Found out devastating news about house we are about to buy, Should we pull out?

[Welikethemoon]

We were all set to move, got everything in place, went for second viewing to show our daughters thier new house for the first time. Owner was there so I asked her about the flood risk which has come up as surprisingly high on the survey. She looked shocked and said she thought we knew it had been flooded twice in last 10 years but flash flood rain water run off and also before she moved in. She had instructed estate agent to tell everyone who viewed. We have had the offer accepted since April, estate agents just told me, sorry they "forgot" to tell us. Now don't know what to do. Thus was supposed to be our "forever" home, that had everything we needed. I have a very specific list of things I wanted and this ticks all the boxes, there us nothing else currently on the market that comes close. It's a significantly bigger mortgage than current place. I don't want to move again after this. Seller has said she has put in extra drainage since the last flood, but it hasn't been tested in similar conditions since so no guarantee it would work. Plus with climate change its more likely to happen.
Husband still wants to move, I'm not so sure. What would you do? AIBU to pull out now, risk losing our buyers and wait for a better house to come on the market?

@MaitlandGirl are you actually in the town your name suggests? I grew up there. Hope you are ok in the floods!

Is it really a surprise? We live in a city where certain areas are known to flood. The price for one of these properties alone rings alarm bells. Then you have your conveyancers flood report which you even state is surprisingly high risk of flooding.

You need to walk into this eyes wide open because it sounds like our city where it is impossible to insure these houses and you are pretty much GUARENTEED a flood every 5-10yrs. Thats when we hear the moaning of all the people who want government help because they took advantage of a cheap house to live in that had a HUGE risk.

It will flood. If its happened twice in last 10yrs it will be on an insurance register to EXCLUDE flooding. I would move on quickly of budget a LOT of money for entire downstairs contents including tanking the building (Possibly already done) or maybe the same money but in flood prevention. A few bits of drainage does not stop this type of flooding.

The only caveat to this is if the local council has somehow spent 10's of millions on redirecting the waterways which our has done but even then, they have just moved the problem further down the line.

I'd pull out the risk of flood would be devastating

I'd pull put now. Far more expensive to manage flood damage in the long run than the costs paid out so far.

If you don't pull out, you're a fool. You'll spend so much money on insurance if you get it, and if you don't you'll need a lot of money to replace stuff when it gets ruined.

Absolutely loads of houses are or will be flood risks now and in the future. Personally I would be reassured about the woman doing the work on the house and I would take steps like tiling the ground floor rather than carpets and having the electrics wired off the ground (new regs mean they already have to do this now).
any of our houses could flood or have issues. Get a drainage expert or flood expert (if they exist) to assess what might be going on and go from there. It’s not the end of the world though.

its a hard one what do the solicitors recommend-surprised the lender is still ging ahead if its not discounted

You may find the mortgage offer will be pulled so the problem will be taken out of your hands, same for the insurance

I would absolutely walk away

We used to have a house with a cellar that flooded and that was bad enough

This should certainly have come up in the solicitor's enquiries. Either the solicitor was at fault for not asking or the seller was at fault for not saying.
You can also check these things on line. We checked land records for our house before buying and found there was a pollution risk from industrial work in that area in Victorian times. We bought anyway and had the soil analysed before growing vegetables.
In your case I would walk away.

@Welikethemoon the searches will return flood risk? Wait for those.

Don’t do it. The cost of your insurance will be well into the thousands if you manage to get any.

have you tried to get insurance for it yet?… ring up or go in line and see for yourself. Once you disclose the flooding it’s a decline. You clearly need flood cover, so…

We live in a city where certain areas are known to flood. The price for one of these properties alone rings alarm bells

But at least the price reflected the risk

Down from where I used to live a new development was built on a flood plain, in one of these crazed schemes seen too often. Called "The Duck Pond" by other locals, those prices certainly weren't a bargain, and worse still the developers were selling them with "a year's free insurance"

Or to put it another way, "We know you'll struggle in future, but by then it won't be our problem"

I wouldn't buy it.

