Selling a house- problems with extension

[Dizzylizzie29]

Hello,
After a little bit of advice. We have recently put our house on the market, buyers arranged for a home buyers report which threw up the house was underpinned.
First we had heard of it so we were quite alarmed, anyway to cut a long story short I found the application numbers for the extension on the house and emailed BC who have sent me this - The last inspection was carried out on 09/11/1989 and there were outstanding issues to be addressed. As there was no further contact the file was closed on 16/12/1992.
There was no further contact for inspections. We carried out a routine inspection on 30/07/1993. The file note says "Appears complete on routine inspection. No action due to lapse of time."

Neither of these applications had a completion inspection as we were not contacted to inspect the finished works.

Sorry easier to cut and paste than try and explain it myself.
House was purchased in 2004 by DH and this was not noted anywhere (he also had home buyers survey which didn't throw anything up)
Have rang the solicitors several times, have been told the solicitor who dealt with the purchase no longer works there and they don't know why it wasn't raised.
Now what do I do? I'm pretty annoyed this was never brought to DH attention when he purchased.
Should the solicitor/ surveyor have picked up on this or is it just bad luck?
Sorry for the essay, feeling a bit lost with it all.
X

[Dizzylizzie29]

Buyers pulled out. Now accepted a much lower offer as we want gone

[ChameleonCircuit]

I think regardless of whether the solicitor your DH used still works there, the firm is still liable for his/her mistake. Hope you get something sorted.

[Dizzylizzie29]

What does being liable actually mean for them though? Will they get a slap on the wrist or is there something they should be doing?
I am going to ring again tomorrow and ask for the complaints procedure so I can follow it to a T

[Spickle]

The people who sold the property to your DH should have declared the underpinning in the Property Information Form.if you still have the paperwork from 2004 you could claim from the solicitor your DH used at the time. Otherwise I would think that the file has been destroyed due to the length of time elapsed and therefore all evidence destroyed. The fact that you have discovered inspection reports doesn't mean the solicitor didn't advise your DH about it. Did your DH have searches because you don't have to if there is no mortgage? I would always advise the full structural survey and that's not always accurate.

[prh47bridge]

If the seller was aware of the underpinning they should have declared it on the PIF. If they didn't that is misrepresentation. It is, of course, possible they were not aware of the underpinning if they bought the house after 1993 and the previous seller did not tell them.

If the solicitor was aware that the house was underpinned it should have been brought to your DH's attention but I can see no reason to believe they would have known on the information you have posted.

A home buyer's survey is limited in scope. The surveyor will not look behind furniture, lift floorboards or drill holes. Often the only way to detect underpinning is to excavate a trial hole so a home buyer's survey is unlikely to find it. So no, the surveyor should not have picked up on this.

[Dizzylizzie29]

Thank you for the replies.
The previous owners were the owners when all this work happened. They haven't ticked on the form the house is underpinned. I'm guessing there isn't a right lot we can do about that now.
The extension on the house - they had permission for one thing (one bedroom one garage) and what was actually built was 2 bedrooms, living room etc.
when building control came to inspect apparently they advised on further work but when they next visited too much time had lapsed to take action. As well as the underpinning this is again news to us. I'm just abit amazed such huge works haven't been flagged. DH needed a mortgage x

[Dizzylizzie29]

We have all the documents relating to the sale, solicitors still have them too x

[Dizzylizzie29]

I'm guessing then this goes down to bad luck. Hope karma bites the arse of the previous owners
A tough pill to swallow.
Thanks for taking the time to reply everyone
X

[Spickle]

If the previous owners had the work done, ie underpinning and extension, then they were aware and should have declared it so you may have recourse. I'd definitely ask your solicitors advice on this and see what they suggest. Not many buyers would be keen to purchase while this is ongoing though. Caveat emptor unfortunately. Good luck.