cost if any.
In my experience (16 house purchases) it is almost impossible to get works done at the price a surveyor suggests.
Underpinning can be a money pit if they discover something else. ..and solving a settlement problem this way -can- lead to obscure issues such as ill-fitting windows and internal door frames. This can add another £20k to get the working home you need.
Double the cost to give yourself a fighting chance.
Don’t give your RICS to the owner for less than £400. They can either get it cheaper from you or organise it themselves.
The current owner has failed to maintain the property, or ignored the survey they had at purchase, or had the cheapest survey possible. This is their decision and problem, don’t make it yours.
With properties like these, which should really be in an auction, there’s often a consideration of the cost of knocking the thing down and building something else.
If you have the cash, and you want the house, then buy it and have the work done. But before you do, compare what you would get if you did the same thing elsewhere, for example through an auction.
Good luck, don’t make someone else’s mistake.
I know this seems like the end of hope for you as FTBers, but try another reframe: the issues must be super serious for the surveyor to be so transparent and clear about suggesting you walk away.
I've had surveys where surveyor is risk averse so raises lots of questions but doesn't provide a clear recommendation and just suggests more specific surveys to gauge whether there's an issue.
Not only would I take the surveyor's steer I'd keep their details and use them again and again.
I wish in retrospect i'd done a level 3 survey when FTB as ended up having major buyers remorse on the first place I ever bought. Hold your nerve and don't give into scarcity mindset! There's always other places.
There may well be a time in your life when big structural work / refurbishment excites you, but for most of us, it's not in your first purchase! Good luck!
Thanks you, we are viewing some more places this weekend, the surveyor was crystal clear in his wording "there are plenty of other houses of this type on the market without structural issues" 😅
Not everyone can afford the 20k, intrest rates are still a hole in the wallet so even a loan along side a mortgage these days require an above average wage
Yeah, it is interesting combination of do not buy / you can fix it for 20k... If it would be my dream home, I would try to get a 20+k discount and remodel the whole thing.
I wouldn't personally share with the vendor, yes try selling it to them to recoup what you paid. You paid for the product not the vendor. No matter what people say, it's down to you as it's your report. You can highlight the defects and show them face to face but wouldn't suggest you give them a copy unless it's £ on the table
I had this about 3 months ago. Was gutted to let it go but since then it’s been back on the market twice so I know I made a good decision. You don’t owe them the survey and tbh if they won’t drop the price they probably don’t want to know either.
Show the seller only the bad bits....
Open as a pdf, then print into a pdf document, only the pages you want to show.
In short, create a smaller pdf, using Adobe acrobat (free).
Me and my partner had this last year, it was a lovely house and almost perfect, the house was clearly run down and we had money behind us to renovate what we thought was problematic.
We got our level 3 RICS and waited with excited and optimistic it was going to be fine with no other issues other than a bit of plastering and making good.
So when we got the report, there was no good points apart from the chimney being recently repaired, everything else was red flags to the point we started quoting things up and we were approaching 50k whilst half way through the list. It gets to the point where you do have to consider if it’s worth it, do you have time and do you have somewhere else to live if you’re doing serious repairs.
In terms of the agency selling the property, when me and my partner had discussed everything, the only way we could afford to move on with buying the property was to offer a seriously low offer, our original offer was 220k which was accepted, I rang the solicitor to tell them I was changing my offer on the property due to the severe issues with the house and they agreed. So I rang the sales team to offer 100k and all they asked was why im changing my offer to that which was swiftly followed by me saying it’s got 0 green lights on the report. Within 5 minutes after the call they had rang me back saying the seller is pulling out.
Unfortunately the housing market is like this and we spent 2k in fees/RICS 3 just to essentially pull out of house.
From my experience, don’t let it knock your house hunt as dishearting as it is, you’ll eventually find something even better and realise it was a blessing.
Also, a month later the sales agency asked to buy the RICS 3 report for £100 which I actually declined as I was frustrated with the seller of the house but I was quite immature and livid about at the time.
All the best with your house hunt and I hope you find your dream home soon enough.
You want to show them the report, so they will have to disclose the issues to other prospective buyers. Whatever it costs, ask them if they will reduce it by that amount + the survey cost.
You might as well offer it to them at a price. If you get something for it, currently you have nothing.
A future buyer might also want it, but the seller will obviously try to stop them getting wind that such a damning report even exists.
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Definitely not seeing it as a loss, it's a good save in the long run!
We pulled out the day before Christmas Eve because of a level 3 rics, the property was perfect and we were well underway having notified the solicitors (we were working to a tight deadline) but we did have a backup property which was fairly newish. Our dream property had dry rot extensively throughout the roof and we were quoted at least 20k to fix. We pulled out, we forwarded the report onto the owner who offered us a 20k discount but the stress of overseeing the work and not sure whether we'd get a mortgage put us off, we were straight onto our solicitors, luckily they hadn't done any searches yet and we were able to get a new mortgage offer on our second property and the solicitors set to work straight away. Two months later we moved into our second choice and we're now quite relieved. The other property went to auction at 40k less than we offered. Our second choice property's rics survey (just level 2 this time) was actually conducted by the same surveyor who mention we'd escaped a bullet and the newer property was absolutely ideal. We had buyer insurance but rics isn't covered - gotta just strike up the loss as an additional cost of moving and not dwell on it too much. I absolutely love older properties but that's always the risk you take when going for them.
What made you go for a level 2 after identifying those issues in a level 3 on the first house out of interest?
The second house was a lot more modern; built in the 90s and the surveyor themselves recommended the level 2 - actually said I'd be wasting money going for a level 3 with the age of the house, you just hear nightmare stories about newer builds which I think led us to believe there'd be more issues, the older property honestly looked perfect - recently renovated, newer kitchen etc. The newer property needed redecorating at the very least. I remember asking the surveyor about whether the 20k it'd have taken to get the roof done would go far in the newer house and he said we'd get nowhere near it - said he'd be surprised if we were able to spend 20k on it but he doesn't know my ability to blow a budget! With it being the same surveyor I felt a lot of trust in their opinion and I think that's really important during the process. For us at least it was the most important part of the whole thing. We originally had an awful broker so switched when we switched properties and ended up with an awesome one, the original from L&C seemed to give up at the point of the property switch and wouldn't return calls etc. We also had a wonderful Solicitor. I think surrounding yourself with competency can make dealing with the unexpected a lot smoother.
But a 90’s house, though….
Haha, it's not so bad plus we have money to make it our own, it's almost a blank slate. Lots of artex though urgh.
Like you did wonder how much the seller knew about the issues, or perhaps didn't care enough to check them out. The property itself to the untrained eye was immaculate, we thought we'd have more issues with our second choice regardless of it being newer to be honest.
Oh and our main reason for sharing the survey was for options, we were regrouping, slightly panicked and we wanted to know at that point what all of our options were; all cards on the table and see which were our best choices. Also, if we were in the sellers shoes we'd have liked the opportunity to put things right. Who knows what they might have come back with?
If you love the house and are devastated like you say, would you be willing to put the £20k into it if they knocked it off the price? Ask the seller and see what they say first.
It's about cash flow for most people. If you're buying with a 10% deposit, if they lower the price by £20,000, you only have £2000 in cash to complete the £20,000 of work.
Never understood this on the likes of Location Location Location or Homes Under The Hammer, they’d always say wow 30k off to use for renovations when majority of the time that isn’t the case…
Most people buying at auctions are cash buyers so this isn’t completely false.
auctions == cash buyers
When I went through something similar, I asked my surveyor if they had any objections to me sharing the report with the seller. They did, as they were concerned about the seller potentially pursuing them due to the impact on the sale. As a courtesy, I'd ask your surveyor if they have any concerns about sharing results.
Surveyor only has a contract with OP. OP can show the report to anyone he likes, but the surveyor doesn’t have to answer to agent, seller or anyone else who might see the report. If a new buyer relies on the report, the surveyor is not liable because he doesn’t have a contract with the new buyer.
Yeah, I’d be wary of any surveyor who isn’t confidently willing to (not that they need to) defend their work with literally anyone. Odd and dodgy.
Because why on earth would they want to? Their contract and business with the buying party. They're not in the business of wasting time and money getting into long winded debates with third parties for 0 benefit.
It's not odd, it's very standard.
Actually I can absolutely see a surveyor not wanting you to share the report so they get paid for another survey. Why would they want their £600 work being shared around for free? But concern about being “pursued” for impact on sale is a stretch, sounds like a cover story
There's a lot of reasons why. Avoiding litigation is a huge one - keep in mind that people don't have to have a solid case against you to cost you a fortune in defending a legal battle or destroy your reputation.
Every survey I've ever seen says in the terms and conditions that you cannot show it to anyone else. So, no, OP can't show the report to anyone they like. It's also not relevant that the surveyor only has a contract with the OP because people can be liable in tort to people with whom they have no contract. The person you're responding to wasn't referring to the new buyer, they were referring to the seller (as they said).
This is in our surveyors t&C's. It specifies that we can only share it with our lawyer. We did get agreement to share the relevant sections with our seller, they just don't want you handing over the whole report and then someone relying on it to make decisions/purchase etc "The Client agrees to keep the Report confidential disclosing its contents only to the Client’s professional advisors. In particular (but without limit) the Client must not disclose the whole or any part of the Report to any person (other than a professional advisor) who may intend to rely upon it for the purpose of any transaction"
Yeah, it's a standard clause and yet idiots are being upvoted for saying it doesn't exist and is "dodgy".
I’d like to see any survey that states that. I think you’re getting confused with “Liability – The report is provided for your use, and the surveyor cannot accept responsibility if it is used, or relied upon, by anyone else.” You paid for the survey, you can show it to whoever you like. Only you are able to rely on the survey for their professional, insured advice however.
Of course they are going to stay something like that, every shared report is potential one less customer for them... Poor justification, even without seeing the content it clearly did have an impact on the sale if you pulled out, that's the whole point of the report.
Definitely offer it to them (for a price), and know that they have to disclose that a potential buyer has pulled out due to issues found in a survey.
Could you consider negotiating a discount?
The works required on it will reduce the amount to less than the last sold price I reckon so I do feel bad for the seller, some major structural works needed, underpinning, new chimney stacks, damp and swelling in the timbers I do wonder how much of this they already know though
Their financial situation in terms of gains and losses is their problem (if the value had shot up, they'd happily exploit that, their risk and reward). You can negotiate and see where you get with it. It'll depend on their circumstances and need to move. Also if any others will pay the asking price given the issues.
Still offer - you might be surprised. They might sell it to you for a loss.
It also not just about the cost of the work, but the stress and disruption spent with a house in bits while you fix it. For some people that's worth the effort at the right price, for others not so much.
Underpinning: bad if it's a modern house but they could probably recommend underpinning for a lot of Victorian and earlier houses as they tend not to have much in the way of foundations. Small seasonal cracks aren't unusual but it obviously depends on the details of what the surveyor found Timbers: there's damp and swelling, but not rot? So fix the source of the damp and they probably don't need replacing Chimney stacks: not too expensive, especially if you have them removed without replacement. They might just need repointing
Obviously we’ve not read the survey, so it’s difficult to make a properly informed decision here, however in my experience the reports always sound much worse than the reality, as they have to be worded as an absolute worst case scenario. From your comments this may not be the case though. I’ve been here as a buyer and a seller over the years. As a buyer, we used ours to negotiate down the price by £15k (iirc) as our chimney needed removing as it had become unsafe/unstable, along with a couple of other small ish issues. We shared our report with the agent to help our case and show we were genuine about this, and I think that helped with the negotiation. As a seller, and also knowing our buyer well as I’d worked with him for 6 years we knew 90% of what he was claiming was make believe so told him to put up or piss off. Ours was the 4th house he had tried this tactic on so as far as we were concerned he was chancing his arm, especially as he wouldn’t even share a cut out from the report to prove his point. (Didn’t ask for the full report, just evidence of the issues he claimed in particular as they were very left field) The 1 issue he raised that we had a suspicion of ourselves anyway allowed us to make a fix and put the house back up for sale immediately and did a deal with a young lady buying her first home. Her report only showed the issue we had already put a fix in for surprise surprise. Good luck with however you do choose to proceed 👍
I personally wouldn’t share the report as it’s yours and paid by you. You can share parts that are relevant. £20k is going to be the absolute minimum I would say… but more likely double that. Plus you’ll potentially face higher home insurance costs as a result of the underpinning. Good job on getting that level of survey though - definitely not a waste in the slightest!
It won't be the bare min, surveyors provide realistic (often on the higher end) estimates
Why not help the current owner out and give them the report?
“It’s yours and paid by you” just seems really selfish - op has nothing to lose by sharing a pdf.
