Advice needed on house purchase

[bogeythefungusman]

We've had an offer accepted on the perfect property (for us - ticks all the boxes, very edge of town, rural outlook, reasonably quiet road). Cash in the bank ready and waiting, survey done, no major issues.

Just found out there is a planning application in for an estate of 270 Persimmon houses in the field across the road. .

The access road to the estate would be directly opposite our drive.

Spoken to planning office who believes the application will be successful because the number of properties on the plan has already been reduced from 400+ to 270, and the county council plan for the area requires building of 250 new houses over the next ten years - this estate will pretty much finalise the plan in one fell swoop. But the planning meeting to approve/decline the plans will not be held until at least November, possibly December.

We need to retract our offer don't we?

Conceivably 3 years of construction traffic/noise/dust.
Loss of rural outlook.
500 cars in and out of the estate, right opposite our house/drive. (The estate is a mix of 2/3/4 bedroom homes, some social housing, so probably lots of families with children to take to school and clubs, adults to and from work etc.

I could weep. We've expended £2000 in survey and legal fees. It's a perfect house, but part of the perfection was the rural outlook and quiet position.

Tearing my hair out.

So we've withdrawn our offer. Words with the estate agent were had....... may have used the phrase 'incandescent with rage'

Don’t know that you can blame the estate agent...they’re working for the seller not you and it wasn’t their job to tell viewers things that were unattractive about the property

Twiglets, sections 3.1 and 3.2 of the property information form specifically ask about proposals to develop land nearby - the estate agent knew this had not been disclosed.

I noticed the ad for the property is back up, still extolling the wide rural views.....

Good on you for pulling out, you would hope the seller would have learned their lesson now that they have lost two potential buyers.

It’s still not their job @bogeythefungusman - they are not expected to warn off potential buyers. It I s buyer beware from the estate agents point of view although your solicitor should help you avoid the pitfalls

I disagree @Twiglets1. The estate agent obviously works for the sellers but they are also obliged by law to share material information and provide accurate descriptions of a property. Extolling the wonderful rural views while being fully aware of the plans for a large housing estate is not an accurate or fair description.
I'm not surprised you are very angry @bogeythefungusman. You've wasted a lot of money and time because they haven't disclosed highly pertinent information that they were clearly aware of. Can you complain to the regulator?

Thats really bad of them , thank goodness you found out

@optingout the estate agents wouldn’t be breaking the law over it, they are operating within the law obviously

@Twiglets1- a quick google tells me that the agents were legally obliged to disclose this as were the sellers when completing the ?TA6 form so it's not obvious that they are operating within the law. It appears that the opposite is true.

@optingout we shall see if they are successfully prosecuted then if you think the law is so easy to understand through quick google searches

Your sarcasm is totally uncalled for @Twiglets1. I have found google a very useful source of basic legal information on a number of occasions. There are plenty of information on there if you look for it.

As you know, @bogeythefungusman hasn't mentioned prosecuting anywhere. She's understandably angry and feels misled which she has been. I get the impression that she wants to find a family home rather than enter into a protracted legal battle.

Twiglet's, our solicitors did mention action to recover the money we've expended but tbh we're more focused on finding a suitable home.

Part of our annoyance is we have an elderly family member living with us and there is a requirement for ground floor bedroom, sitting room and bathroom to accommodate their needs. The house we've just pulled out of met these needs and looking online, houses which have this specification within our budget are rare.

Buying a home is a very personal and emotional experience. I just feel it doesn't require the extra level of angst - if the estate agent is honest and upfront it saves wasted time and money across the board.

I would report the agent for misrepresenting the property.

Op, I would do a letter to the Manager of the Estate Agents (so there is something in writing) and then if you do not get a satisfactory response the Estate Agent Ombudsman. It pisses me off that this profession get away with shoddy underhand behaviour and unless people are prepared to stand up and say hang on this isn’t right nothing will change. Good luck with your house hunting. I completed a sale and purchase several months ago and it was the most stressful time of my life.

Ah that's really shit. We we're buying a house and found out there was planning permission to build a huge housing estate on the fields the house overlooked and also pulled out. The £2,000 loss is nothing compared to the negative impact it would've had on your life. If its any consolation we are now close to exchanging on our 3rd house during this process and this house is 10000x better than the other too and we are very glad the previous sales fell through, hopefully the same happens to you.

I bet the vendors are moving because of it.

And of course they knew: they would have received the consultation documents.

If the house meets all your requirements minus views, is it worth asking for a substantial reduction? Would you live in it if it was a bargain?

Thank heavens for local searches @bogeythefungusman

Really disappointing you weren't made aware before outlaying £2k but it's done it's job.

Good luck with finding another. It will come along even if a bit of creativity is needed in terms of layout.

Interesting comments re Estate agents. I am doing the preliminary sift through property for DS at the moment. There was a great maisonette I spotted but the EA details had a warning about a nearby planning application which would impact the access, reading through the portal the applicant had tried several times with different plans.
I don't see how this is different.
Could you complain to Rightmove etc about a misleading advert. If your solicitor has suggested you fo for compensation I would go for it, depending on the cost as you were misled.

EA's vary unfortunately. A local house to us has been advertised slightly under market value. All photos look really decent but a quick drive past reveals a honking great pylon in close proximity . Just seems to waste people's time as, like the OP, it all comes out eventually.

Does anyone remember the house for sale in Dungeness? They failed to show/mention the power station directly behind it

I didn’t know about that one @PlonkyWillyWonky but surely the viewers noticed??

metro.co.uk/2009/09/29/for-sale-charming-white-fronted-cottage-by-nuclear-power-station-448867/?ito=article.mweb.share.top.link

Faith slightly restored - we were going to have a look at a house and when I rang the estate agent he was really honest and said there was sagging roof joist and the house is on a septic tank (not mentioned in the ad) and they didn't know if it met current regs. I told him that we really appreciated his honesty, and he said no point hiding stuff - prospective buyers will likely find out about problems anyway. So, good estate agent. Or maybe they'd been blasted by previous prospective buyer for not divulging........

Mydogwillow, that is hilarious.