Home Buyer Report

Russinating

Russinating

Russinating

Soldato
Joined
27 Dec 2005
Posts
17,316
Location
Bristol
So we got our Home Buyer Report back today and large portions of it are quite vague, dramatic, unclear or unhelpful.

The main element of this is that at the end the surveyor has estimated "the current reinstatement cost of the property is £125,000".

£125,000?! Considering we had a quote of £140,000 to renovate a completely inhabitable, non-residential 2,000sq/m stable, this seems a bit wild. Whilst this one is in need of modernisation it's no different to any other granny house and the report doesn't say anything along the lines of "this is broke and needs fixing", just a few "may need doing" etc.

For example the windows are all brand new double glazed, but it's rated as a 3 (Defects that are serious and/or need to be repaired, replaced or investigated urgently) because some of the windows are low level and aren't etched correctly as being safety glass. The flooring is rated as 2 because there's one floorboard missing in the airing cupboard.

The report also doesn't give any breakdown of the reinstatement cost either so I'm finding it difficult to work out how they got to it. Or is it just assuming that everything marked as 2 and 3 needs completely replacing?

Anyone have any experience with these reports and have any advice? I know they need to cover their backs but it seems very unhelpful to just pick up on everything and then give a massive quote at the end.
 
Our home buyers report was similar. Massively over-dramatised. It's just how they work. Only look for things that would cause you a material financial issue if not factored in. The rest is just 'fyi' and often the advice in it was actually really helpful when doing improvements to our property.

Some plaster was cracking and blowing on a wall in one of the bedrooms and they made a huge deal of that. A cast iron soil pipe will need doing at some unspecified point in the future and the buyers should factor this into their offer. I'm spending hundreds of £k for God's sake! Half the stuff they come up with would only achieve annoying the vendors if you picked them up on it, so we ignored anything that wasn't thousands of quid that we weren't aware of.

They basically listed everything that might need replacing.

They're doing two things mainly: obviously providing negotiating ammunition to the buyers, but also covering themselves against 'why didn't you tell me that?' type come back.
 
It's only an indicative value anyway, just make sure you have adequate buildings insurance (e.g. Direct Line provide £1mil of cover as standard)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom