Old Gatehouse - Build Log

platypus · 26 Mar 2018 at 09:43

I've spoken with heritage house in the past and they were very helpful over email, even without us engaging their services.

BigT · 28 Mar 2018 at 17:03

I can't remember who I used on our 600 year old house but it was a specialist in older and listed properties and i was glad I did. Paid something in the region of £1,500 as I remember and got a 100+ page report back. It was useful for me for the following reasons:

1. Any house of scale and age is going to have issues. The report is a great guide to understand in what order to address them and how bad in real terms they are.
2. A 100 page report full of things to watch out for is jolly useful as a negotiating tool. I got another £10K off the price as result, more than paying for the cost of the survey and I didn't really "need" to do everything listed in it. Or else there was a compromise alternative course of action that had adequate results for far less money.
3. Peace of mind. Allowed me to go into buying the thing with my eyes wide open. This is important in older properties because they all have their nuances and quirks; it is what gives them their character.

GeX · 28 Mar 2018 at 21:11

Scrutinize said:
I would make the vendor rectify rather than lowering the offer or contemplating funding repairing yourself.

This.

Our house was built in 1903 and we had a scary sounding survey too. On the back of the survey we lowered our offer by ~£10k below the absolute minimum that'd every accept (lol).

Part of the risk was downstairs damp, and as they wouldn't let us lift the floor we couldn't determine if it was just rising damp or there was a broken drain. Turned out it was lack of a membrane between the floorboards and solid floor - so a minor issue really!

ramsden · 28 Mar 2018 at 21:39

House surveys appear to be a bit of a minefield. We bought a 1930s property just over a year ago - survey brought up the roof as the only serious issue and we nogtiated the price down. A year later and 17K spent on damp/dry rot remedial work! Do your research and find a reputable surveyor. RICS accredited does not guarantee a good surveyor.

fastwunz · 29 Mar 2018 at 07:43

ramsden said:
House surveys appear to be a bit of a minefield. We bought a 1930s property just over a year ago - survey brought up the roof as the only serious issue and we nogtiated the price down. A year later and 17K spent on damp/dry rot remedial work! Do your research and find a reputable surveyor. RICS accredited does not guarantee a good surveyor.

To be fair it depends on the type of survey you had - all differ in scope and so it is likely that some issues would be missed

SPG · 29 Mar 2018 at 09:39

Our old house was built is 1858,

We never bothered with the survey as we went with if its still standing now and people are living in it and the houses on the street are not falling to bits we went with the gamble. (it was also our first house so money was tight)

All i will say is enjoy doing 15 jobs (one of them being major) to actual fix the thing you was trying to fix in the first place

and plaster OMG the plaster.

Martynt74 · 5 Apr 2018 at 14:27

@platypus

Thought i'd post in here to avoid disrupting the other thread!

Cheers, things are going well so far. We've had a roofer out yesterday to take a look and his opinion was greatly different to the Surveyor. We've used him a few times and referred other work his way all with good results so i trust him.

Have found one or two other builders who specialise in Lime and older properties so one of those is coming out next week to meet me there.

We've decided to press ahead with the purchase, it might be stupid but we don't want to lose it as in the last 12 weeks since first viewing absolutely nothing has come up which has tempted us. Having re-read the survey i'm less and less concerned about things. We've got a contingency budget of around £15k for any immediate works and i think that should stand us in decent position. We have around the same again but that's intended for the kitchen/flooring.

However...Plot twist

The original building is split into 2 properties and there is a small section of land adjacent. Our plot would be the blue one and then this bit of land is in red. The people who own our house were interested in buying it a few years ago but the guy in the other home ended up getting it.

He's now thinking of selling and i'm debating having a chat with him about that plot. It has a decent looking garage on it and i was planning on building a workshop/homegym in our garden anyway. It could be in his interest to sell to me as it might not add as much value to his house sale as it would by selling separately.

I could already be spending our contingency money before we even move in!

platypus · 5 Apr 2018 at 15:07

I'd definitely be buying that if possible!

Skillmister · 5 Apr 2018 at 15:11

Do it. Monster plot then

#Chri5# · 5 Apr 2018 at 17:18

Buy land now, use umbrellas in the house if the roof leaks

Martynt74 · 6 Apr 2018 at 08:10

Have sent a message to my sellers asking for contact details so we'll see what happens.

