Anyone had a structural survey that missed an expensive problem?

[Wizzywoo18]

I purchased a 2 bed house a few months ago after getting a structural survey. It's a Victorian end terrace which needed internal updating and some minor roof repairs.

After moving in and the weather cooled, I started to notice an increasingly musty smell inside parts of the house. A humidity monitor would shoot up after rain. I bought a dehumidifier which got rid of the pong and booked an independent damp surveyor who read my structural survey.

He said it entirely glossed over a downpipe discharging into the front garden too close to the house, a lack of subfloor ventilation and other issues with the roof. The front garden needs to be completely re-landscaped and the downpipe replaced and diverted. The airbricks at the front of the house are in the wrong place. A tall hedge needs to be cut back severely.

I'm annoyed because if I'd known this I would have renegotiated the purchase price.

My sister says I should complain to the surveyor - has anyone done this and had a satisfactory outcome? She said I should ask for the cost of the survey to be refunded. I think it's likely they will have a get-out clause and I'll just have to suck it up.

(The estate agent selling the house recommended this surveyor but so did another surveyor who was too swamped with work to help me. Now wondering if there's a....ahem....'arrangement' between the agent and my surveyor but perhaps I'm being overly suspicious! Frankly nothing would surprise me. The agent said if I posted a 5 star review for them, I'd get an Amazon token. Unsurprisingly, they have many 5 star reviews already.)

I've just moved house and although there is a few issues, nothing like you have mentioned (so far anyway). I really feel for you. I would definitely make a complaint if I were you. My Dad had a survey done on his current house, but apart from pointing out a couple of very obvious things it was next to useless.
Surely a trained surveyor would pick up on no subfloor ventilation and the downpipe issue? I don't know how expensive your landscaping will be, but can I assume it's to build a soakaway? That's quite normal now as many councils don't like downpipes going to the sewer, so prefer you to have a soakaway in the garden - although the amount of rain we get now I'm surprised more people aren't buying a barge to live on rather than a house.
Get a complaint sent to the surveyor and see what they come back with. Good luck with it.

Yep. They missed everything. The holes in the roof, the skylight that wasn't attached to its frame, the missing bricks in the end wall, the crumbling wall in the years that will need replacing soon, the front wall that would fall over with a hefty push....

We were first time buyers with a newborn with a dramatic health condition plus a kid with Sen; we weren't in a position to spot any of this ourselves.

The surveying company said they can't move anything to look behind it or lift a loft hatch if the owner says no. Which means the owners can hide everything and plead ignorance. We threatened to sue but no joy.

I’ve seen people post about this problem before on Mumsnet so yes, it does happen & isn’t that rare it seems. People never seem to get anywhere with challenging their surveyor though as they put so many caveats in the survey to cover their arses.

Makes you wonder if it’s really worth paying all that money for a full survey. They do pick up issues of course. Just not necessarily all the issues.

Yep and we took the surveyor to small
claims court and won. we had to prove on a point of law which was that we had already negotiated a reduction in price for another structural defect which meant that it was hughly
likely that had we known about the other defect that we would have negotiated the repair price off the asking price for the massive hole in the chimney. It was a fabulous moment when we won! Surveyor hadn’t been arsed to put his head in the loft.

Thanks for your responses - it's shocking how shoddy a survey can be and I'm so utterly jaundiced about the whole process now. The absolute bullsh*t spewed by agents for a start.

If I buy again, I will make sure I have a good builder on tap to check out any property I'm interested in. Now to find a good builder.......

Most of those issues are very common, and though they need fixing, they aren't massive issues, though if left undone they could cause bigger problems. I doubt you'd get anywhere, I'm afraid. Any Victorian doer-upper will have similar problems; it would be expected.

Sorting out the drainage and putting in a proper soakaway further from the house ( you might need Building Control for that) is not a massive issue. (Surely you don't need to relandscape the whole front? If you claim you do, it may go against you. When making any claim, don't exaggerate.)

Any house that old will probably have cracked ceramic drains which may be leaking into the house underfloor. We had ours relaid in plastic, make a big difference.

The airbricks may just need clearing out- ours did. If you need extra ones, surely that's not going to cost the earth?

What's the problem(s) with the roof?

As for the hedge, you must have been able to see that when you viewed?

I'm sympathetic as you seem not to be very experienced with old houses, and really needed more guidance before buying one. What level of survey did you buy? Did you get any trades in for more detailed quotes for anything? Did the survey suggest you did?

@BlueMongoose Yes, I'd happily admit to not being experienced with period homes. But that's why I got a Level 3 structural survey which I hoped would reduce the risk of 'nasty surprises'.

The recommendations for work come from a specialist damp surveyor (who has been mentioned on Mumsnet) and as such, I'm not in a position to second guess or disagree with his advice. I do appreciate specialists are always aiming for the best possible 'fix' rather than the bare minimum required. I've only just got his report prior to Christmas and I'll be talking it through with him.

Re: soakaways - the problem is I have one already but building regulations say they should be 5 metres from a building and 2.5 metres from a boundary. My front garden isn't anywhere close to 5 metres long! This should have been obvious to the surveyor.

