Property survey over but there are repairs to be done

[maria123]

hi,

being a first time buyer and new to the whole situation any honest opion about my situation is greatly appreciated.

The property we are interested is a 1930's semi-detached house in south-west.After the building survey we got the property valuvated for the same price we had offered.

But the report has mentioned about the following repairs required for the property :

1.There are two chimney stacks and one of them has 3 pots.Rendering to both is defective.Coping to the main stack is deteriorating.The flues need to ventilated with airbricks or special chimney stacks.

1. subfloor ventilation blocked due to conservatory extension.

1. the roof is orginal and needs to be felted in future.Moss needs to be cleaned from roof surfaces.

4.Rainwater gutters require realigning to adequate falls.

5.Cement flashings need to be replaced in lead.

6.Utility room which is ancillary accomadation has dampness.

Now we just don't know whether we need to go forward with the property or not after seeing all these issues.We asked the seller whether he is willing to re-negociate but it was a blank 'No'.Now we are trying to get quotes from builders/roofers to find how much its going to cost.

Could anyone please suggest whether we need to move forward .we are not sure how much these repairs would cost?

thanks in advance

If the property has been valued at the price you offered (they don't usually value higher, but will 'devalue' if necessary) then what is your grounding for negotiating a different price?

Any property with age will have things that need doing IMO/E. Once you have the quotes, you can decide whether you can afford it or not. (PS You don't have to do the repairs as soon as you move in, or even at all)

The value that you were given will be for the property as it is, so it should be worth more if the work that is needed is done.
To be honest none of the repairs sound too bad.

We had our flashings replaced with lead and it cost £2,500. I imagine felting the roof would be a fairly large cost. To be honest, surveys always pick up loads of stuff and sound dreadful but a lot of the time it's nit picking. You have got some costly stuff listed and I would expect to re-negotiate to a certain extent, but certainly not for the full cost of all the work, that never happens. Did the property appear to be excellent condition and has this come as a shock, or did it look like it may need a bit of work doing? Did you feel that you've got a bargain? in which case that may be why the vendor won't re-negotiate

The property has been valued at what you have offered in its current condition so really I do not think you can expect the vendor to reduce the agreed sale price when he will not be benefiting once the jobs have been done. Get 3 quotes for each of the jobs that need doing & decide if the house if for you. remeber all houses need maintenance. Good luck

None of these issus sounds unusual for a property of this age. The vendor is right to assume that you would know the property's age and that therefore it would not be in 'new build' condition. I think you could only ask for money off if any of these could not be easily assumed for a property of this age.

Surveys always come back with lots of issues. We are buying at the moment with the survey due soon. Unless it says that the property is falling down we would not expect a price reduction, especially if the valuation is what we'd agreed to pay.

When we bought our current house the survey raised various issues, totally £13k. We asked for a reduction, they said 'no' so we said we wanted £5k off or we'd walk away. It seemed fair to us. The vendor agreed to the reduction but trashed the house on their departure causing far more than £5k of damage. It wasn't worth it.

I'd say that most of this is 'should ideally', not 'need to be'.

Utility room has dampness - that's so vague it could be anything. It might be that it would be better if it had an extractor fan, or didn't have a whole load of nappies constantly drying in it.

Tweak your gutters so the rain falls out of them better - well, we should tweak our gutters, but it's not top of my list of priorities by a long way. Just look at them when it's raining and see whether the water is actually getting stuck.

Moss to be cleaned from roof surfaces. I have a memory that that's no longer considered to be necessary by old roof experts.

Cement flashing should be replaced with lead - I can imagine this probably would be worth doing if you plan to stay longer term, but they clearly aren't actually leaking now, so there's no current problem.

Subfloor ventilation blocked - hmm - I don't live in a brick house so can't say on this one. I don't think it matters in a 1930s house, though, does it?

Rendering defective on chimneys - keep an eye on it and fix when necessary!

I don't think any of those problems sounds serious at all. If a 1930s house still has its original roof the survey will always say it needs a new one/felting. There is some argument as to whether rooves (rooves? looks wrong!) should be felted anyway since it doesn't allow the house to breathe. Our house is 1920s and I guess approx half in the street still have their original roof.

You can add some airbricks to increase subfloor ventilation - not a big job.

There is nothing there that would make me worried about buying the house or renegotiate the price.

We are also in a process to buy 1900 Victorian 2 bedroom terrace and the survey brought much more than I was expecting first of all, past movement in the structure (not progressive), structural alterations which don't have any building approvals (although the surveyor said the job was carried out properly), dampness in utility room, no vents in closed chimneys, no trap in some pipe outside, some bad joinery, starting to rust radiators.. Looked very scary in the beginning I almost pulled out; but then I realised that more or less all houses have their own issues and the house is not cracking or not collapsing and it is not in a new condition so what do I expect else? It crossed my mind that I could negotiate price, but I didn't know were to start, did not feel like negotiating, and also there are no alternative properties which I would like to buy in my area - so I left as it is and am trying not to stress myself too much. I hope I am not doing a mistake, but hey nobody is perfect!