Works to be done on property purchase

[pilates]

Is it my understanding that you only renegotiate on price if it’s big works to be done? A couple of grand on a roof and a new boiler is something you would expect?

There's no blanket answer for me. If it's a £500k house then I'm probably not going to quibble about getting you down £5k. If I'm a FTB spending £150k with only a small deposit and legal/mortgage broker fees to pay then I'd be worrying about potential spiralling costs of the roof.

I think a new boiler is something you'd look at on viewing and be able to see if it's ageing though.

There really is no rule - some buyers would have expected that, others will quibble over the slightest comment in a survey. It’s up to you whether you want to negotiate or not. Nothing’s final until the contracts are exchanged.

Depends if already priced with such works in mind, if not how urgent, visible on viewing or if lender makes a retention.

Depends, I recently sold a property which needed work and the asking price reflected that.

I've gone back to my vendor to renegotiate because the work is significant on the outside of the property and will need scaffolding etc and they have accepted this but I wouldn't expect to reduce the price for the smaller things that are needed

Personally yes, although it depends on a few other things I guess. Ie How much you felt you'd agreed a fair price that reflected any work to begin with, whether it's a big job vs lots of little jobs and how urgently any of it would need doing, whether the work is for safety or cosmetic reasons etc.

The house we're buying was listed way too high to begin with (by the agent's own admission!) so although we offered under the asking price it was still a good price that we agreed for the house from the vendor's perspective. We knew that it would likely need a new boiler and possibly rewiring so that didn't bother us, but when we got our survey back it listed multiple things that needed addressing quite urgently from a safety perspective that add up to a fairly substantial amount. Our surveyor also valued the property at £30k less than the price we'd agreed and recommended entering renegotiation. We decided to ask for £7500 off (definitely won't cover the cost of all the work but we also didn't want to just ask for £30k off for the crap of it as our mortgage will still stretch to make up a fair bit of the shortfall). This was agreed and we also passed on a copy of the 54 page report for the vendor to see so that they knew we weren't just chancing our luck at getting more money off.

I think it depends. If it’s a smartly presented house, it needing a new boiler would be a surprise. However if it was a homebuyers survey that flagged that I’d want to check the working. RICS absolutely HAMMER into their surveyors that they aren’t to comment on what they aren’t qualified to check, so I doubt the surveyor would say it needs a new boiler but they often flag them in red/3 and say they could need replacing but they don’t know they aren’t gas engineers.

Thanks all.

We got £10k reduction on 485k house as the survey brought up a couple of damp and timber issues. That was a year ago though...in current market..I’m not sure we would have done.

I’d also say yes. You have to expect that there are going to be things that need doing and suck up the cost yourself.
If the whole roof was shot and costing £20k to fix, then that’s a different matter!
You need to remember surveyors tell you the worst to cover themselves. I’ve had so many things pop up that were red and ‘needed immediate attention’, only to find they were the usual things and not worth worrying about!

Good question, OP! I'm dealing with the same issue.

We had a roofer in on advice of the surveyor who said there was £25,000 of work, some immediate and some short-term, which was enough to make us pull out. The owner wouldn't budge at all - we didn't expect them to cover it all but a gesture would have been well-received. The EA had pushed the house as being in excellent condition, and we had paid a bit more than we were comfortable with (competitive bidding) because of this, so it was a bit of a surprise.

What did you do, @mobear?

@gelatodipistacchio We bid on another house in the same street which we got for a £25,000 less and pulled out. Then the first seller wanted to negotiate, but by then we felt it was too late. If they’d been straight forward from the beginning I think we could have reached an agreement but the EA had told us they couldn’t afford to, nor did they think they should have to.

I should add we got really lucky because houses on that street don’t come up often and we felt a huge amount of time-pressure because the original SDLT deadline was looming.