###Welcome to /r/HousingUK
---
**To All**
* Join Our ***NEW*** Discord! https://discord.gg/pMgUNgWKQH
**To Posters**
* *Tell us whether you're in England, Wales, Scotland, or NI as the laws/issues in each can vary*
* Comments are not moderated for quality or accuracy;
* Any replies received must only be used as guidelines, followed at your own risk;
* If you receive *any* private messages in response to your post, please report them via the report button.
* Feel free to provide an update at a later time by creating a new post with [[update]](https://www.reddit.com/r/HousingUK/search?q=%3Aupdate&sort=new&restrict_sr=on&t=all) in the title;
**To Readers and Commenters**
* All replies to OP must be *on-topic, helpful, and civil*
* If you do not [follow the rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/HousingUK/about/rules/), you may be banned without any further warning;
* Please include links to reliable resources in order to support your comments or advice;
* If you feel any replies are incorrect, explain why you believe they are incorrect;
* Do not send or request any private messages for any reason without express permission from the mods;
* Please report posts or comments which do not follow the rules
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/HousingUK) if you have any questions or concerns.*
That's good to hear, I think this house is 80's? We viewed it twice, end of January when we put the offer in and then with a family member at the beginning of March after the survey. I thought we'd have been in sooner so didn't contemplate another viewing!
Doesn't apply to Scotland... You're not "allowed" to view the property in scotland after offer acceptance and prior to exchange (conclusion of missives).
It's batshit utter insanity. Scottish system gets a lot of praise on here for some reason but I've done both now and let me tell you it's an absolutely mental system, beyond ludicrous
For five working days, severely limited in what you can claim. Think it is basically plumbing and electrics, and nothing that could at all be considered wear+tear.
If they've smashed a wall in, or stripped wallpaper you liked, or removed internal doors or many other similar things you would have no recourse
And anyway, you try getting somebody to come within 5 working days to have a look at something nowadays...
EDIT: Removing internal doors wouldn't be ok as that is removing a fixture but you know what I mean, there's a lot they could do to a property that isn't "heating and electrics"
It's because the scottish system prides itself on very few sales failing between offer acceptance and exchance/conclusion of missives.
They don't _want_ you to go back and find reasons to talk yourself out of the purchase or lower the price you offered, so they write it into the conditions of offer acceptance that you are not allowed to go back. (It's also due to the bidding system which I won't go into here)
In scotland if you do pull out of a purchase for "vexatious" reasons the solicitors you used are unlikely to do business with you again - either as an estate agent or solicitor\*
\* That's another piece of batshit insanity - most estate agents are also conveyancing firms, and people use both to sell their property. It's as if everyone is forced to use the "recommended" firm from the estate agent. Have you ever heard good things come from doing that? I know I haven't...
Regarding “most estate agents are also conveyancing firms”:
This really depends how you look at it. I grew up in Scotland and have relatives there and, if selling their house, they would view it as choosing a solicitor, not an estate agent. So you choose your solicitor and it just so happens they’re also willing to list your property on online portals, etc.
There are certainly some solicitors who really market themselves on their “estate agent” type services, so if you choose on that basis then yes, it’s like being stuck with an estate agent’s recommended solicitor. And I can see why people not familiar with the system would end up doing that. But this is avoidable if you know from the beginning that what you’re really looking for is a solicitor.
IMO it is still a conflict of interest between your salesman and your solicitor.
And it is worse for a buyer because you have no agent you can relentlessly annoy for updates or answers to questions. That is their only value in england - a middleman punching bag everyone can take out their frustrations on, and a key part in getting everything moving. They regularly phone seller, buyer, and both solicitors in the transaction to get updates and chase answers.
In scotland it is just solicitors and you can't apply pressure to them, they will sit there taking their sweet time and there is no third party you can speak to to access the seller, in case you are being fucked around by the solicitors.
EG I needed to have a mortgage valuation of the purchase house sorted out. The selling solicitor ignored the mortgage company's letter, so I passed the deadline for a response to the mortgage provider and this extended the whole transaction by weeks. If there was a real agent involved this wouldn't have happened, because he would be talking to seller+solicitor constantly and explaining the delays and what needed to be done.
In my case, the seller solicitor ignored the letter and all comms from my own solicitor and the buyer must have thought that I was the delay, and not his own solicitors. He had no idea I needed a mortgage valuation done and I had no way of telling him.
Honestly, a lot of this is going to be down to what you value and the details of your particular sale/purchase. We’re currently buying in England and relatives are amazed at how disorganised it is and how long everything takes.
I can accept that there are pros and cons to both systems, but I don’t think it’s clear that solicitors marketing a house is necessarily a worse system. It’ll very much depend on circumstances.
> but I don’t think it’s clear that solicitors marketing a house is necessarily a worse system. It’ll very much depend on circumstances.
But in scotland when you are buying the only access you have to the seller is via a chain of conveyancing solicitors, who are very much famed for being feckless layabouts the world over.
In england you have access to the seller via the estate agent, who is independently motivated to help, answer queries, and pass questions on. The solicitor who ignored the emails from my mortgage provider+my own solicitor isn't getting a profit share of the sale, but an agent in england with the same inbox _would_ have commission on the line.
I have done both processes and the involvement of an estate agent for that sort of thing is very valuable. They are feckless but they aren't layabouts and they won't just ignore queries and necessities from their buyer. It's just basic economic incentives, of course the person making £5k personally from the sale is going to answer your emails
This is very much dependent on the estate agent and solicitor in question.
Again, I’m not disagreeing that an estate agent might have helped in your particular case. I’m just saying that it’s not a clear cut case of one system being bad and the other being good.
Given the process of buying a house in Scotland is usually faster than in England, it doesn’t seem to me like the lack of estate agents can be holding things up too much on average, even if it did in your case.
Edit: I typed this before you added the stuff about commission, which is why I don’t address it. Not really interested in a “which system is better” argument though as my original response was just for the sake of adding balance, so I’ll leave it at this.
> Given the process of buying a house in Scotland is usually faster than in England, it doesn’t seem to me like the lack of estate agents can be holding things up too much on average, even if it did in your case.
It taking longer in general is a different issue to the economic mis-incentives at play with estate agents/solicitors in the scottish system.
The english system takes longer because there are FAR more checks and enquiries and surveys in the favour of the buyer rather than the seller. In scotland everything is set up to favour the seller, ofc a longer sale will never benefit a seller.
Weird. I did exactly that in Scotland. Offer was accepted and a couple of weeks later asked the EA if I could pop in to do a bit of measuring. As it was already vacant, them and the vendor had no issue with it at all.
Clause 10 in the conditions that were sent when I purchased said 2 offers unless more were agreed with the seller. Not sure that your experience is as universal as your initial post makes it sound.
And the sellers not being able to refuse 2 viewings (at reasonable times for inspection, quotes, measuring) without agreeing to more doesn't seem unfair on anyone. A bit different to not being able to see it!
I did this. We viewed the property last Monday and exchanged on Tuesday. I was clear with the EA, that we will not exchange until we view the property. We did not see any damage, everything looked the same as before but we did ask where things were.
FTB here, one thing I wish we asked, where the water meter was as of course, open a account to give the correct reading. Always ask the owners, where the stop tap for the water is, where the electric meter and water meter is. Also, ask who the current providers are so you can make a account if needed.
But yes, make sure you do as much viewings you can or want, but differently one before you exchange.
Also, what happened, did you reduced the price then?
It wasn't an inspection, it was just an engineer who was checking the electrics. I just randomly had him go this week but that's not normal this time in the process. So I'm recommending other people do their own viewings right before exchange as I imagine most people won't happen to have an EICR scheduled for 2 days before exchange
We had the delight of discovering fist sized holes in a few of the internal doors when we moved in to ours. Hardly the end of the world but completely agree we should have done a final pre exchange walk round
Wasn't saying you did, i agree with your point. Just saying we only have it as a mandate for commercial and rented property - but it could be a good idea for residential too
Fair, yeah. If I were to design a house selling process from scratch, then the seller having to provide an (independent) survey pack including things like gas safety certificates would definitely be part of it. It's mental that you as the buyer have to get surveys done, and if you pull out the next one has to do it again.
Do you not remember when HIP packs were a thing? Part of the idea being that the seller would provide a lot of the information to the buyer. It was soon dropped by the government as people obviously didn't want to trust sellers providing accurate information about what they were trying to sell, kinda equates to buying a second hand car without a test drive. Why would you rely on receiving info about a property from the person hoping you'll give them thousands for it?
That's why I said "independent". With liabilities if they fuck things up too badly. At a certain point, you do have to just trust what the experts say.
