Buying off plan - advice/tips

[Dinosauraddict]

Hi All, I was buying a wonderful old cottage (I like old and quirky) but it's fallen through. It's the second one to fall through - one we had to pull out of as the survey was awful, major damp and woodworm. So now we are looking at a new build, and are considering buying off plan. I've never done this before and we're going to an open day next week. What do I need to look out for? What should I ask? (If it's relevant we're cash buyers and not too concerned about completion date, but I want to do as little work to a property as possible once we're in.)

Plot - most important of all. Is there enough parking, suitable front garden (not so everyone walks past your windows or lights sign through. Where are the street lamps, some people on our estate have them so close to windows! Is the garden big enough, go for one on a bigger plot if possible you'll never regret it even if it means waiting. Avoid plots with visitor parking outside as they become a residents permanent parking place and it'll drive you insane.

If there is green space council won't adopt so check what management company fees are per year.

Ask where speed bumps are if any, the noise of people driving fast over them will drive you insane!

Check whether solar panels or other green things included and that you own them outright

Check for mine shaft knowledge - depends where you are in the country

Check plans for internet, don't assume like we did that it will be the most modern!

Any weird covenants

USE YOUR OWN SOLICITOR

Hope that helps

Wow @Minnie881 that's incredibly helpful thank you!

Buying off plan, check what's included and what's optional, that there is the 10 year NHBC warranty.
Newbuilts can often have tiny rooms so be very careful with your measurements to make sure your stuff fits.

Agree about looking at different plots with the same house.
If there is a Show Home check if the spec you see there is the actual spec in your house.
There is frequently a lot of upgrades which you might have to pay for.

Ask to see electrical plan - it's a lot easier to add extra sockets now rather than when you move in.
Landscaping. Is any included, ditto patio. Our new build patio was actually just a slightly wider path round the back.

If there's no show home ask if they would allow you in another of the same type that's finished but not moved into. We had to do that.

Definitely check streetlights, some of the ones on ours are right outside bedroom windows.

Another tip on plot, try to see it. An estate near us has properties at the edge and on plan they have decent gardens. What it doesn't show is the gardens are very shaded and the boundary is wild hedging and trees. Trees all have preservation orders so they lose a chunk of their garden to the whoppers and all their light.

They also built next to a workshop that does incredibly noisy work 8am-7pm every week day. It doesn't come up in searches so you wouldn't know unless you heard it. Workshop is obscured from view so you wouldn't necessarily notice to ask

Check if the garden is south facing etc, my DS wanted to buy one with a North facing garden I persuaded him that it was not a good idea.

He pointed out to me the house he had originally chosen and the garden is permanently in the shade.

It matters so much more in new builds as the gardens are much smaller.

If there is a show home, look at it critically. Furniture is often scaled down to make rooms look larger. Check there is enough room to pull out dining chairs. In bedrooms check to see if it contains all the furniture you’ll need in yours - not just a bed but a wardrobe, chest of drawers, bedside tables etc. Is there a laundry/utility room or are laundry facilities confined to the kitchen? If so, is there actually space for them? What landscaping is planned? Check what you’ll get patio-wise etc.
Bargain hard if you’re cash buyers. If they won’t come down on price see if they’ll add things - additional landscaping, extra electrics, alarm system etc. Check provisions for adoption of roads, water pipes etc. If there’s a management company check what plans are for future running of it.
I’ll second to use a solicitor who is completely unconnected with the developer.

Make sure you know where the windows are! DD looked at a studio in London that on paper looked fine, but when you walked in, the only small window (600mm-ish) was at right angles to the room (kink in outside wall), and the space was soooo dark.

That's fantastic, thank you everyone. Particularly the windows and street lights - would never have thought of those!

Beware the major builders.

If there are “extras” that you can add, choose those which would be a pain to add later. More electric sockets than you think you need, loft ladder, tiled kitchen floor etc etc

Definitely see an identical show home. We were ok to do this as there was one on the same estate. But just to get a feeling for the space and layout rather than their high spec fittings.

