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Indemnity for "built-over" sewer, do we really need it? (Victorian building)

7 replies

aufaniae · 14/10/2012 20:27

The buyer's solicitor is asking for indemnity for the channel out the back, under the ground, which takes the waste to the sewers, on the grounds that it has been "built over" and we do not have a "build over agreement".

But how could we possibly have a "build-over" agreement? The bit of house which goes over the sewer is original. It's Victorian. The Victorians were not known for issuing "build-over" agreements!

Do we really need one? I'm guessing perhaps they are assuming that bit of the house is an extension?

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aufaniae · 14/10/2012 20:28

Aargh, what happened to the title?!!

It should say

Indemnity for "built-over" sewer - do we need it? (Victorian building)

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aufaniae · 14/10/2012 21:24

Hopeful bump!

Perhaps I should try again with a readable title!

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tricot39 · 14/10/2012 22:26

I think that they are assuming that that part of the building is an extension too. I assume it comes up as now being owned by a water company on the searches?

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aufaniae · 14/10/2012 22:37

Thanks for the reply :)

AFAIK it's classed as a public sewer, that's what the solicitor is saying anyway.

Do you mind if I ask how you know that?

I also suspect it's just for extensions but I've tried googling and I can't find a definite either way.

Unfortunately my solicitor is useless as I never get to speak to the actual solicitor! The person I speak to can't answer these kind of questions, she passes them on and it takes ages to get a response. If I'd know that before I never would have chosen them. (They were cheap, of course!)

They've got a quite for me of £325 for the indemnity (will get my own quotes if we have to do it) so I'm keen to avoid it!

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oscarwilde · 15/10/2012 15:40

The solicitor is being crap. Personally, I would tell them to stuff it as it is the original building structure [these days you would have to move the man hole]. If they want the house badly enough they will do without it. We were asked for some mad indemnity in case a local church came looking for 100 yrs of back tithes ...... the cover was £85 and the estate agent offered to pay it in order to secure the sale !! Bonkers.
Just as an FYI - I got a quote to move a manhole as we plan to extend over a Victorian side return and it was about £850. So it's not as though if there are any problems, they will have a huge cost to deal with.

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Sallythedog · 16/10/2012 18:26

I'm in a similar situation, except the buildover of the public sewer is in a kitchen extension (there's a manhole), which was done in the 80's. My solicitor is advising that the vendor must provide an indemnity because if the water authority need access to the manhole, they will do what they have to do, but won't necessarily be very careful and won't make good. If that should happen, the indemnity would provide the cash to enable me to return the kitchen to how it was prior to the problem. I don't think it just relates to the cost of having the manhole moved.

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aufaniae · 16/10/2012 19:25

See I could understand it if it was an extension, but the building is original.

No one's going to want to move the manhole cover, there's no where to move it to! It's currently in a small patio area, if you extended over that then all drains would be totally inaccessible. The council would never give permission for it.

I think I'm going to refuse this. It's not coming from the mortgage provider.

If they want indemnity, they can go get it themselves!