Buying A House With Structural Problems

[HongKongphooey]

My husband and I are living in rented property, he's 63 and too old to get a mortgage, i am 51 but don't earn enough to have a mortgage. Between us( we were both divorcee's we have a fund of £150,000 to buy a house. My husband has fallen in love with a 2 bed semi bungalow which is on the market for £119,000.Normally this type of bungalow would be worth around £220,000 around here. But the estate agents said it was built on soft ground and the foundations are sinking, and the drains are all cracked. my husband is an electrician and we have loads of contacts/friends who are builders. He thinks it would not be a problem to correct the subsidence and we could live out his retirement there. we have no dependant both sets of kids have left home. I am not so sure, I'm scared of sinking our savings into something which we are possibly not going to be able to put right, and be left with an unsaleable worthless property. We;ve looked at other properties, but they are all smaller and this has a garage and large garden and plot, in a quiet rural close at the better end of town. What do answerbanker's think, is it fixable within our budget? Or am I right, 'a wouldn't touch with a bargepole job'?

[EDDIE51]

You need an expert surveyor to give an opinion. Absolutely impossible to say without a survey and test drilling of the ground.

[Tilly2]

So you have £31000 for repairs and structural/ building work? Is that going to be enough? I have no idea but do you need to put some of that by for a rainy day?

[Buenchico]

It's worth paying for a specialist structural engineer to provide a report (while stressing to him that you don't just want to know what's wrong with the property - you need to know exactly what's needed to put it right and, if possible, an estimate of the cost of doing so).

You can find a local member of the Institution of Structural Engineers here:
http://www.findanengineer.com/
(Select 'Domestic: Subsidence/Underpinning' as the specialism).

[Buenchico]

^^^ With respect to Eddie, I wouldn't use a surveyor. They can tell you what's wrong with a property but they're unlikely to have the expertise to tell you how it can be put right (or the cost of doing so). It's a structural engineer that you should be looking for.

[Togo]

No one, no matter how good a friend, is going to take on underpinning a property without being covered themselves should it all go pear shaped. The wrong structural engineer(that is what you need)will bring the whole place down. The property though is ripe for a for a buyer with those skills.

[Tilly2]

What about next door? Is that in the same state? Are they doing something about it?

[silliemillie]

It's on the market for 119k. Could you get some more off? Do you love it too? If so it might be a good chance to get the property you want for the price you can afford.

Subsidence is very fixable but you must look into how much it would cost.

Swings and roundabouts. How do you feel? Excitement or dread?

[Old_Geezer]

£101,000 off for the subsidence ? Quite a bit off already. 46%. Is subsidence the only reason for the price drop ?

Of course it helps one's case to have an expert quote on the costs (and possible inconvenience) of putting it right.

[EDDIE51]

Thanks Chris 'structural engineer' is what I meant to say! Thought 'surveyors' could do the same.

[tandh]

i may be being really silly here, but if you brought it and things did start going wrong, would your home insurance not pay for it? i would defo follow chris's advice and find out what the problems are, and more importantly how much it will cost to fix. I brought a place that was about to fall down at such a bargain price, and i've now increased the value by about 50k by just spending 20k doing the structural work. I did a lot of research into it though and i knew what i was getting myself into, i would strongly suggest you do the same

[tandh]

also, find out if your able to get a mortgage on it, if you can't you'll probably get the price down even more

[woofgang]

tandh, if you buy a house with known issues then you won’t get insured for those issues unless you can get certified proof that they have been rectified.

[tandh]

arrr, thanks woof gang, i was thinking that it didn't make sence. What if you buy a house without getting a survey done, and then find out it has problems once you move in?

[woofgang]

no idea...

[tonyav]

House sellers must tell buyers about structural defects and any other information that could affect their decision to make an offer under legislation now being applied to property sales.

Have a look at this, tandh.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/property/house-prices/10864514/Failed-property-survey-Now-sellers-must-disclose-all.html

[tandh]

wow, thanks for posting that link tony, i think i may have a claim ageist the people that i brought my house from, as they failed to tell me about the free hour long drum festival we get to enjoy everyday, and they also didn't tell me that the dam boiler wasn't working

[tonyav]

Yep, look into it tandh.