Legal action against seller with subsidence?

[EmW1987]

Hi hoping you can help advise. We brought a house (almost 2 years ago now) but within 4 months of moving in some major cracks appeared in the House. We now know that there is subsidence and are pursuing a claim through our insurance people to rectify the issue.
However, I’m wondering whether we have any right to seek legal action against the seller of the property? None of the searches revealed anything about subsidence however I know now that the two houses either side of the property have both had work for subsidence and our neighbour confessed that when his house was being fixed the previous owner of our house called his insurance people to see if they would fix his house at the same time/do the same work to his house. Why would he do this if he didn’t think there were any signs of subsidence? Don’t they have to declare this when they sell the property? We have also seen where he has filled in a number of cracks - although I appreciate this doesn’t mean he knew it was subsidence. I just wondered if anyone had experience or knew whether we could do anything about it? Every part of me is convinced that the seller knew there was subsidence!

I'd have thought you should pursue this with the surveyor who failed to notice, not the seller.

Yep, agree that the surveyor is at fault here not the seller. The seller should have declared any work done on subsidence as well so consult your solicitor/conveyancer that dealt with your purchase.

Is it a new house? I used to live in an area known for subsidence (sandy) so you got used to looking for the warning signs!

Your insurance company will probably pursue it with the surveyor on your behalf.

I’d probably go down the surveyor route first, but failing that this article suggests you may be able to bring a claim against the previous owners if they concealed the cracks or knew about the issue.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.lovemoney.com/news/amp/21315/what-should-you-declare-selling-your-home-property-information-form

Thanks everyone that’s really useful to know. Nothing revealed anything about subsidence although I know now that most of the houses in our road have been affected by subsidence - in fact the surveyor was off to check a bungalow 3 doors down straight after ours! The survey (we paid for a full building survey - the most comprehensive one available) did say there was an oak tree near the property (which is the cause of the subsidence) but nothing further. We did find the surveyor useless because when we first went in the loft we found there had been rat poo everywhere and there was no mention of that, although surely a rodent infestation should have been mentioned (granted that’s not structural but I’m still angry anyway!)

If the previous owner had called his insurance company and asked them to look at doing possible subsidence-related work to his house and they didn't do this, then surely that would suggest that at this point in time, there was no significant subsidence to his house?

Our neighbours both sides have had subsidence treated. Our house has many cracks. We have had 3 structural engineers out. One for our survey just noted the cracks. The other two were for our insurance company when we reported the cracks and said it was "just movement" and we have reports with this in writing. When we come to move, we will provide those reports that refuse to use the word subsidence.

It is the surveyor you need to sue, and good luck with that because the ranks will close tight. Speak to your insurers.

There have been a few court cases on this, and unfortunately even when the sellers have lied on the property information form the judges rule in favour of them quoting caveat emptor (buyer beware), and putting the onus on the purchaser to do their own due diligence before buying. A couple of years ago there weren’t many reports that would cover subsidence, but there is a very good company out there now called Terrafirma who carry out desktop risk assessments prior to purchase. Might be worth looking at them to get a better idea of what the problem is..