Surveys are not worth the paper they’re written on. Better by far to get someone (ideally local) who knows the housing stock and can come and look with you.

i appreciate not everyone has a father in law who is a builder, but after my first survey failed me I always used him.

If the survey you had done was from a damp surveyor who would also have done the work I would be VERY wary. Usually they find tens of thousands of Pounds worth of work, very little of which actually needs doing.

Yep, they missed a number of very serious issues and we were about to exchange when we had a lucky escape. My Dad, who works in the building trade, wanted to see the house and he picked up at least 6 very expensive issues, with one being a complete nightmare had he not see it. We tried to get redress against the surveyor but they hide behind small print and even lied, when we had photographic evidence. After that, we get a builder to check over a property, as have no faith in surveyors at all now.

@Hurdygurdy12 He's an independent damp surveyor and doesn't do the work himself.
Nor does he recommend damp proofing companies but he can check out quotes and tell me what is reasonable.
He told me a few horror stories about these companies! One family was quoted 20K to tank a basement when it was just a leaky bit of guttering that needed fixing etc.

We had the same. Level 3 survey covered with phrases to cover their back for every single point made. It really gave us no detail about what we were buying. Total waste of time.

Report the surveyor to RICS.

Not me personally, but my niece bought a victorian terraced house and the surveyor failed to notice that the next door neighbour's 'lean to' build has gone over about 18 inches onto their land and continued to nick the land by redoing the garden fence with an additional 18 inches added to their garden. The previous owner of her house was an elderly man and the garden unfortunately was neglected so no one noticed..

I doubt a surveyor would notice a boundary question. They don’t have the deeds. The owner is wholly responsible for that.

I would always insist on a surveyor being RICS qualified. Damp “surveyors” are probably no such thing. Qualified surveyors are required to offer a professional service and you can complain to RICS about them. They should easily pick up damp and then explore what might be wrong. Some surveyors would also refer you to a structural engineer if there was a possible structural issue. I would definitely complain. Some issues might be opinion but some clearly are not. Small claims court if they won’t offer compensation.

Yes. Needed a new roof the winter after we moved in!

Surveyors are not really qualified to be advising on alot of the issues mentioned on here so far, their main purpose is to provide a valuation surveyor to ensure the property is in the ballpark of the amount of the sale being agreed in order to protect your mortgage provider.

A structural survey should be carried out by a structural engineer, and if that engineer has missed something which was structurally significant then you can take them to small claims (they will have insurance for situations like these).

However, the survey will non-intrusive and no floor boards/carpets will be lifted so if the structural defect is hidden this wont be covered, an intrusive survey (will cost in the thousands).

I often get called out to houses where a surveyors report was given the all clear and the home owner wants to know why their strucutral defects weren't picked up previously. (work as a structural engineer)

@noseyparker12 RICS wouldn’t agree with that. A decent qualified surveyor will be able to do an informative survey but should tell the client when more detail
is needed, eg from an engineer.

Structural engineers are sometimes used in conjunction with surveyors by sensible people who know a house has structural issues. Usually the engineer inspects a property when the surveyor is unsure and calls one in for further advice. DH did some as a younger Structural Engineer. Usually to look at cracks and wonky roofs. Also non tanked leaky basements! As a civil engineer, drainage is his thing too but surveyors can assess drainage. A structural engineer wouldn’t look at damp though. Most decent surveyors can do a thorough job but their reports are more of a snapshot not a detailed assessment. You need to spend more if you want this.

If the damp surveyor is who I think it is, possibly the same as ours....then I'd certainly take their word for it.

We had a L3 before buying, and a proper damp survey after (+) , which necessarily came up with more detailed things, as we could allow them to drill into walls and opened up the underfloors and boarded off areas of the loft for them. I had no quarrel with the L3 survey, which was more detailed than yours seems to have been, and was right as far as a L3 survey can/is supposed to go. Where the surveyor couldn't be sure, they were cautious, and suggested more investigations or gave warnings about possibilities (#) - it would have been better if yours had been like that, I think. But some posters here would have criticised it for backside-covering- it's hard for surveyors to get it right sometimes.

It sounds to me from what you describe that yours was a rather weak initial survey, but unfortunately not bad enough for you to be able to take action on it, which is a lousy situation to be in.

I'm really sorry you are going through this. The soakaway thing is a real bind- surely there must be some way out of it? I know they don't like rainwater going into sewers, but if there is no alternative there must be some leeway? A house as old as yours will have mixed drains anyway, won't it? Whatever happens, I do hope in the end it turns out not to be as bad as you fear.

( +) because though we had a damp-proofing company look at the house pre purchase, I thought their report was a load of old rubbish, and I was right.

(#) e.g., we were warned in the L3 that a house this old would be likely to need some joists replacing, but the surveyor also said that fairness she had jumped up and down and tried to bounce the floors close to the walls and hadn't found any movement. The only joists we have had to replace were in an area under a floor with 2 layers of 3/4" ply over the floorboards, you'd have needed an elephant doing a fandango to flex them in spite of the (few) rotten beam ends. But she warned us, so were prepared for the possibility. To my mind, that's not backside-covering, thats's the sort of advice you could have found helpful, as we did.