Boundary issue any advice with purchase?

[Foeveryoung1]

I am purchasing a property that has a left-hand side rear garden boundary retaining wall with the neighbours situated at the higher point on the hill. That would be left-hand side with my back against the back of the house.

The wall in question has been assessed by an independent RICS surveyor and separately by a builder as posing a threat to life. It looks like it is on its way to collapse and would severely damage other structures in the garden as well as potential hurt/kill someone if they are unfortunate enough to be around when it collapses.

We have said to the vendor that we would only proceed if they get written legal commitment from the owner that this will be rectified at a specified date.

We are worried that this will be a long drawn out process and not worth our bother of waiting for this to be resolved not least because the vendor will need to determine conclusively who has liability for the retaining wall. We think it is generally the house whose land is being retained by the wall, which would be the neighbours.

Any advice on what we should be wary of? Any experience of this issue? Should we run away from this? Should the council be informed? We’re talking here of nearly 200ft in length and over 2.5 meters in height.

What I would want is for the vendor to get a legal commitment from the neighbour that they would fix the problem

Not good enough. Honestly, they can agree, but never do it. You’d have to take them to court, they could go bankrupt, it could take YEARS.

My colleague was out of their house for 9 year after a subsidence issue. 9 YEARS (I’m shouting!).

It is very possible that the reason this wall has been undermined is work being done by a house one further along who has dug a basement.

Did you see the pictures of the 2 houses in Chelsea that collapsed last week due to a basement excavation?

God if there is a basement involved as well get as far away from this mess as possible.

Building Control can do the work and bill the owner if there is an immediate threat, but if the owner is not certain and possible third party liability then the mess will be overwhelming.

And I'm pretty sure your insurance won't cover anything as the issue would be known at the time you purchased.

You can still have the house, it just needs to be sorted before you exchange. If it can’t I'd run far away, it’s not your problem. I wouldn’t even ask for a reduction as who knows how the cost might escalate once work started.

However, even if it is fixed you’d need to be prepared that it might need doing again at some point in the future - could you afford that?

while it might look like your forever house be wary of getting emotionally attached to that idea so you overlook issues like this.

We moved somewhere that we thought was perfect apart from one potential issue that was unclear how it would impact the house. It could have been nothing or terrible. All the assurances were that it would be fine so we took the risk. It was terrible. We had to move within 3 years of moving there. It nearly caused the breakdown of our marriage and now four years on, it still causes my husband stress. It is simply not worth it. Please don't assume it will be fine.

We had an issue like this in our last house. The neighbour got a digger in and undermined our garden, resulting in the need for a robustly engineered retaining wall on his land. It was an absolutely nightmare getting him to comply - in the end the council did get involved, but only as a last resort. The solicitors bills and stress were off the scale. We were also worried we would have an issue selling, we declared it all and the sale did go through - our buyer fell in love with our property, so we were lucky they were ok with this. Honestly, please, for the sake of your mental health - walk away. There will be another property out there for you.

Surely the vendors should be discussing this with their insurance company?

@Flaunch

Surely the vendors should be discussing this with their insurance company?

The insurance company will only get involved if there is subsidence of some other event...I know a neighbour whose wall was washed away after storms (was extremely old wall).

This is just normal wear and tear on a wall not designed for this purpose. Like others, I would run a mile away from this grief

We’re leaving it for the vendors to sort.

The title deeds says that the property we’re interested in is responsible for the north and west side. This accords with the deeds of the other properties EXCEPT the one who we think is responsible for the problem wall. It’s deed does not include “north” which is the position of the boundary in question.

Anyway, we are certain that we will not exchange any contracts until this is sorted.

Such a shame, but I think the consensus view is right here. It’s not really your dream house bum with such a nasty problem attached to it

Not sure where “bum” came from

Guess what, the property next door is rented. The landlord was contacted by the vendor and what did he do? Say he would buy the house. His solution to the problem is to gazump me.

Well...wasn't expecting that outcome!

That's so bizarre! Maybe he'll fix the issue and then sell on to you?

It’s arrogance and a lack of decency. I am sure when we are out of the picture he will hold the vendor over a barrel and pay them as little as possible using the wall as a threat to keep other buyers away.