Disagree with survey results

[WhenTheyComeForYou]

This is purely hypothetical - but what happens if your buyer comes back to say their homebuyer survey on your property has identified an issue you know doesn’t exist?

Is the seller entitled to see the original report to check they’re not lying or misinterpreting the results?

Is it then up to the seller to pay for an expert to get a second opinion if they’re confident it’s not right?

I don't believe they have to show it to anyone

Is it then up to the seller to pay for an expert to get a second opinion if they’re confident it’s not right?
It is a well-known concept that you cannot prove a negative. Either the prospective buyer proves the assertion or the seller tells them them that they don't believe and won't factor it into negotiations and will be finding another buyer.

@towelsandsheets if a buyer wanted money off my property, I’d want to see evidence to make sure they weren’t chancing it or misinterpreting the report, is that not normal?

Has anyone felt they’ve had to accept “report findings” and a subsequent reduction in offer price without evidence that a qualified professional actually sees a fault with the property?

How have you addressed this without having to spend money yourself on a different survey/assessment?

@senua thats a good point. So would you ask to see their report?

When I recently asked to reduce my offer on the basis of significant problems having been found during a survey, I sent the EA the relevant sections of the report so that the vendor could see for themselves what the issue was.

Having paid for a survey you own it, and you are not obliged to share it, but why wouldn't you if you were asking for a significant reduction in price?

If I was your buyer and you said there wasn't a problem when my report clearly says there is...then I might walk away. That said, not all surveys are equal, some are absolute rubbish.

Of course you would! At the moment, their say-so has no more weight than "my dog / cousin / next door neighbour has raised an issue that ..."

If they won't provide evidence then they are not the sort of person that you want to do business with; they will probably be a nightmare throughout the process.

I suppose that would be a mutual decision as no seller would want to make a reduction when they don’t agree with the buyers concerns.

The whole thing is always a negotiation. The buyer can't force the seller to accept anything. At the point of survey there is an agreed price, if the buyer wants to re-negotiate, the onus is really on them to persuade the seller that their new proposal is acceptable. If the buyer can't persuade the seller, then the seller just says "no" and the buyer decides to either provide appropriate evidence to support their position, or walk away.

If a buyer refuses to supply evidence, they are undermining their own position, so it seems odd that anyone would refuse to share the survey findings unless they are deliberately playing silly games.

Absolutely it's about a mutual decision and negotiation - it's about what the sale of the house is worth to you (in terms other than financial) and whether that means you stick to your guns and don't accept a reduced offer, or whether you find a financial compromise (as I did - the buyer and I have shared the cost of the works that need doing) that allows everything to still go ahead.

The challenge is, what might seem like a major issue to your buyer may be something you have lived with for years and don't consider to be a problem at all. OR it may be that your buyer (or their surveyor) is trying it on and what they're suggesting is entirely un-necessary...like the perennial "needing a damp course" scam on old properties.

But even then, depending on the level of £, it stops being entirely about the money and also becomes about how much you want to sell the house; unless your finances were so tight that you couldn't afford to drop even a couple of thousand, agreeing to a modest reduction to allow everything to proceed is financially irrelevant in the very long term that a mortgage covers, especially with the variation of interest rates over time.

This is part of why house-buying/selling is so stressful I think, because it's about a huge amount of money but it's also about the emotional and practical reasons you want to buy/sell in the first place!

The report belongs to the buyer so the seller has no automatic right to see it.

However, in the interest of reaching agreement if the buyer wants a price reduction, what they normally do is send screenshots of relevant paragraphs to the EA.

The seller may still disagree that the “problem” is valid but again, in the interest of moving forward, they normally agree a price reduction with the buyer. The exact amount is open to negotiation.

Agree, there is no right to see it but if they're trying to negotiate on the basis of a survey they should certainly show it to you. Many moons ago I had potential buyers asking for a massive price reduction post survey. I asked to see the survey and, while it raised some fairly minor issues (Victorian house), it clearly valued the property at what we'd agreed. They had tried to offer a stupidly low amount earlier which I hadn't accepted. I don't think they could afford the price agreed because they vanished. Fortunately I got another buyer very quickly who was absolutely fine. Good luck OP.