Mortgage Valuation £0 - Structural Movement

[SammySays]

We are in the process of buying our dream home which is a complete renovation project- it’s has not been decorated in 40+ years so does need a lot doing to it but it will be beautiful when we are done with it. Found out today that our lender has valued the property at £0 due to structural movement of the property and their belief that it is not structurally sound. They have asked for a chartered surveyors report or a report from a structural engineer. As it happens we have both as the sellers (probate) had a structural engineers report after a previous buyer pulled out and we had a level 3 survey. Both show the property is structurally sound and any sign of movement is historical and not progressive. Reports are from 2 different companies and different assessors so there is no bias at all.

Im so nervous that the lender will reject the mortgage despite these reports. Has anyone had any experience of this?

I had this but on the remortgage of my house a couple of years ago. I commissioned at the prospective new lender’s request a structural engineer’s report which confirmed there wasn’t ongoing movement and recommended that I repair the cracks and keep an eye on a couple of trees. The mortgage then went through absolutely fine.

Thank you @Secondsop that makes me feel better! Hoping that our experience is as straight forward as yours!

Has anyone else been in this position please? Found out today we are looking at around 3 weeks for a decision (seems such a long time) and in the mean time we are spending money with the solicitors to keep the chain going in the background. So worried that they will not accept the view of our reports and either say no outright or under value and it all fall apart. Not only is this our ‘forever home’ but I also wouldn’t want to let our buyers down.

any experience would be greatly appreciated please.

I had similar although years ago and the mortgage lender would only lend to a capped amount and I had to find a bigger deposit to lessen their risk, it was 70/30 but they dropped it down to I think, 60/40 from memory.

I had to pull out as that was my max.

Just out of interest why are you spending money "keeping the chain going" ?

Surely you shouldn't be doing this ?

We had this in 2019. Lender (Barclays) refused to lend because of structural movement (crack through window lintels), structural engineers report stated this was restricted to bay window, was historical movement and non-progressive. Barclays refused point blank to change their position, however when we went through a broker, NatWest and a few alternative lenders were happy to lend with the structural report in place.

The sale eventually fell through as vendors still hadn’t found anywhere to buy 8 months after we’d gone through the mortgage rigmarole so I can’t say for certain the another lender would definitely have delivered us the required mortgage but have no reason to think they wouldn’t.

@GasPanic I’m continuing with legal work because I’m concerned that if we delay my buyer might get frustrated and pull out. On 1 hand I have 2 reports that say it is structurally sound with historical movement but nothing progressive so hoping that will be enough for our lender. If they come back in 3 weeks and say they are satisfied then we will be ready to exchange with no time lost. There is obviously a flip side to this though if it doesn’t go our way…

@RoseBucket im sorry that happened to you. If that is the stipulation from the bank, we have got some wiggle room as we have declared a deposit with keeping a large amount back for renovations so hopefully we’d be able to put more down whilst still getting the urgent things replaced like the boiler and wiring. We would never be able to afford this house if it was all done up.

@ClinkyWotsit thank you for your reassuring experience. I thought it would be a case that if one lender refused as it’s not appropriate capital then all would feel the same. At least not all is lost if that is our lenders view!