Japanese knotweed-agents stopping sale LONG

[pinkie1982]

My grandmother is now staying with my parents after falling down the stairs and breaking her hip on Xmas eve. Her house has been up for sale now for the last month. The plan is to sell both houses and buy a bigger house so that my parents can look after my grandmother, who is almost 80 years old.
She has had three offers on her house. The agents have now contacted my mother to say they have found the knotweed at the back of her garden. The lawn part of the garden is 100yds from the house and a good 30ft higher than the ground that the house is built on (split level garden- bottom half all being concrete).
The agents have now taken the house off of the Internet and advertising it in the shop as 'cash buyers only'. My parents have been to look and there is a small bit in the garden, there is a lot behind her boundary wall and it is pushing the wall over into the back of her fence. This is council owned land.
She is contacting environmental health for the council tomorrow but we are worried that this will stop the house from selling which will be a huge problem as they cannot carry on I the house they are in with an extra person in it. They cannot afford to get a company to start the 3-5 year treatment. Has anyone else has experience of this with the main source coming from council land?

It is the responsibility of the owners of the land the JK is spreading from to put an eradication programme in progress. If it has undermined the wall, they should put that right too. They will have insurance for these kinds of liabilities.

The council will have to act. The reason the EA have the house listed as cash buyers only is because mortgage lenders don't want to lend on properties with JK in the vicinity. It could be worth accurately measuring how far from the house it is.

On the plus side it does sound as though it is a quite a way from the house.

I don't know what the prospects of a sale are with a documented treatment programme underway.

Can they really not afford to have the small amount on your GM's land treated? It should be the council's responsibility, but they might want the peace of mind of knowing it is being dealt with. If treating the JK gets the sale back on track then it's a cash flow issue rather than being unaffordable.

Even if they decide to go down the route of getting specialists in (and/or the council ) to eradicate the knotweed they can't really do anything about it at this time of year. Effective treatment needs to be carried out in late summer (and then takes years or repeated treatment to be eradicate the problem totally).

How frustrating for you all!

There's very little point starting your own eradication action if the council aren't doing the same on their land so first priority is to get them to prioritise it - threatening legal action if necessary. As pp said, no mortgage lender will lend with this problem in place. Could they get the house into a rentable condition and find longish term tenants who want to be there for 3-5 years and use the income to contribute to the mortgage on the new bigger place while eradicating the knotweed for as long as it takes?

Fish that is a very good idea.

It would've been a great idea if it were a better house. It needs about 20k worth of work doing to it which my patents can't afford. Grandmother has no savings and only one parent is working. It's turning out to be a complete nightmare. Grandmother has got worse and has been bed bound for the last four days. My parents house is the only one rentable and they can't move into the other house as needs this work and it's too far away for my mum to get to
Work as she drives.
Thanks for your replies. We have no idea what else to do barr wait for the council to get back to us

Sorry, was meant to say she doesn't drive

Neither house is going to sell that quickly. Grandma needs to go temporarily at least into a suitable care home. Costs can be recouped when the house is sold.

meanwhile you can look into the other actions. But yes, sadly with knotweed on the premises mortgages are hard to get.

Hard, but not impossible to get a mortgage. Our neighbours have just managed it! I think the agents are totally overreaching themselves, it's none of their business, it is up to potential buyers to make the call. It is certainly not a given that it is unmortgageable! What a miserable situation. There's a lot of paranoia around knotweed. We had/have a bit in our garden, mostly now eradicated, luckily not needing to sell. The only way the knotweed would have threatened the structural integrity of our house is if in some freaky postapocalyptic universe it became sentient, walked in and started hammering on the bricks! Honestly, it is an awful thing to build a house on top of, but the chances of it damaging an established house are slim to negligible.

Sounds very odd that an Estate agent would even care, and why have they only found it now? Agree it's not for them to decide how the house is marketed.

I'd be slightly suspicious that your estate agent has a 'friend' or an associate that is a cash buyer, and they are deliberately trying to get a cheap purchase for them.

Change your estate agent.

