Renegotiating the price post survey.

[Didicat]

So we got our structural survey back, had a specialist builder come to estimate the costs to put right. Only the top 3 things on his list which were desperately need sorting came to £34k.

We’ve made a reduced offer, still waiting for a response.

If you loved the house, top of your budget, what price reduction would you ask for?

Thanks in advance.

It depends whether the things that needed sorting were new or already known from viewings etc, and whether it’s already priced in to the asking price.

If it is completely at the top of your budget, presumably you have no real choice but to ask for the full 34k off?

If you have room to manoeuvre, I would ask for 30 and settle for 25. But it depends a bit on the sort of work as well

What @milienhaus said - if these things genuinely only came to light at the point of the survey, then i would take off the full cost of the works off my offer. If they’ve already priced it lower because of work that needs doing, then they might not accept a lower offer but should have told you about the work before you offered.

Yes I agree with @milienhaus did you know the defects needed fixing when you viewed the property and put in an offer?

Our house needed roof works doing which came out in the survey but wasn't apparent when viewing.

We got a couple of estimates ranging from 8-14k for the work. We desperately wanted the house and had some contingency so we asked for 7k off the price which was accepted. I think we offered to show the vendors the estimates so they knew we were legit.

Did you know it needed the work doing when you put the offer in? If its a sold as seen might be harder to negotiate.

If it's essential work I would only proceed provided I had the cash to sort it. Would go for £40k off.

Does depend what essential work is though. I would class stuff like structural soundness, water ingress, roof in that. Not cosmetic or to taste stuff like dated interiors.

Although I've never really understood why it's considered bad form to renegotiate on an offer. I totally understand it irritates the vendor. But it's my money and a house that needs significant building work is a financial liability.

All the work is structural in nature, and not having an eye for how old buildings should be cared for, the estate agent came round with us and the builder, she clearly had no clue either.

It’s a lot of brickwork, chimneys and reducing water ingress into the building.

We’ve sent the estimate to the estate agent to pass on to the vendors.

With the saving on stamp duty, we have got some additional funds, but not all of it, but we could save between no and next spring which is when we would have to wait for a builder to come free at any rate.

I hate waiting for the estate agent to get back to us, barely slept!

Thank you everyone for your responses.

When looking around houses dh always asked the question- is there anything significant likely to come up on the survey?
One person mentioned the flat roof so we mentally reduced our offer before survey. Then the survey showed a couple of other things (the vendor must have known about) and we reduced the offer by that again.
This was 2008 so peak credit crunch

Look at it from the other point of view - what reduction would you accept on a property you were selling? Was the property being sold in need of updating? How intrusive is the work?

We pulled out of one purchase, not because the seller wouldn't reduce the price much but because the nature of the work was intrusive enough to put us off the whole property.

Other times we asked for a reduction based on cost of work and who benefits from the improvement. I wouldn't expect a seller to pay the cost of reroofing but I would expect the price to reflect work was needed.

@C8H10N4O2 The property was marketed as recently renovated, the inside has been prettified.

All the work quoted for is external, so would not be too intrusive.

We renovated ours literally did everything barring a couple of ceilings, we had no expectations about anything coming up on survey.

@blastthepast I think it will be a shock, as they seemed to think everything was ok......

I am going to be on tenterhooks all the time until I hear from the estate agent, we wanted to be in before September.

The property was marketed as recently renovated, the inside has been prettified

So the above applies but also significant structural work. Red flag time for me. I would wonder what has been covered up by studwork, plaster and paint.

@Mulledmead

Yes I agree with *@milienhaus* did you know the defects needed fixing when you viewed the property and put in an offer?

Our house needed roof works doing which came out in the survey but wasn't apparent when viewing.

We got a couple of estimates ranging from 8-14k for the work. We desperately wanted the house and had some contingency so we asked for 7k off the price which was accepted. I think we offered to show the vendors the estimates so they knew we were legit.

I’m in a similar position to this, had my survey come back on Wednesday and it’s mentioned problems with the roof and suggested replacing in the next 3-5 years. That just won’t be in my budget so I’ve thrown it back to the solicitors to see what the sellers say. It obviously wasn’t visible from the viewings but from the loft, there’s daylight seen through the roof!

It’s bought up some other issues which I half expected / can’t be too concerned with - decking needs replacing, some dodgy electrics in the outbuildings (which I plan to knock down anyway), so I wouldn’t ask for a renegotiation on these things as they won’t cost me any more money than I’d already budgeted for.... but the roof is a real concern!

he property was marketed as recently renovated, the inside has been prettified

Like tilder I'd also wonder what might have been botched if the renovations were to make it look good rather than structurally sound.

FWIW the property we simply pulled out of was like this. We could see some stuff - like older windows - but they looked well maintained/painted and the decor was something we could just live with for a long time (and with small kids that was a factor - we didn't want another renovation job).

Surveyor found half the metal framed windows wouldn't even open due to corrosion which had been painted over and a damp problem all around the house which would have been very messy to repair and require near complete redecoration and other problems with the roof etc.

The windows/roof issues would have been a case of agreeing a fair reduction but the intrusive nature of the damp issues and other repairs meant it was priced as "good" whilst really being in need of significant doing up.

They were not willing to negotiate on price, but by then we had decided to pull out anyway.

We ended up buying another wreck in need of doing up but knowing what we were buying. We are yet to buy a house from a living person!

Depends on how much properties nearby are asking and also recently sold ones. I don't know I'd be keen to buy a house that needed immediate structural work. It might uncover loads more problems. But if I loved the house and had funds then fine. Did the price already reflect work that needs done. Are their other buyers interested? How disappointed will you be to lose the house?

Well we didn’t hear anything today so will have to wait till Monday

We’ve normally gone for 50:50 agreement as both sellers and buyers - but it’s always been 5-10k so it’s not huge stuff.

In one instance though a survey revealed 50k of completely unexpected stuff - rotten floor joists, roof problems, water ingress, etc. We knew the house needed serious cosmetic updating and the price reflected that, but not serious structural stuff. Buyer was stroppy about it all, not prepared to negotiate whatsoever. We had no option but to walk away.

Not buyer stroppy - seller!

I'd be wary of buying anything with a surprise survey result of £34k of urgent works unless the house was £1m+. And even then.

You can't know the rest of the story until you get under the hood and that chassis is pretty rusty. The fact that it's been "prettified" suggests this may be a known issue.

I'd back away.

@Anothernamebitesthedust we have offered a similar split to the costs, they are moving abroad, they have already taken 60% of the house Contents abroad in the 5 weeks since offer.

You expect houses of that age to have quirks and a few issues, the work required to the house is due to not understanding historical methods and using the wrong materials that need remedial work. Just it’s very labour intensive and more expensive materials.

Today we pulled out after a lot of thinking we decided the faults with the house were their liabilities and we weren’t keen to pay to fix them after an insultary offer from them. We will now be looking for a rental.