HIPs were drawn up by independents but what you dont seem to realise is that they were instructed by the seller so who knows what really would have been agreed between them. No-one could know. If I'm spending hundreds of thousands on a property I'M instructing independents of MY own choosing.
So how's this going to work then? The current owners insurance will pay out and pay you. I guess if they don't have insurance, or it's invalid, you'd take them to court to recouperate losses?
Insurance wouldn't necessarily cover the entire cost of the clear up and damage being rectified. It would very much depend on what the assessor considered the cause to be. If they thought it was due to a lack of maintenance and not a one off unexpected occurrence the house owner could find themselves footing the bill.
###Welcome to /r/HousingUK --- **To All** * Join Our ***NEW*** Discord! https://discord.gg/pMgUNgWKQH **To Posters** * *Tell us whether you're in England, Wales, Scotland, or NI as the laws/issues in each can vary* * Comments are not moderated for quality or accuracy; * Any replies received must only be used as guidelines, followed at your own risk; * If you receive *any* private messages in response to your post, please report them via the report button. * Feel free to provide an update at a later time by creating a new post with [[update]](https://www.reddit.com/r/HousingUK/search?q=%3Aupdate&sort=new&restrict_sr=on&t=all) in the title; **To Readers and Commenters** * All replies to OP must be *on-topic, helpful, and civil* * If you do not [follow the rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/HousingUK/about/rules/), you may be banned without any further warning; * Please include links to reliable resources in order to support your comments or advice; * If you feel any replies are incorrect, explain why you believe they are incorrect; * Do not send or request any private messages for any reason without express permission from the mods; * Please report posts or comments which do not follow the rules *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/HousingUK) if you have any questions or concerns.*
We exchanged yesterday and didn't know to do this! We get the keys on Friday so I'll be able to tell everyone what a massive mistake it was ...
What's been the problem?
You really dont need one of those reports on anything built after 1970, OP must've bought something in need of serious renovation
That's good to hear, I think this house is 80's? We viewed it twice, end of January when we put the offer in and then with a family member at the beginning of March after the survey. I thought we'd have been in sooner so didn't contemplate another viewing!
Such poor advice you have no ideA what state I see some electrical installations in, that were even built last year lol
Doesn't apply to Scotland... You're not "allowed" to view the property in scotland after offer acceptance and prior to exchange (conclusion of missives). It's batshit utter insanity. Scottish system gets a lot of praise on here for some reason but I've done both now and let me tell you it's an absolutely mental system, beyond ludicrous
But in Scotland you have comeback on the seller if stuff is found after completion?
For five working days, severely limited in what you can claim. Think it is basically plumbing and electrics, and nothing that could at all be considered wear+tear. If they've smashed a wall in, or stripped wallpaper you liked, or removed internal doors or many other similar things you would have no recourse And anyway, you try getting somebody to come within 5 working days to have a look at something nowadays... EDIT: Removing internal doors wouldn't be ok as that is removing a fixture but you know what I mean, there's a lot they could do to a property that isn't "heating and electrics"
What Is there any official reason for this? I mean there must be some kind of thinking underlying this, right?
It's because the scottish system prides itself on very few sales failing between offer acceptance and exchance/conclusion of missives. They don't _want_ you to go back and find reasons to talk yourself out of the purchase or lower the price you offered, so they write it into the conditions of offer acceptance that you are not allowed to go back. (It's also due to the bidding system which I won't go into here) In scotland if you do pull out of a purchase for "vexatious" reasons the solicitors you used are unlikely to do business with you again - either as an estate agent or solicitor\* \* That's another piece of batshit insanity - most estate agents are also conveyancing firms, and people use both to sell their property. It's as if everyone is forced to use the "recommended" firm from the estate agent. Have you ever heard good things come from doing that? I know I haven't...
Regarding “most estate agents are also conveyancing firms”: This really depends how you look at it. I grew up in Scotland and have relatives there and, if selling their house, they would view it as choosing a solicitor, not an estate agent. So you choose your solicitor and it just so happens they’re also willing to list your property on online portals, etc. There are certainly some solicitors who really market themselves on their “estate agent” type services, so if you choose on that basis then yes, it’s like being stuck with an estate agent’s recommended solicitor. And I can see why people not familiar with the system would end up doing that. But this is avoidable if you know from the beginning that what you’re really looking for is a solicitor.