@Skillmister You might be the best placed to answer this but is there anywhere i can see the previous purchases price of land? I know Zoopla/Land Registry holds things for property but i'm struggling to find anything for land without having to pay the £3 charge for title documents.

Skillmister · 6 Apr 2018 at 13:11

Marvt74 said:
Have sent a message to my sellers asking for contact details so we'll see what happens.

@Skillmister You might be the best placed to answer this but is there anywhere i can see the previous purchases price of land? I know Zoopla/Land Registry holds things for property but i'm struggling to find anything for land without having to pay the £3 charge for title documents.

You could try this but I don't know whether you'll have any more luck http://landregistry.data.gov.uk/app/ppd

Martynt74 · 6 Apr 2018 at 13:17

Cheers, think thats what i tried the first time around but it only looks to show details for property and not land.

If i look on this link and put the postcode in i get what looks like multiple entries for "land adjoining". I'm not sure why there are 2 entries for the land adjoining "1 Gatehouse" as i'm sure it's only one piece of land.

I know i could pay £9 for all 3 searches but seems a bit of a waste at this point.

https://eservices.landregistry.gov....L3NwZl9zdHJ1dHNBY3Rpb24vITJmUURTZWFyY2guZG8!/

EDIT - Also at some point i should probably remove the above links to my future address but will leave it in for the purpose of conversation - You can all come round and help repair the house!

Skillmister · 6 Apr 2018 at 20:29

Marvt74 said:
Cheers, think thats what i tried the first time around but it only looks to show details for property and not land.

If i look on this link and put the postcode in i get what looks like multiple entries for "land adjoining". I'm not sure why there are 2 entries for the land adjoining "1 Gatehouse" as i'm sure it's only one piece of land.

EDIT - Also at some point i should probably remove the above links to my future address but will leave it in for the purpose of conversation - You can all come round and help repair the house!

It's a bit of a mess

This is #2.

This is "land adjoining #2"

And these are both "land adjoining #1" but separate parcels

By all means tag/quote me if you ever want this deleted.

Martynt74 · 6 Apr 2018 at 22:02

Ah that’s good to know. Thanks for that. I really appreciate it. That last one is showing on our deeds as having been separated so might ask the solicitor what the deal is.

Last thing I need is to be spending a fortune on a tiny slither of lane!

Skillmister · 7 Apr 2018 at 07:48

I assume the one adjoining 2 is already included in the sale?

Hard to tell from Google earth but it looks like the smaller "adjoining 1" one is actually within the boundaries on the ground of number 2?

Martynt74 · 9 Apr 2018 at 09:00

I'm not 100% to be honest. Title deeds read like nonsense to me!

EDIT - Actually, yes it does look like the land adjoining no2 is included. No idea why it's been split off. Maybe something to do with the extension and extending the boundary.

Skillmister · 9 Apr 2018 at 13:03

Marvt74 said:
I'm not 100% to be honest. Title deeds read like nonsense to me!

EDIT - Actually, yes it does look like the land adjoining no2 is included. No idea why it's been split off. Maybe something to do with the extension and extending the boundary.

I meant in the contract. It should have 2 title numbers on it, although you probably won't have seen it yet. You better make sure, its extremely easy to miss these things when acting for a seller if you don't know what other land has been purchased/split off previously. That map I showed above is a relatively new thing in the last couple of years. Before there was no way of just browsing the map to see how titles were laid out and what should/shouldn't be included in sales. I dread to think how many things have been missed over the years because there was no way of knowing if people don't query it after viewing properties

At least I know your address now for my invoice

Martynt74 · 9 Apr 2018 at 13:11

Crap!

Yeah no contract yet. Although have had a nice letter from the Solicitors saying First Direct are talking about a 3k early redemption charge. There isn't meant to be one as we're just adding to the existing rather than paying it off so that'll be fun to sort out.

Skillmister · 9 Apr 2018 at 13:14

Shouldn't be too hard to sort out. Banks seem to do it every time like when people are taking out new mortgages with the same lender and the ERC should be waived but they include it anyway. There must be a lack of communication (and I assume a difference in computer systems) between redemption and new mortgage departments.