Estate Agents recommend not having a survey
Independent Surveyors for help and advice
Our highly qualified independent surveyors can offer you advice on your property problems and can carry out a building survey on your prospective purchase; whether it is residential or for business. We can prepare a schedule of condition and property report in relation to your lease. We carry out dilaps reports for landlords or tenants.
If you have a property problem we may even already have written an article on it and would refer you to our free articles page Click Here
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Estate Agents
There are some good Estate Agents, some excellent Estate Agents but we would say that most Estate Agents are okay and we would say that many are not so good Estate Agents.
Estate Agents over the years
We would comment also that the quality of the Estate Agent has changed over the years and to be more exact the way Estate Agent's work has changed over the years. Estate Agents have certainly progressed in many ways but we believe in some ways they have taken a step backwards particularly, we would say, with regard to ethics.
You need to keep a friendly attitude with Estate Agents
Fortunately or unfortunately during the house buying process you need to keep a friendly rapport with Estate Agents as Estate Agents offer you properties to buy on behalf of their clients the seller of the property. Do not for one minute imagine that Estate Agents are working for you and do bear in mind that most Estate Agents are paid heavily on commission so the sale is what they are after and they will lose interest in you very quickly once they have the sale.
Estate Agents do not want you to have a Surveyor carrying out a Survey
We believe that Estate Agents do not want you to have a structural survey or a building survey. They understand that you need to have a valuation to get a mortgage approved and in many cases it should be remembered that the Estate Agents are part of the mortgage group who have a vested interest. In fact the sale of the mortgage to many Estate Agents is as good if not better than the sale of the house from a financial point of view. With the sale of the house it is a one off transaction and from a mortgage sale point of view the Estate Agent gets a commission every month you pay the mortgage.
Things that get in the way of Estate Agents selling a house are:-
1) Lack of properties to sell
2) Lack of appropriate properties to sell that people ask them for
3) Lack of properties to sell to people wishing to buy houses
4) Having a survey carried out that points out in some cases some very obvious problems with the property as Estate Agents are against structural surveys.
The first two points do not stop Estate Agents from selling houses
We can give you numerous examples but one that we remember is an Estate Agent sent our client, who we were carrying out a structural survey for, an email saying no matter what the Surveyor comes up with it will not affect the price. The Estate Agent went onto say in their experience surveyors always find damp, woodworm, wet rot and a whole list of other things, which have been allowed for in the price and therefore their client would not reduce the price of the property.
Estate Agent very friendly
The Estate Agent's comments had taken the buyer by surprise particularly as the Estate Agent had been very friendly and that they were also aware that the property had been on the market several times and the Estate Agents had come back to them to find out if they were still interested in the property. There clearly had been some problems with sales in the past. Interestingly the Estate Agent felt the structural survey was not needed on old property such as this.
The potential purchaser showed the Estate Agent's email to a relative who was so infuriated by its contents they actually came along to the building survey to meet us and to ask us to explain exactly what was going on with the Estate Agent and this sort of email
Valuation is not a Survey
The main reason the potential purchaser had a structural survey carried out was that the valuation that had been carried out by the bank said that there may be movement in the property and recommended a structural survey.
Why do Estate Agents call a valuation a survey?
Interestingly the Estate Agent told the potential purchaser originally they were getting a survey carried out on their behalf but by this the Estate Agent meant that a valuation had been carried out by the bank (admittedly although you pay for it, this certainly is not your survey and indeed they often say for you to have your own survey carried out).
Two page valuation being called a survey
When the two page valuation arrived not only did the potential purchaser discover that it was not a structural survey the potential purchaser also discovered that the valuation stated that they should have their own survey carried out. This comment did not relate to the fact that the valuation mentioned possible structural problems but was merely a standard clause in the valuation.
We rarely come across valuation reports that do not recommend you having your own survey.
Please see our surveying articles on:-
Buying a house
Estate Agents
Trust me I'm an Estate Agent
Can you trust a Surveyors Valuation?
Structural Survey by an Independent Surveyor
The potential purchaser decided to have their own structural building survey carried out on the property.
As it turned out it was an interesting survey as we spoke to the neighbours and the builders of the neighbours next door who advised us of the various alterations and amendments that had been carried out to the property we were surveying (this is something that we usually do – talk to the neighbours and any builders we find nearby). From this we discovered that the front had had the render removed and the brickwork cleaned and re-pointed and we discovered that a wall had been removed and never been put back up with studwork and interestingly we discovered what work the neighbour was carrying out.
Please see our surveying articles on:-
Information on Valuations
Snap, the valuation is exactly the same price as you offered for the property
My Estate Agent has just told me off
Why we always recommend having an independent building survey?
Always have an independent building survey as this will pinpoint any property problems. Caveat emptor means buyer beware and is why you need to have a building survey to find out if there are any problems within the property; the estate agent certainly will not advise you of any but we most definitely will!
Remember the independent building Surveyor that you employ will be the only person working for you with your interests at heart
We use many pictures and sketches in our surveys
In our survey reports we include our own unique sketches and photographs from a very powerful optical zoom camera to identify problem areas and to help to explain pictorially the issues, which we as Independent Surveyors often find helps to highlight and explain property areas of concern.
Our circles and ovals
In our building surveys and structural surveys the circles and ovals are a system that we used to highlight property problem areas so that you are not left wondering where the property issue is.
Independent Surveyors
If you truly do want an independent expert opinion from an Independent Surveyor with regard to building surveys, structural surveys, structural reports, engineers reports, specific defects report, dilapidations or any other property matters please contact 0800 298 5424 for a friendly chat.
Commercial Property Surveyors
If you have a commercial property, be it leasehold or freehold, then you may wish to look at our Dilapidations Website at www.DilapsHelp.com and for Disputes go to our Disputes Help site www.DisputesHelp.com .
Our articles
We hope you found the article of use and if you have any experiences that you feel should be added to this article that would benefit others, or you feel that some of the information that we have put is wrong then please do not hesitate to contact us (we are only human).
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