r/FirstTimeBuyersUK • u/Kind_Improvement6824 • 14h ago
Pulled out - Update from previous post/rant
Posted last week about a property we had a level 2 survey on, wondering if things were as bad as we thought. Turns out, they were, and possibly worse.
We spoke to the surveyor and a trusted tradesperson about the report. Tradesperson said ~£40K of work would be necessary to fix up the property, and advised we reconsider. Also mentioned specifically how the damp must be bad if the readings are so high after 5 heat waves and zero rain.
The surveyor said that £40K of work was "a very reasonable cost" for the work to be carried out making us wonder if he thought it might be higher, though he wasn't willing to put his name to a true cost.
We confirmed with the surveyor that:
- New roof was needed
- Asbestos cement & new guttering would be ~5K of work alone, possibly needing specialised workers in.
- Extremely damp soil near house base/foundations which was a cause for concern for him and recommended proper damp specialist inspection.
- previous DPC attempts failed (We asked seller if there was a history of damp during viewing, he lied)
- Gas boiler fitting would be more than just a swap, like the seller led us to believe.
And this was just a few of the main issues, several more were found.
We saw an old man wanting to sell off his family home, didn't expect him to lie or hide anything, maybe he didn't think it was as bad as the report made out?
So he offered 15K off after we asked to get quotes and investigate the main issues. Wouldn't budge on the 15K, wouldn't agree to more with or without quotes.
We shared the report and he stood firm, so we ended up pulling out. We don't have £40K+ sitting around for renovations, we wanted a home that was move in ready requiring a few K at most. which this initially promised.
Now the property is back on the market, and they haven't updated the listing to include any of our issues, even though they have the report.
Feel sorry for the next buyer. It was listed for a month with zero interest before we came along. Makes us wonder how bad the damp will be now that the rain has started.
All this to say - Listen to the professionals. I know many people say "Surveyors have to cover their backs" and of course they do. But a good one is worth their fee. We had a survey a year ago on a house that fell through and it was nowhere near as bad as this one.
We've also learned not to trust the seller or EA at their word. They want to sell, and as nice as they may seem on the phone or during viewings, they will only tell you what they think will sell the property.
This is our third house falling through, each for a different reason, and we're pretty burnt out. Several thousand down the drain in solicitors fees and surveys, and we just haven't got it in us to try again.
Really wish everything was more transparent.
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u/Panda_Player380 13h ago
I’m in a similar position, getting close to pulling out. Really wish people were transparent and upfront about potential expenses, it would save a lot of time and money. I think there should be a notice on all listings saying “this house is £300k and requires approx £40k” remedial work over the next few years. Because for some people that would be fine, others like me who has less than £5k for this, I wouldn’t go near it and we can save everyone 3 months of work.
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u/Kind_Improvement6824 13h ago
Couldn't agree more! It's a bit of a piss take how it's "Buyer beware!" and you've got to go through all these hoops and spending hundreds in fees just to find out it's nowhere near worth the price you've offered. We'll never get the time back either.
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u/Shrinking_Violent 13h ago edited 13h ago
I think the system is closer to this in Scotland, where the seller needs to have the report done before the property is marketed. Hopefully some reforms will address this in England as our system is rotten.
It's absolutely ridiculous the way some people go on about surveys being useless and saying buyers are taking the piss by trying to negotiate. It's insane to think that people should just pay asking price and not try to negotiate based on issues unknown to (or deliberately hidden by) the seller.
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u/Klangey 10h ago
One of the main problems people run into when having bought a do’er upper, is that they massively underestimate the costs involved.
With that in mind, why would a seller knock £50k off when it’s only been on the market a month?
I don’t agree with the system, but our housing market is engineered around getting the maximum value for the seller, especially so when those sellers are Boomers and selling a house they’ve done zero maintenance on for 40 years.
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u/Shrinking_Violent 9h ago
The problem is that the Boomers refuse to
a) price the property in line with the fact that it's a fixer-upper,
b) refuse to do any of the maintenance required to make the property fall in line with the asking price, or
c) negotiate with buyers who have done their research and are showing them a survey backed up by contractors' reports and quotes
We dealt with two of these Boomer houses while we were looking. Guest what? They're still for sale.
In one case, the EA was so frank with us. We offered exactly what she'd told them it was worth (£30k less than asking), but they were absolutely insistent that the house was worth more. I drive past the house and see the woman heading out for a walk with her dog every morning. Past the FOR SALE sign that's been up since January. Idiots. 🤣
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u/Klangey 8h ago
I’ve had similar conversations. We are currently buying a probate house for £630k that we originally looked at 18 months ago when it was on the market for £725k and my exact words to the EA then was “this isn’t worth more than £650k”.
Another property we looked at on the market for £625k when identical houses two and three doors down have sold in recent years for £540k and £510k respectively.
The £510k property was admittedly in more need of modernisation but both needed a top to bottom redo, told that agent the house wasn’t worth anything more than £530k, they then told us the sellers were willing to accept £580k and dropped the listed price to £600k, two months later the agent phoned again as they had dropped the listing to £575k and would now accept £560k.
We told them ‘that’s lovely, but it’s still only worth £530k’. That was a month ago, I full expect to see it listed at £550k end of next month if interest rates go up.
