To ask vendor to pay for full amount of damp costs

[madamdoodle]

My husband and I are about 11 weeks into purchasing our dream property - an 1800s cotswold stone cottage - which would also involve relocating to a different part of the SW.

The survey came up with a big red flags, mainly over the extent of the damp and suggested further, more thorough investigations which we’ve got booked in with a local specialist for early next month but the survey came up with £40k worth of red flags… a lot of which we’ve gone through and feel that’s it’s just the surveyor covering their backs so wanted to investigate electrics/plumbing further for a more realistic assessment.. and so far, so manageable.

however on going to visit the property to measure up I noticed for the first time, probably due to recent wet weather, that the ground floor of the house smelt strongly of mildew and was very humid to the point that the furniture was wet! When I pulled a - wet- armchair out to examine the wall behind I could put my finger through the panelling. There was black mould in the cupboards. Upstairs seems unaffected in any obvious way.

I have been digging around as much as I can to research this and ended up speaking to a lime specialist who has experience working with damp in old heritage houses and he told me (on the phone without looking at the issue) that I could expect to be paying in the realms of £40k.

The housing market in the area is slow as it’s rather rural and we were the only people to put in a bid. The vendor isn’t buying another property and so doesn’t need a specific figure but obviously wants to get the best price they can. To pay for a thorough damp survey with a specialist with knowledge in heritage buildings will be £1.2k and I’m hesitant to pay for that unless the vendor is willing to pay for the costs of remedial work needed to rectify the (significant) issues.

AIBU to ask the vendor to agree to absorb the cost of the damp issues which could be anywhere in the region of 15-40k? With the interests rates as they are and to cover the other issues that need addressing - average for age of the property - there’s no way we can afford to pay for it ourselves and would be forced to back out.

if you’ve got this far, thanks for reading!!

I would pull out its hassle you won’t need and very likely to be ongoing

Yep - nice line of drilled holes in the C17th bricks (originally wattle & daub) that does precisely nothing. Must have cost a bomb.

One thing I have learned is that "good ventilation" includes no furniture up against any external wall or you are asking for trouble.

I’m currrently in a 1700s house with no damp issues because no one has ever done anything stupid to it with modern materials. Our previous house was 1850s flint and had been brutalised with chemical dpc, tanking and gypsum plaster. We chipped all the walls back to brickwork and had it re-plastered in lime, painted with breathable paint etc and kept the heating turned up so it was never cold but it seemed the damage had been done and we couldn’t stop the mould growing on the inside of our external walls and in the cupboards it was really grim.

OP, given you are prepared for the "joys" of old houses, I would try asking for the £40k off.

Our survey (all 150 pages of it) came back with north of £150k of work that needed doing. Some we were well aware of, none were urgent and none were of the kind that would make me pull out of a purchase. We did go back post-survey and request £50k off the asking price - they'd had over 50 viewings and everyone but us had run away. We eventually agreed on a £35k reduction... they weren't very pleased but I had been very firm with original offer that it would be lower post-survey.

I shared the results with them, and had their EA on my side (he came round with me and the expert surveyor I hired for the full 4 hours so had heard all the problems first hand).

Pull out and run as fast as you can.