Home survey, yes or no? With poll!

[mumdone]

Hello, we’ve moved and renovated many times. We’ve never found a home survey to be useful and just highlights what you might want to look into a bit more. We are now (hopefully) buying a barn conversion. One barn is made of stone and another has wood cladding. Renovated in the last few years. So will have building control certificates etc. We’ve negotiated a very good price. I’m doubting the value of having a survey.
have you ever found them valuable?

We’ve never had a survey done because we both have a good idea of what we’re looking at. However in this particular case I’d consider it.
We viewed a bungalow with a dormer added this week. Husband spotted a few things that seemed questionable and then stuck his head in the access hatches in the dormer. No steels supporting any of it, so it’s basically a major rebuild waiting to happen.
We had actually met the owner there who had done all the work in the house himself so they had a chat. Turns out he is basically a cowboy builder.

I don’t know how they get this stuff past building control but I’d not want to take the risk on something like you’re looking at. In the grand scheme of things it’s not much money.

We didn't need a mortgage so didn't require a survey. Our house is victorian, my reckoning was if it's still standing after all these years, it's fine. Husband is a joiner, so he knew what to look for, we knew there was a possibility of damp, the electrics would need upgrading eventually etc. 5 years on and all OK.

My cousin paid for a top tier survey. They missed the dry rot in the cellar. £1000s later (Any wood that touched it needed replacing) they managed to claim back from the surveyors. I doubt they would have bought the house though, if it had been picked up sooner.

So yeah, if your confident you know what you're looking for, I'd save the money.

Never bought a property without a full structural survey. It's saved me a couple of times from buying houses with hidden defects.

We always get at least the home buyers survey, usually fine but we’ve pulled out of a couple of sales due to results.