OP, tell us more about the situation of the house. Is it in a city/rural/new development, etc? DH works for the Environment Agency and has, for example, managed to solve flooding from farmers' fields that went into local houses and a church. Often it means working with farmers to try to stop compaction from heavy machinery working on already wet ground, and squashing out the air gaps so the water can't sink in. Even flooding of our local town centre was traced back to water running off farmers' fields on the hill above. But anyway, tell me a bit more about your situation (PM if necessary) and I'll ask him. What did the current owner say about the circs of the flooding?

Do you remember the scenes of people standing in their flooded houses on the news? It must be heartbreaking and so utterly stressful to deal with. I'd pull out.

Don't pull out until you've done your research and spoken to your solicitor as you've already forked out for the searches.

If it's surface run off flooding there may be mitigations that can be put in place, we recently viewed a house which was high risk on the Environment Agency map but the owner had invested in extra garden drainage. Half the estate was classed as high risk on the map, but its been a popular residential estate since it was built in the 1970's with only minimal issues for certain properties, so you need to check the details before making a decision. Although twice in 10 years doesn't sound great. . . .

This episode of Radio 4 You and Yours programme about flood risk insurance may be of interest too www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0742kw2

I recently read that 1 in 5 house chains are collapsing at present, and anecdotally of the 10 houses we've viewed 4 have returned to market, so don't get so emotionally invested until you're much further through a sale!

Err, yes it is.
Hundreds of pieces of research are available to show this. Here’s a peer-reviewed paper from the university of Sheffield from 2019, for example:
“in this paper the modelling that was undertaken to try to quantify the changes in risk, together with the effectiveness of responses in managing that risk, are described. It shows that flood risks may increase by a factor of almost 30 times and that traditional engineering measures alone are unlikely to be able to provide protection.”
www.oieau.org/eaudoc/system/files/documents/40/204328/204328_doc.pdf
I don’t have an opinion on what OP should do but please post scientifically accurate information on a public forum.

I think you've had a very lucky escape OP. I can't believe your solicitor didn't point this out and warn you re the flooding. What do you pay them for. A good one would have been raising this as a red flag.

I would pull out and also try to get some of the money you've spent off of the EA. them 'forgetting' to tell you has caused considerable inconvenience.

@Welikethemoon You're not that far along at all. I thought you had exchanged contracts by what you implied, but you've only just started really. Your mortgage company may not be willing to lend you the asking price on a house that has a history of flooding. The sale price should have reflected that, it's surprising that it doesn't considering it will come to light! You will probably struggle to get insurance cover - which is a part of the contract with the mortgage company - that will cover the buildings against the flood risk (and I'd expect a huge excess to apply). These are two huge issues.

I'm surprised that the vendor hasn't had her own reports regarding the flood prevention measures taken. I'm sure I would if I were in her position. In the forms which are part of the contract between the vendor and the buyer, the question "Has the property ever flooded?" is directly asked, so you would have found out about then if not before.

In your position, I would pull out before I spent any more. Your buyers may wait for you to find another property or you could try to move into rented in the meantime (not that that's easy) in order to keep the process going. The vendor would have to reduce the price substantially before I would reconsider tbh, and even then it's still a huge risk and every time it rained hard...

Pull out. That was a lucky encounter!!

You need more information - was the property damaged, how badly, what measures have been put in place and ideally get a professional to give a view on whether they will be effective. Then armed with your information you argue for a discount, if you decide to proceed at all. It's not necessarily a deal-breaker

This is the burning question. I suspect you wouldn't have offered at all if you'd known up front but if you are thinking of proceeding, you need to drop the offer, in my opinion.

I wouldn't buy a house that has been subject to flooding and the risk is still there.

No, twice in 10 years is a LOT and it will get worse z you’ll struggle to get insurance and are you sure the previous flooding has caused underlying problems??

Climate change or not, it can also be housebuilding removing areas of land drainage, people concreting over front and back gardens .... roads built across natural drainage areas, farmers not having the manpower to clear gullies or ditches, the EA and Highways agencies not clearing culverts.