We had JK in our garden when we bought a house 3 years ago. At the bottom of the garden, a way from the property.
A farmer mate gave up heavy duty probably illegal weed killer & it seems to have gone.
It wasn't mentioned at the purchase of the house, although we all knew it was there.

Agree with housepicturesqueclub.

The EA should be working for you and not purposefully pointing out this problem.

However, you need to be prepared that the knotweed may disrupt an agreed sale as it's likely to come up during survey and standard buyers questionnaire.

Thanks everyone.
No chance of putting her into a care home, no spare cash and she point blank refused to go into a physio centre on discharge from hospital. She isn't an old 80, far from it. Hard cos she was fully independent living alone. She slipped on the stairs in her slippers

Eastwick its a silly situation isn't it. We all knew too when we bought our house., apart luckily from the mortgage co! Our solicitor put a big sign on his notes saying 'DONT MENTION THE KNOTWEED . Luckily our mortgage surveyor apparently didn't know his knotweed from his bindweed! And likewise our neighbour. Surveyor no1 noticed, mortgage refused. Surveyor 2 didn't, so mortgage OK! Sometimes I think the mortgage cos are in cahoots with the kW removal companies, who charge huge amounts of money to stick some glyphosate down a couple of times and give you some worthless certificate in return. Arse-covering is the name of the game, rather than any genuine risk assessment. Very frustrating!

Dig it out, rebuild wall and fence and and get on to council?

There's probably not much point in rebuilding the wall, put a cheap fence up to keep up appearances in the meantime. If the council moves as slooooooowly as they typically do, it's likely you'll only be doing the same thing in a few months.

Contact the council immediately in writing and keep writing to them until they do something about it. Send pictures of the problem, maybe an aerial screenshot of the properties and point out where it's encroaching from the council land. Literally torture them. If you don't have a meaningful response within the next few months appoint a solicitor- you could see if your gran's home insurance would cover legal proceedings against the council if it comes to it. Probably a good chance they'd cover it if she has legal cover. And get a second opinion, that agent sounds like they're up to no good.

Thanks, we had no idea legal assistance on home insurance might cover this, will look into it!

you said she can't live with your parents, where she is now. You said the house needs £20k of work. Someone is going to have to do something they don't like for a while. Sheltered flat?

the weed needs proper treatment, mostly by the council (kick up a big fuss) but also by whoever takes on the house. There are serious rules about disposing of it too. Please do not get cowboys in. It takes 3 years of treatment to eradicate it.

you'll need to sell the place to a cash buyer and take a hit on value.

She is living there but the place is too small for long term.

Japanese Knotweed can be eradicated with persistance. We had it 30 years ago and my brother gradually got rid of it by pouring glyphosate down the hollow stems, when the fancy took him.

Are you sure it is Japanese Knotweed? Check here:

www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?pid=218

www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/364846/Japanese_Knotweed_information_note.pdf

PS, I would be investigating other estate agents.

Sorry no helpful advice but having looked at the link, I think I had this on the garden of a flat I sold 15 years ago . I used to think of it as "The Triffids", but had no idea it was so horrible. It wasn't picked up in the survey, which was done in the winter, when it had died back...

It is awful stuff but as ppl have said upthread it can be got rid of if you are persistent. and yes check if it is actually JK.

Your agents are overstepping their mark drastically. Not all mortgage companies ask about knotweed, it isn't a given that they'll refuse to lend.

I would change agents quickly, they're affecting your sale.

Also, don't dig it up. Get a reputable company in for advice. Basically, it takes a programme of works to remove but it can be done with persistence.

Hubby got rid of our neighbours (on unused waste land) knotweed by injecting the stems with glyphosate for 2 years and it's all totally gone, no sign last year at all. I know that doesn't help you much, but maybe offers some hope that it can be done for minimal cost!

It isn't that hard to get rid of it you use the right weedkiller.I've successfully eradicated it in 4 different gardens over the past 10 years. As people have said,either inject the stems with glysophate or spray the leaves with a solution. Don't use over the counter stuff,it isn't strong enough,Roundup Bioactive is the best one,available from farm suppliers,and use in spring,then September. I think the solution is 1 part weedkiller to 3 parts water. It won't affect pets once it is dry either.