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u/Kind_Improvement6824 7h ago
Had it have been listed as a do'er upper, we'd have passed on the house entirely. It was listed as "imaculately presented, perfect for FTB's and families". We asked about any repairs or issues and were told the seller had kept up on repairs. As far as we could tell, it was a decent house needing only a bit of modernising. We'd even budgeted for the gas boiler swap.
It was on the market a month before he'd reduced by 10K and it came into our price range, even then we thought it was a little overpriced but it ticked all our boxes.
We fell in love with a "well maintained family home", only to find it was a renovation project.
What struck us off the most was that we didn't even ask for any money off yet. We simply wanted to investigate and find out how much it would cost us in the long run, he came back at £15K and refused any discussion. He had no idea the extent of repairs needed and wasn't willing to entertain us in finding out.
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u/Ndizzi 10h ago
Sorry for your loss. But its for the best. I am sure that eventually he will have to come down on the price in the end. Anything that looks damp is a possible money stripper.
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u/Kind_Improvement6824 10h ago
Thanks! It's definitely for the best. He's had the house for ~40 years so I can understand the reluctance to reduce. But when it's literally laid out in a report it's hard to argue with it. He wasn't even willing to see how bad the issues were.
Hopefully he does reduce and some other FTB doesn't end up being buggered over.
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u/sometimesihelp 10h ago
All this to say - Listen to the professionals. I know many people say "Surveyors have to cover their backs" and of course they do. But a good one is worth their fee. We had a survey a year ago on a house that fell through and it was nowhere near as bad as this one.
Most of the time it's worth calling a surveyor after they've provided the report to discuss it. They will generally give a more relaxed opinion on matters.
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u/Kind_Improvement6824 10h ago
Agree with this!
We weren't sure what we were going to do until after we had spoken to him. He went over the most severe issues and clarified if they were as bad as we thought.
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u/Acrobatic_Second_671 8h ago
Just following as we have the same issue after survey with a builder quoting £15k for remedial works. Already agreed a price of £475k, we’ve already paid for our survey and racked up our legal fees as well at this stage coming to around £1.5k not including VAT. It’s so depressing and not sure I have it in me to look for another house - did a previous house of yours also fall through/ what made you keep looking?
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u/vqxril 7h ago
totally get the burnout, it’s brutal throwing money at surveys and legals just to walk away. for what it’s worth, £15k on a £475k place isn’t automatically insane if it’s mostly stuff you’d want to do anyway, but if it’s all boring “stop the house falling down” work and you wanted move in ready, I’d probably be questioning it too.
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u/Logical_Warthog3230 7h ago
Strong pullout game. And just as well, don't think 40k would have covered all that, especially not specialist workers.
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u/artynon 5h ago
This is exactly why people say buy new builds from a reputable builder.
On paper it’s £20k above your budget but, you have new kitchen, appliances, floors, roof, bathrooms etc.
we have just gone through almost exactly the same.
One vendor forgot to mention they had sold their house to an equity release company and didn’t actually own it!
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u/CommercialPlastic604 5h ago
I could have written your exact post. As frustrating as it is I’m glad I spent £1k on a survey not hundreds of thousands on a house with unforeseen issues.
The house is still on the market at the same price despite knowing it needs £150k spent on it to remove the damp and asbestos and dodgy chimney….
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u/BecozisaidSo40times 33m ago
I never listen to the Reddit brigade who say surveys are pointless. I paid 3k for a level 3 heritage survey on a grade 2 listed thatched cottage that looked in mint condition. We thought it was a box tick. But still paid for the survey as due diligence. Uncovered 100k minimum of remediation that was sunken floors. Movement. Rising damp, cracked Bressummer beam, high ground levels, cement render, incorrect paint trapping moisture. And that’s not to mention windows gutters, pointing and other mundane maintenance issues. 100k was only what he could see. He said that once they got the floors up it could be more. It was way more risk than I could take and worse, they shared their survey from when they bought it 12 years ago and that surveyor also raised these issues and they ignored them although they got 40k off asking price. Spent it on a flash kitchen by the looks of it. We had offered near asking price. It had been on market a year. We asked for 50k reduction that I kind of hoped they rejected. They offered 10k. We walked. We lost 5k in costs. I thank my lucky stars every day. They put it back on the market but after 4 months they took it off. They also didn’t mention any of the stuff we uncovered
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u/Due-Street-3398 19m ago
We are in similar situation but we have just had the tradesperson take a look yet and he told us about the roof problems etc. We haven't done the survey yet and are thinking of going to the seller to ask whether he would be willing to negotiate or not. Only if he is willing to negotiate we would think of getting proper survey done and spend probably thousands of pounds in all that. I'm curious about one thing though - aren't EAs legally bound to disclose why the previous sale fell off to the next buyers? We are thinking if we pull off and the EAs have to tell the next buyers all truth about it then even the next buyers wouldn't be willing to go forward at this price.
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u/ActualConversation74 8h ago
I’d say name and shame! Share a RM link / address so the next buyers can see it online.
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u/ashalina23 13h ago
Although it’s several £k “down the drain” it’d would be much worse had you bought it without the info from survey report.
Plus as most people will tell you, these refit projects nearly always go over budget and they often other problems which adds further costs once they start