Subsidence problem on survey

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Has anyone got any experience with subsidence?

This has come up on the survey of the house I am supposed to be buying. They think it’s as the back of the property is on a fairly steep slope and there is a cracked drain in the front garden.

They’re unsure if this is an active shift or not (would need 6-12 months to know). I’m still waiting for the full report on Friday.

I’m a FTB so completely unsure how this works. We had the mortgage approved on a valuation survey.

Obviously this is a fairly significant issue and I feel it is unlikely that the house would sell unless this is fixed. What would be the done thing?

Can we ask house to fix this before we go ahead with the sale? Or would the done thing be to get quotes for the work and reduce our offer to reflect this? If that is the case, as the valuation for the mortgage offer has been done, would we still get given the full amount of the mortgage so if we make the offer, we have the cash to fix it? Or do we need to back and tell the mortgage company who will likely reduce our mortgage offer?

I’d really like to find a way round this as whilst the house isn’t my perfect forever home, the location is absolutely fantastic and we’re unlikely to match it (semi rural village, very close to where I keep a horse, perfect for mine and partners work, have friends in the village etc) but we are prepared to walk away if need be.

To add;
If quotes etc were done and showed the work to be 5-7k, we could absorb that and just make a lower offer to reflect that regardless of mortgage situation as have some cash to do some work to the house anyway but from looking online there is potential for it to cost significantly more.

I would walk away.
Cost
Time and effort
You wil pay £££££ for it in terms if future insurance premiums even if the vendor fixes it!
Not worth in imo.

Walk away- it could me a minefield and You will struggle to get house insurance now and in the future

Thank you; good point re house insurance.

That’s another question; if it were repaired and no further issues, would it still need to be declared in future sales? That’s another factor; it’s not a forever home for us.

Walk away. We live in a house with subsidence and it's a nightmare.

I wouldn't touch this with a bargepole

Yes you would have to declare it, or it does show up on future survey valuations or something.

I know a lot mortgage companies (over 15 years ago mind) that wouldn't entertain a mortgage for a subsided house. I think it had to be historical damage proven not to have moved any more over a set amount of years.

I could be very out of date with what I think, but can't see mortgage companies changing their policies that much over the time.

You will really struggle to re-sell. The subsidence has to be declared. It will put many many people off.

I'd walk away.

Thank you all.
Gutting but the unanimous opinion does help!

It depends how much you want the house. Personally I’d walk away. The stress of having difficulties with insurance and potentially when you come to sell, plus every time a new crack appears on a wall is going to be pretty stressful. You’ll be declaring it from now to the end of days to everyone.

If it’s from a broken drain then it’s not so bad as there is a clear and solvable cause but really the vendor needs to resolve before sale. Even then I’d want to see some time elapse so it becomes clearly historic. To be honest I’d be surprised if they weren’t aware that their house is subsiding.

Walk away!!

Sadly, I'd run a mile.

It'll be a nightmare to sort, and you may well find yourselves unable to sell in the future.

This is probably gutting for you OP. ☹️ My friend bought a house a couple of years ago, they decided not to get a survey done before completion (just had the compulsory mortgage valuation survey) and then found there was subsidence after they moved in. If it helps you with your decision it has cost them a *lot more than 5-7 grand to fix and resulted in months of living on what was effectively a building site. We've recently an offer accepted on a house on a slope and are crossing everything that the survey doesn't suggest subsidence.

If you really like the house you could get a full structural survey from a structural engineer.

A valuation report really doesn’t tell you much.

People are very nervous about underpinned properties but actually many are much better for having been underpinned, or strenthenrd foundations, than not.

Ideally if there IS subsidence the sellers would get the work done in insurance, and there would then be a guarantee.

Cracked drains are all over the place.

I bought a house that had subsidence (so you do have to declare it). As it had been fixed a few years before there was no problem insuring it or selling it.
But it depends on what's causing it (say a big tree) and whether that can be dealt with to stop the issue recurring, and how much to fix it.
If it's the way your land is there may not be an easy solution.
Unfortunately subsidence is quite an issue and not as easy to address as, say, damp is.

I think my main concern would be the resale. If it were a forever property, I think I’d be more likely to take a punt on it but as we definitely wouldn’t be there forever, it might just be too much of a risk.

I wouldn't even entertain it. Walk away. Subsidence can be a huge problem and buying this house would likely be a massive headache. There are plenty of other houses.

I discovered (sellers didn’t tell) a previous subsidence issue with a house we had offered on. I phoned my current home insurance and they told me they did not insure anything that had previous subsidence problems. Other companies may be different but it ruled the house out for me. Now in a house we like more anyway.

Run away. The small subsidence crack we had in our house meant moving out for over a year while they put it right, cost the insurers over £200,000 (more than the value of the house at the time!) and insurance premiums went up 6x for the house. It certainly put people off buying, the house was sold at around a 15% a discount in the end compared to others very similar nearby.

Thanks all. This has been invaluable. We will wait for the report to make a final position but 98% sure we will pull out.