We paid £600 to get the house surveyed before we bought it....

[TheNoiseHurts]

...just in case something huge like the roof needed doing.

We got what we thought was a decent surveyor with good reviews.

We have lived here 6 weeks, the roof is leaking and is going to cost us 8-9k to repair.

What exactly is the point of surveyors?!

Fuck.

(Obviously the survey showed nothing!)

And it was a full structural survey

Literally no point to them at all IME. For the cheaper ones (like your £600) they don't even leave the car, they just park up and have a quick look from the road.

Waste of money!

The felt needs replacing and tiles need replacing.

The fault would have been there for a long long time. The previous owners would have known too.

That wasn't the cheap one.

That was the most expensive of their options

A full structural survey with a 34 page review with photos.

I feel your pain although I haven't had it quite so badly. Regrettably surveys are so hedged around with caveats that they can cause these problems, and the RCS really close ranks if you dare to question one of their members.

the reason for surveys is to improve the chances of insurance cover - any possibility of that paying out?

Sue them for negligence
Your home insurance will usually have cover for legal fees for this sort of thing
What did the survey say about the roof felt/condition/tiles etc?

How big is your roof!? Have you had a second opinion on the roof - we had our (slate) roof replaced for that...

Most surveys, even full ones, state in the small print that they haven't been out onto the roof because of safety issues. Was there evidence of a leak inside the property when you moved in, or did it look OK? If there was evidence internally then the survey should have picked up on that but otherwise unfortunately there is not much you can do. Would it have stopped you buying the house anyway though?

Go back to the surveyor. They should be insured for this kind of oversight.

we had our survey done in the summer as we were moving in july, and windows were fine then come the winter 6 months down the line one of my kitchen windows the rain is pouring in when the rain hits at a certain angle, so quite a big job to rectify but in june no way could the surveyor have picked this up winter is hard on houses

After we moved in we noticed a fault the surveyor has missed and complained to them. They paid out for it to be put right.

@TooTrusting has a good point. Years ago, some friends started proceedings against their surveyor when their roof started sagging in the middle and it transpired that the previous owners had replaced the original slates with much heavier tiles without adding in any extra support for the ridge.

They got the whole roof replaced, some new timbers, new guttering and downpipes (aka rainwater goods, which always makes me chuckle, for some reason ), all at the expense of the surveyors liability insurance.

I don't know how big the roof is.

Big-ish I suppose? 5 bedrooms.

I will go back and look at the small print. A quick look in the loft would have given them the answer to be honest.

Thats a hell of a quote for replacing tiles and felt - does it include costs for internal repairs as well? Unfortunately it is part of the risk when buying houses - even with full surveys they aren't really worth the paper they are written on. I would be tempted to go back to the surveyor though and see if you have any comeback on this.

We have had 5 quotes, we were hoping it was too much as well 😭

We need scaffolders and stuff.

I dunno, apparently that's what it's going to cost.

It includes a tiny velux and some other bits. Facias or something? I dunno.

This is why we got the cheapest survey because even if you get the most expensive they still just sit in the car outside and go "yep, that's a house". They are so full of caveats they are not worth the paper they're written on.

What exactly is the point of surveyors?
Not much. When I moved here I considered having a super duper survey but when I read all the small print it basically said "you can pay us lots but don't come crying if we miss anything"

Fuck.

Fucking bastards.

Go back to the surveyor... see what they say. Check that they are properly affiliated and follow the complaints procedure.

Good luck.

Have you asked them how they missed this?

This is why we got the cheapest survey because even if you get the most expensive they still just sit in the car outside and go "yep, that's a house".

That is, of course, rubbish, hence why the OP received a "34 page review with photos". We got the same.

It's true that they're too full of caveats to be able to rely on them finding everything there is to find. That doesn't make them useless, as what they DO find is valuable. Our survey highlighted a number of issues we were able to fix after moving in before they got worse.

I did wonder that when we bought our first house. To be fair, he did pick up on a few things - none of which put us off as we were buying a fixer upper - but my god was the small print thorough. So many caveats at the end of it basically suggesting we get professionals of every other trade (woodworm, roofers etc) to look and confirm before we buy and that they were liable for bloody nothing.

Last time we were buying my uncle - ex surveyor for an insurance company - did an informal survey for us and it was much more helpful. He went around for 3 hours, I trusted the results and he did it for free.