How to do Building Surveys

We're going to divide the Building Survey process into three sections:-

  1. the start
  2. viewing the property (the middle)
  3. survey reflection (the end).

Survey Reflection

This stage is about communicating the information you have gathered to a digestible format to the client (remember with clients we have are either informed clients; those with a lot of knowledge about property or uninformed clients; those with no knowledge, and all those in between, ensuring you are presenting the survey in a suitable format for your client), making sure you highlight the most important issues as you consider them, and also highlight any important issues they have identified. This should be put together in an Executive Summary, which should include a suitable title, all the items, the actions required and the approximate cost and also the timescale that you believe the work needs carrying out in, and whether it can be amalgamated with any other work.

You will then need to go into more detail about the issues within the main body of the report under the headings of:

•  External

•  Internal

•  Services

Along with the Executive Summary, you also need to include Situation and Description, which is a brief summary of the area the property is in and an outline of the type of property. You need to include a Construction Summary, Accommodation and Facilities. In each case you need to use terms that will be understandable by the client. You need to think about how you can add value.

Things to do

how to do surveysGive feedback to a colleague within your group on their survey and how it could be improved.

Have a feedback meeting and review all feedback to see if there are any common benefits and improvements that can be made.

Take a look at our website to look at articles on any particular issues they have.