Selling our house but have to disclose neighbour dispute

[Pegs11]

Hi, we are selling our house and we’ve just accepted an offer… unfortunately on the solicitors forms, legally, we will have to disclose a dispute we had with our neighbours over noise (they kept having loud parties) and which went to the council (they are social housing tenants) and then to mediation. This was three years ago and it was resolved and we haven’t had any cause to complain since then. Still, I’m concerned that when our buyer sees it on the form, she might be put off. It’s making me very anxious. Just wondered what people’s thoughts are.

You are paying for a conveyance solicitor for their professional expertise so use it! This is exactly the kind of issue they can give you best advice on.

If the same people would be still living there I would run.

The last house I sold we had to declare that we'd complained to the council about our neighbours loud music. After a while an abatement notice was served, and therefore issue was resolved. All this was declared to the buyers solicitors. Thankfully it did not put the buyer off.

Thanks all for your replies. To clarify a couple of things: I have already sought the advice of a solicitor, which is how I know we definitely need to declare it. There is no getting around it, because if the new owners find out about the dispute (which they probably will, given that neighbours gossip) then the implications for us could be devastating. They could sue us, force us to rescind the contract, and force us to pay their legal fees. It would ruin us.

In particular, we have to declare because the council got involved.

OP I think the BTL purchaser would have less of an issue with it so they may be an alternative route to go down if this sale falls through. Bear in mind though that the housing market is such that purchasers are not as choosy as they may have been previously. This sale may well work for you and you certainly have done yourself a massive favour by being candid.

- it’s a real bind and why I can’t even face trying to start the process of moving house. There is an awful catch 22 at play. Put up with bad neighbour behaviour or get the council involved, resolve, but then face buyers further down the line pulling out. Exacerbated by people thinking that if you report it must be REALLY bad because nobody would risk a future sale otherwise. I always think life would be so much better if as a society we were stronger on what acceptable behaviour is. Before I had this in my own life I thought countries that imposed strict rules on things like putting your bins out were ludicrous - not now!

I do think you’re in a very good situation with having a back-up in the form of the investor, however, so don’t lose heart.

@Pegs11 we sought advice from our solicitor about our neighbour dispute because I knew that although they hated us they just loved fucking us over and would object to us selling. I would have thought they would be glad we were moving but she was an alcoholic so completely unstable and unpredictable.

We declared it but with the help of the solicitor who told us how to phrase it. It had all been quiet for 2 years. We sold to a cash buyer who would be renting it out. They didn't care about the neighbours.

Next door threw their toys out of the pram about the sale and rang my estate agents on several occasions saying there is a dispute to declare she can never sell. My EA told her they would pass on the details. Obviously those details came to us as the EA is working for us. Plus we declared the dispute to our buyers anyway and the EA knew about the dispute as we had warned them she might call drunk. She didn't send any solicitor's letter and considering how many they had sent previously we were surprised. We feel that the husband (reasonable and level headed) was keeping her in check.

We learned that they divorced the following year and sold the house. Good luck in your selling endeavour, consult your solicitor on how to word the now settled issue.

I just discovered (by speaking to my mortgage provider just now) that if our buyer did pull out, we could actually keep our current house and rent it out, and go and buy somewhere else to live. This is a huge relief.

It wouldn’t be ideal… renting it out will come with its own set of issues, especially if the neighbours do start causing problems again… but I think we could cover any unforeseen possibilities.

It’s good to know it’s there as a backup option.

Sorry , would 100% put me off and I'd withdraw my offer/pull out of sale. No one wants anti social neighbours

I think it’s important to provide enough information about the dispute to reassure the buyer that it was in the past and is no longer an issue.

I bought a house with from someone who declared a dispute with two neighbours.
The seller explained the dispute, when it occurred and the steps taken to resolve it.
It didn’t put me off because I was confident it was resolved some years ago. I was right. I have no trouble with the problematic neighbours (and in fact get on very well with them!).

We had this issue (not the same exact problem but horrendous neighbour) and took off record legal advice.

They said as long as it’s not actively ‘in dispute’ then don’t disclose.
Ie. If it’s resolved - dont
If a current issue was raised even if officially documented as long as you don’t dispute (ie, back and forth of on paper arguing) - then no need to disclose.

It was basically described to me that neighbours are allowed to complain about one another. It’s only when they start officially arguing back with you legally that it becomes a dispute. So in the case of your neighbour - you complained about noise, they accepted they were loud and were repeat offenders. But that’s not a dispute.