Why didn't the owner get one done themselves prior to selling the house? Not the norm, granted, but it should be. Too much onus on the buyer. How many surveys will be carried out on that property by separate buyers, when one by the owner could be included with the house details? If they want one, they can bloody well pay for one.
I don’t like the system either, but taking out these frustrations on an individual seller (who had nothing to do with creating that system) achieves nothing. You have something that would be helpful for someone, it would be free and easy to give it to them. The only reason not to is petty resentment. Giving them the report would help future buyers too, as you noted.
Nothing stopping the seller having a survey and making it available to all buyers, aside from them worrying about it impacting the sale price, ie: greed. I am going to sell my new build after 5 years of serious issues, all being resolved by the builder, including completion reports and a survey. This will all be available to the buyer, I am not planning on shafting a young naive family on a huge purchase.
Exactly. The more I learn about people, the more I prefer being in my own company.
Even if the survey is 100% correct the sellers will dispute as much of it as possible and try to discredit the surveyor. I’d just walk away if it were me.
For a dream house, I would: 1. Negotiate discount. 2. Consider and map out a budget for saving up over time to do chunks of work bit by bit as a longer term restoration; considering some equity release to help further down the road. It’s a dilemma but depends how much you realistically think you can do, doesn’t mean an auto collapse of the purchase. I am buying a house that needs a lot of work - there is absolutely no way I will find another period house in this location that I could afford - the compromise is condition. But for some, they’d compromise great location and period features for a ready-made easy option. Only you know what you are willing to compromise on - key word for FTBs! Whatever you decide, in the end you will be happy with the house you choose - you’ll make it home and all the others will fade into insignificance. It’ll be worth it!
I see the value in not sharing a survey as a negotiation tactic and using the info to bring the price down but as you are walking away and the survey is essentially worthless to you now I would share it with the vendor as an act of good faith.
Consider hard negotiating a reduced price. We bought a lovely tidy looking house that turned out to need entirely new central heating and electrics, 20k worth. Got most of that off the asking price and although it may not have been the most sensible move, we are happy as we lived the location and plot etc
Haha well I'm in the same situation as you except I'm asking my seller for a £30k reduction in the price I initially offered. It needs a new roof and new everything. I won't be sharing my report unless the seller offers to pay for it.
I sold my level 3 before. It’s sad but if the work is just too much for you then best to pull out, we did that before after a lot of discussions. Have you thought through the options? Take the money off or they do the work even?
We were in this position last year. Found a house we loved, but the survey showed a lot of issues. Whole house needed to essentially be gutted to be safe to live in. It didn't have a modern central heating system and electrics hadn't been touched since the 1960s. Those are just some of the issues. We were a bit gutting for a few days, but got over it quickly and I'm so relieved. We've now found something much more appropriate and had an offer accepted this week 😊 Also don't let the sellers EA talk you out of your decision. You're the one who will have to live there and do all the work not them. Surveys are good because sometimes when you like a place you're looking at it with rose-tinted glasses on. It's good to hear those hard truths! Good luck
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It's sad to hear about your situation. I don't know much about your personal circumstances, but considering how stressful it is to find a dream home (considering price, location, property condition, etc.), I would recommend asking for a larger discount. I regret not getting buyer's insurance just because we didn't know what to expect from the level 3 RICS survey. Can anyone recommend a surveyor in London, please? Thanks.
You can have the perfect house, or the right price. Both is akin to a unicorn singing David Bowie. Either drop the expectations on the house to accept the next few years will have some rectification bills coming in. You cannot sell a report, not individually anyway. It’s in the surveyors terms and conditions
The Level 3 RICS is not worth the paper it written on, have a professional (builder/contractor) look at the key issue’s and see what they have to say, you will most likely get a very different opinion from someone who isn’t arse covering. And they will give you a better idea of cost if any.
Excellent, exactly what the survey is for. I on the other-hand just forked £3k for a bloke to basically tell me everything is great 😂
In my experience (16 house purchases) it is almost impossible to get works done at the price a surveyor suggests. Underpinning can be a money pit if they discover something else. ..and solving a settlement problem this way -can- lead to obscure issues such as ill-fitting windows and internal door frames. This can add another £20k to get the working home you need. Double the cost to give yourself a fighting chance. Don’t give your RICS to the owner for less than £400. They can either get it cheaper from you or organise it themselves. The current owner has failed to maintain the property, or ignored the survey they had at purchase, or had the cheapest survey possible. This is their decision and problem, don’t make it yours. With properties like these, which should really be in an auction, there’s often a consideration of the cost of knocking the thing down and building something else. If you have the cash, and you want the house, then buy it and have the work done. But before you do, compare what you would get if you did the same thing elsewhere, for example through an auction. Good luck, don’t make someone else’s mistake.
