Hi everyone,
Wonder if I could ask your opinions on a house dilemma. Last June we sold our house in North London and moved to the Cotswolds. We’re currently renting, watching house prices rocket as our capital dwindles! A few attempts to buy have fallen through. Our choice is very limited as we’re trying to get into the tiny catchment of the 'best secondary in the county', and more than half the houses in the area are medium/high flood risk.
5 months ago we had an offer accepted on a lovely Victorian 4-bed semi in the perfect area. Eye-wateringly expensive (we had to offer a fair whack over the asking price as competition was fierce) but we were in love.
A few weeks ago the chain finally completed, and the solicitors sprang into action. Mortgage sorted, exchange planned for Easter. But… we’ve just got the survey back, and it’s flagged up ‘substantial historic movement’ in the ground floor bay window. This sounded pretty terrifying, but the surveyor said off the record that it shouldn’t stop us from buying it, and every house of that age is likely to have something similar - bays often moved as they didn’t have proper foundations. She also says it’s not actually subsidence and it’s not actively moving, so we don’t even need to declare it to insurers (but we will). No remedial action is needed.
Our friends and family are divided 50/50 on whether it’s a deal breaker. My husband thinks we’d be mad to ditch our dream home - where we could be for the next 15 years - over one dodgy bay window. Having talked to an insurance broker, it seems it won’t be that expensive to get cover. But I’m worried future buyers will be put off. I’m changing my mind every 5 minutes about it – no idea what to do! We can’t negotiate a price reduction as the sellers’ onward purchase is stretching them as it is, and I expect they’ll just put the house back on the market if we don’t pay the full amount.
Any advice gratefully received - thank you