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Why property surveys are money well spent

If you like reading about the property market, you may have noticed that, over recent years, there has been something of a trend away from “let the buyer beware” and towards seller disclosure.  In fact, buyers can now take legal action against sellers if they can demonstrate that the seller deliberately mislead them.  Of course, they key words in that sentence are “demonstrate” and “deliberately”.  Sellers can only disclose what they know and in law a person is innocent until proven guilty, which means that the onus is on you to prove that the actively failed to disclose something to you, rather than that they simply didn’t know it.  That’s why a property survey can be a wise precaution.

Surveyors work directly for buyers Sellers choose the estate agent they want to use to sell their home and the estate agent acts for them, not for the buyer.  Insofar as they legally can, it is the estate agent’s job to highlight a home’s good points and draw attention away from any potential flaws it has.  Buyers choose surveyors and the surveyor works for the buyer.  It is the surveyor’s job to give an accurate and objective report of the condition of the property so that the buyer can make an informed decision as to whether or not its price is reasonable.

Surveys versus valuations A survey is undertaken on behalf of the buyer and looks at the condition of the home so that the buyer can make an informed decision as to whether or not the terms of the purchase are reasonable.  A valuation is undertaken on behalf of a potential mortgage lender and simply assesses the value of the home and whether or not the home can be used as collateral for a mortgage.  While you could reasonably see a valuation as being a form of home survey, it has to be clearly understood that it is a very “light touch” survey which offers very little in the way of hard information to the purchaser.

Different kinds of surveys Not only is there a difference between a valuation and a survey, there are different kinds of surveys to cover different situations. New-build properties At one end of the survey scale there is a new-build “snagging survey” which basically is intended to catch little bits and pieces which may have been overlooked by developers.  Surveys on new-build properties do not typically need to go into great levels of detail, since new-build properties typically come with guarantees from the builder. Building surveys At the other end of the scale, there are building surveys, which are the most comprehensive type of surveys are really do go into a lot of detail about the condition of the property.  These surveys are strongly recommended for older and/or unusual properties, in order for buyers to be comfortable that there are no nasty surprises waiting to bite them in the wallet later on. Condition reports and HomeBuyer’s reports These two types of survey are somewhere in the middle with condition reports being relatively lightweight and HomeBuyer’s reports being more in depth.  As such the former is more appropriate for newer and/or more standardised properties and the latter for properties which are neither particularly new nor particularly old, but still fairly standard. The value of a proper survey Money saved is worth as much as money earned and spending a little money on a home survey can save you a lot of money later since it will alert you to any issues of which the seller was unaware.  It is also worth noting that if the issue is news to the seller, they may agree that it is reasonable to lower the agreed price so the sale can still go forward, just on a slightly different basis. For surveys we act as introducers only.

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