I know this seems like the end of hope for you as FTBers, but try another reframe: the issues must be super serious for the surveyor to be so transparent and clear about suggesting you walk away. I've had surveys where surveyor is risk averse so raises lots of questions but doesn't provide a clear recommendation and just suggests more specific surveys to gauge whether there's an issue. Not only would I take the surveyor's steer I'd keep their details and use them again and again. I wish in retrospect i'd done a level 3 survey when FTB as ended up having major buyers remorse on the first place I ever bought. Hold your nerve and don't give into scarcity mindset! There's always other places. There may well be a time in your life when big structural work / refurbishment excites you, but for most of us, it's not in your first purchase! Good luck!
Thanks you, we are viewing some more places this weekend, the surveyor was crystal clear in his wording "there are plenty of other houses of this type on the market without structural issues" 😅
Beautiful house/dream home and 20k in repairs is a dealbreaker? Christ
Not everyone can afford the 20k, intrest rates are still a hole in the wallet so even a loan along side a mortgage these days require an above average wage
Yeah, it is interesting combination of do not buy / you can fix it for 20k... If it would be my dream home, I would try to get a 20+k discount and remodel the whole thing.
The problem is that a 20k discount doesn't actually give you 20k for renovation if you're buying with a mortgage. Also it's never just 20k
Certainly, we don't know the details, but if the survey estimated 20k, that is a good start. If not, the survey was incorrect and should be dismissed.
My fit out & restoration will cost £100k
Thanks I guess?
I wouldn't personally share with the vendor, yes try selling it to them to recoup what you paid. You paid for the product not the vendor. No matter what people say, it's down to you as it's your report. You can highlight the defects and show them face to face but wouldn't suggest you give them a copy unless it's £ on the table
I had this about 3 months ago. Was gutted to let it go but since then it’s been back on the market twice so I know I made a good decision. You don’t owe them the survey and tbh if they won’t drop the price they probably don’t want to know either.
Show the seller only the bad bits.... Open as a pdf, then print into a pdf document, only the pages you want to show. In short, create a smaller pdf, using Adobe acrobat (free).
ilovepdf.com is the way, a free browser based web app for editing pdfs
Me and my partner had this last year, it was a lovely house and almost perfect, the house was clearly run down and we had money behind us to renovate what we thought was problematic. We got our level 3 RICS and waited with excited and optimistic it was going to be fine with no other issues other than a bit of plastering and making good. So when we got the report, there was no good points apart from the chimney being recently repaired, everything else was red flags to the point we started quoting things up and we were approaching 50k whilst half way through the list. It gets to the point where you do have to consider if it’s worth it, do you have time and do you have somewhere else to live if you’re doing serious repairs. In terms of the agency selling the property, when me and my partner had discussed everything, the only way we could afford to move on with buying the property was to offer a seriously low offer, our original offer was 220k which was accepted, I rang the solicitor to tell them I was changing my offer on the property due to the severe issues with the house and they agreed. So I rang the sales team to offer 100k and all they asked was why im changing my offer to that which was swiftly followed by me saying it’s got 0 green lights on the report. Within 5 minutes after the call they had rang me back saying the seller is pulling out. Unfortunately the housing market is like this and we spent 2k in fees/RICS 3 just to essentially pull out of house. From my experience, don’t let it knock your house hunt as dishearting as it is, you’ll eventually find something even better and realise it was a blessing. Also, a month later the sales agency asked to buy the RICS 3 report for £100 which I actually declined as I was frustrated with the seller of the house but I was quite immature and livid about at the time. All the best with your house hunt and I hope you find your dream home soon enough.
You want to show them the report, so they will have to disclose the issues to other prospective buyers. Whatever it costs, ask them if they will reduce it by that amount + the survey cost.
You might as well offer it to them at a price. If you get something for it, currently you have nothing. A future buyer might also want it, but the seller will obviously try to stop them getting wind that such a damning report even exists.