Also

check what the house will look like externally. This sounds stupid, but what I had no idea about (and no-one told us when we bought off plan) is that although the interior of the house was identical to the show home and sales blurb, the exterior was not the same.

In fact there are four houses on (phase 2) of our estate which are internally identical, but look very different from the outside. One of those is ours. (Build in red brick, black door, white window frames) one is the show home (yellow brick) , one has green wooden fascias and grey door, grey frames, and the fourth has different windows completely. For some reason our garage is in yellow brick as well, so it doesn't match the house. It honestly never occurred to me that it would look different to the pictures/show home. I don't mind it now but I was not happy at the time.

Definitely look at the plan hard. Check for overlooking properties, and not just the size of the garden and the direction its facing, but also the slope. We knew ours wouldn't be flat but its really annoying me now. We only got a bit of patio, but turf was included.

Also they wouldn't add in a garage door (as in a pedestrian door) for our double garage. It seemed stupid when they hadn't even built the garage yet, but it wasn't an option, so we will have to get one cut in at some point.

I pondered over the add ons for a long time, and decided that I wanted some in built wardrobes. In the show home, they had lots of them, but I didn't think I needed them all and I'm glad I just chose one each for the kids rooms as they seem much bigger than the show home rooms.
The add on price to add a shower over the bath was outrageous. We paid it anyway but seriously ridiculous.
The add on price to add rails to our walk in wardrobe (they don't come as standard - its just a small room) was also outrageous. Rails!

Agree streetlight. We have one directly outside our bedroom window, however I knew this was going to be the case so I bought a blackout roller blind as well as blackout curtains.

Don't forget to ask about charges. Maintenance/service/whatever its called, its whacked on top.

Get hold of a plan (for your location) and keep hold of it. Barratt homes conveniently keep being unable to locate the plans (seriously!) and we had to fight to get our tree in the garden, which we knew was on the plan.

Thank you! @lovelyupnorth it's a v small building company (which actually worried/s me?) but @sugarbum because the development is so small there definitely isn't a show home. Lots to think about though.

Check if there is any commercial units on the ground floor, what usage will they be...if hot food outlets pay cause issues in getting a mortgage. Any property which isn't easily mortgageable by the majority of high street lenders I would stay away from as when it comes time to sell you don't want your buyer to have issues in arranging their mortgage. You'll almost always find a lender but would you really want it to be an obscure lender with rubbish rates...

We also bought ours from a small builder and its only an estate of 31 houses, we've not seen the levels of complaints the likes of taylor wimpey and persimmon get. There's been some issues but nothing major and all put right fairly quickly. We found extras were cheaper than when we had looked with TW.

Thanks @hartof that's reassuring. Our potential development is even smaller than 31 but we've got an appointment over the weekend to go and see what they're like in person. I am armed with a list of questions!

You've been given some great advice here & I can't really add to it. We moved into our home we'd bought off plan 5 months ago now. There wasn't a show home for our house either so we had to attempt to visualise how it would be. We didn't see inside our house until a few weeks post exchange & it was a pleasant surprise how much hallway space we had & how many nice touches we had like glass shelving in bathrooms, mirrors & under sink storage.

We bought off a known builder, (but not one of those with a really dodgy rep where literally everything is an added option). All the little bits that you would want, like an outside tap & full tiling were included. Even recycling bins. Plus our gardens were turfed & planted. It is definitely worth paying a little extra for quality. We are on a large development & were the first ones on our road. It is lovely that we are getting to know all our neighbours & creating a wonderful new community.

Only other thing I would say is to make friends with the sales staff & don't be afraid to haggle on price. If there are people already moved in ask them what kind of deal you can get. Don't ask don't get! Good luck. You won't regret it!

Reserved a plot this morning - thank you for all the advice!!