Offered on a Grade 2 Listed house, can we take out an indemnity insurance for work done by previous owners?

[Swifey]

We are slightly concerned that the people who own it now have altered it in some ways and wanted to protect ourselves. I presume that the survey will pick up most of this stuff? We are having the full one.
Is it worth meeting the conservation officer before hand? Tia

Indemnity insurance is insurance against effectively "being found out" and is rendered invalid if you do anything to make the planning & conservation people notice you. I would expect that meeting the conservation officer would come under that category.

Ah ok, thanks. So do we just hope that the surveyor picks everything up when S/he goes there?

When I was interested in a house like this I got all the consents from the local authority and compared them with what had actually been done to the house. It was fairly straightforward and I didn't want to risk surveyor or solicitors missing anything - or indeed, paying for those things before I knew the works were all legit.

I wouldn't 'just hope' with the surveyor - you need to instruct them very clearly, and presumably, pay them more. I'm not aware of checking listing details being in their normal course of work - though not an expert.

I would check with your solicitor. Works to a listed building without the right permission is actually a criminal offence so not sure if indemnity insurance would cover that. With a LB I would always try and regularise the work as you need permission for all internal and external work, so if you wanted to do any work in the future it may be noticed then anyway.

I have a II* listed house. All the previous works are listed in the deeds, with all the licenses. Your solicitor should be well on top of all of that. Our surveyor was a specialist in listed properties, he was no more expensive than anyone else. The estate agent may know someone - your solicitor can't recommend (I think)

If someone should come round and find an unlicensed work they won't go straight to prosecution. They will discuss it with you - we have a couple of 'illegal' windows and a plastic drainpipe, both are noted by the previous owner as having been there when he bought it, so they have been in place for 20+ years. We have spoken to the conservation officer and they are happy to let things be... with the caveat that we will remedy them if/when we do any works or local grants become available.

If you buy then as soon as you become the owner all changes in breech of the listing are your responsibility to put right. However, as curious says conservation officers are usually quite reasonable about time frames and enforcement.

When I bought a Grade II listed house, searches turned up a lack of permission for an Aga flue installed 20 years previously; I was told by the builder, estate agent and the conveyancing solicitor that I could get an indemnity against it, because the previous owner had done the same and it hadn't been chased in the 15 years she'd owned the property. Everything else had been done to the book. The council were fine about retrospective permission.

The sellers should buy the indemnity insurance, they will fe indemnifying you against any future claims and they'll need to certify that they haven't done anything they shouldn't have done.

They won't get it if they've previously been in touch with the conservation officer or are acknowledging they've done work illegally