To ask for the plans for a loft conversion before buying a house?

[squeekywheel]

We've found a house we like. It's lovely, four beds, conservatory, big garden, good schools etc.

However, it has a half finished loft conversion. Would I be unreasonable to ask to see the plans for it before putting in a final bid? I don't really want to shell out for a survey for a total lemon and I have some suspicions that it won't meet building regs anyway. They haven't applied for approval from the council- I checked.

Bump

Definitely ask. A (somewhat naive) colleague bought a '3-bed' house (the third room being a loft conversion) in a private sale - and when he came to sell it, no estate agent would touch it because there was no evidence of it meeting building regs - so he had to sell it as a 2-bed, losing a lot of money in the process...!

No harm in asking. Approval may not be needed if it’s permitted dev. But there should probs be a building regs application? Have the conversation with them.

Yes, I would definitely ask. We sold a house where we had plans drawn up and permission granted for an extension which was written in the legal contract. It was definitely a selling point and the family that bought it went ahead with the building work and still live there.

Even though our loft conversion was within permitted development we still applied for a "certificate of lawfulness" from the council on the advice of the loft conversion company. They wouldn't start work without it. Didn't take long to get the certificate.

At the end we also had to get a building regs certificate when it was done. Had a couple of checks throughout the build and a final visit at the end.