A dispute would be that they denied they were being loud and reported you for harassment / making false reports.

So I am sure many will come on to say that’s incorrect, but at the end of the day law is all interpretation. We were confident enough we would have legal backing from a firm good enough to win the case and so did as they advised.

If you don't tell them, and problems arise, the new owners can sue you.

@LemonSwan that’s interesting. We sought legal advice and were told we’d have to disclose that we complained to the council and that it went to mediation. But also to say we’ve had no cause to complain since then.

If we don’t disclose, my worry is that the neighbours we fell out with might, at some point, tell our buyer that we “kept moaning” about their music, ”dobbed them in” to the council about them, and “forced” them to mediate. Not a problem if they remain nice and quiet after we’ve moved. But if they turn the music back up after we’ve gone and cause problems for our buyers… I dunno.

This is not a backup option! There is so much more to it which will depend mostly on your financial situation and stability.

BTL mortgages usually come with higher interest rates and/or bigger deposits. You will still have to meet the mortgage repayments on both houses. If your tenant defaults it can take a while through courts to get them out and if they cannot afford to pay costs, etc. you will have to foot the bill.

You will need insurance for both properties and also money for repairs if, for example, you need a new boiler. When you eventually come to sell, you will have to pay capital gains tax on the BTL house. This is not something to enter into lightly, you need a really good stash of back up cash or at least the ability to borrow more (and pay it back).

Just thought you should consider these points before rushing in as that is really not a solution to your current problem.

I would tell the buyers about the dispute and let them know that if they pull out you have another offer to go with. Or just go with the BTL purchasers and let them deal with whatever occurs.

I suppose It would cost somebody quite a bit of money to sue without any guarantee of success especially if any dispute wasn’t ‘official’ ie no paper trail.
I doubt that anyone would take this route unless it was really really bad.

Thinking it doesn't make it true.
There is a cut-off for trivialities, but it does not need to have been reported to anyone.

I would pull out if I saw that. Sorry

@WallaceinAnderland I know it’s not easy for landlords particularly at the moment when things are very heavily weighted in favour of tenants. But it’s something we can at least put on the table as being something to explore, which I didn’t even think would be a possibility for us. It so happens that we are good friends with our former landlady, who owns several properties and has been in the BTL market for donkey’s years. So for a start we’re going to get the lowdown from her, see what tips and advice she might have. We certainly wouldn’t rush into it lightly.

Our estate agent is encouraging us to tell our BTL offeror about the dispute straight up. He is familiar with this investor and thinks he probably won’t be overly concerned, so I think it might be worth letting him know now, and getting it cleared up at an early stage. The fella will either consider it a problem or he won’t, and the sooner we know, the better. Maybe he will use it as leverage to come back with a reduced offer, but provided his offer doesn’t drop massively, it will be worth it for the peace of mind. I just want as much certainty as possible really. This thing is really weighing on my mind.

If I’d known that raising a formal complaint about our neighbours could create such problems down the line when it comes to selling, perhaps I would have thought twice about complaining. Then again, I’m not sure I could have just put up with what they were doing… it was very, very, VERY stressful. And we weren’t in a position back then to be able to move anywhere else.

Ahh yes so mediation may count as back and forth legal arguing.

But then if it’s resolved?

Regardless - if your chosen firm is advising you disclose then they are clearly not confident they would win a case. So I would do as they say or switch firms.

As another point on this you shouldn’t be taking legal advice from your actual solicitor handling sale on this matter; as I think they are legally bound to tell you to disclose, or to disclose anyway.

Our advice was given completely independent of the sale.

Completely independent 😊

I bought a house where the dispute wasn’t declared. My solicitor told me it would cost me thousands to sue without any guarantees of success so not worth the stress

@Pegs11
How did this span out for you?

We have noisy neighbours which i've called the council about once - to ask to pass the message on to reduce noise.

However our other neighbours continuously complain about the noise, and know we are bothered by it so we would have to disclose. Its not going to be a resolved issue either likely, so i cant pretend we resolved it either.

We are looking at selling as I want to move to get a different catchment., but worried nobody will buy it.

did anyone buy in the end?

@Pettypettyneighbour I’m sorry you’ve been having trouble with your neighbours. It really is horrible.

We did sell in the end and we did disclose. We felt we had to take the reduced price that was offered, which sucked, but at the end of the day we sold the house in the knowledge that we are legally covered with regard to the dispute. As someone who suffers from anxiety it was worth it for the peace of mind.

This!