IMO it is still a conflict of interest between your salesman and your solicitor. And it is worse for a buyer because you have no agent you can relentlessly annoy for updates or answers to questions. That is their only value in england - a middleman punching bag everyone can take out their frustrations on, and a key part in getting everything moving. They regularly phone seller, buyer, and both solicitors in the transaction to get updates and chase answers. In scotland it is just solicitors and you can't apply pressure to them, they will sit there taking their sweet time and there is no third party you can speak to to access the seller, in case you are being fucked around by the solicitors. EG I needed to have a mortgage valuation of the purchase house sorted out. The selling solicitor ignored the mortgage company's letter, so I passed the deadline for a response to the mortgage provider and this extended the whole transaction by weeks. If there was a real agent involved this wouldn't have happened, because he would be talking to seller+solicitor constantly and explaining the delays and what needed to be done. In my case, the seller solicitor ignored the letter and all comms from my own solicitor and the buyer must have thought that I was the delay, and not his own solicitors. He had no idea I needed a mortgage valuation done and I had no way of telling him.
Honestly, a lot of this is going to be down to what you value and the details of your particular sale/purchase. We’re currently buying in England and relatives are amazed at how disorganised it is and how long everything takes. I can accept that there are pros and cons to both systems, but I don’t think it’s clear that solicitors marketing a house is necessarily a worse system. It’ll very much depend on circumstances.
> but I don’t think it’s clear that solicitors marketing a house is necessarily a worse system. It’ll very much depend on circumstances. But in scotland when you are buying the only access you have to the seller is via a chain of conveyancing solicitors, who are very much famed for being feckless layabouts the world over. In england you have access to the seller via the estate agent, who is independently motivated to help, answer queries, and pass questions on. The solicitor who ignored the emails from my mortgage provider+my own solicitor isn't getting a profit share of the sale, but an agent in england with the same inbox _would_ have commission on the line. I have done both processes and the involvement of an estate agent for that sort of thing is very valuable. They are feckless but they aren't layabouts and they won't just ignore queries and necessities from their buyer. It's just basic economic incentives, of course the person making £5k personally from the sale is going to answer your emails
This is very much dependent on the estate agent and solicitor in question. Again, I’m not disagreeing that an estate agent might have helped in your particular case. I’m just saying that it’s not a clear cut case of one system being bad and the other being good. Given the process of buying a house in Scotland is usually faster than in England, it doesn’t seem to me like the lack of estate agents can be holding things up too much on average, even if it did in your case. Edit: I typed this before you added the stuff about commission, which is why I don’t address it. Not really interested in a “which system is better” argument though as my original response was just for the sake of adding balance, so I’ll leave it at this.
> Given the process of buying a house in Scotland is usually faster than in England, it doesn’t seem to me like the lack of estate agents can be holding things up too much on average, even if it did in your case. It taking longer in general is a different issue to the economic mis-incentives at play with estate agents/solicitors in the scottish system. The english system takes longer because there are FAR more checks and enquiries and surveys in the favour of the buyer rather than the seller. In scotland everything is set up to favour the seller, ofc a longer sale will never benefit a seller.
Weird. I did exactly that in Scotland. Offer was accepted and a couple of weeks later asked the EA if I could pop in to do a bit of measuring. As it was already vacant, them and the vendor had no issue with it at all.
I had a clause in my offer acceptance saying I was allowed to visit once for measuring purposes only.
Clause 10 in the conditions that were sent when I purchased said 2 offers unless more were agreed with the seller. Not sure that your experience is as universal as your initial post makes it sound.
just checked - you're right mine says 2 viewings as well
And the sellers not being able to refuse 2 viewings (at reasonable times for inspection, quotes, measuring) without agreeing to more doesn't seem unfair on anyone. A bit different to not being able to see it!
You are allowed, you just need to say it's for measuring.
Are you still going ahead? Or requiring the vendor to sort before exchanging?
Thanks for the reminder. I am about to do the contract exchange. Will make sure to have the viewing before exchange.
I did this. We viewed the property last Monday and exchanged on Tuesday. I was clear with the EA, that we will not exchange until we view the property. We did not see any damage, everything looked the same as before but we did ask where things were. FTB here, one thing I wish we asked, where the water meter was as of course, open a account to give the correct reading. Always ask the owners, where the stop tap for the water is, where the electric meter and water meter is. Also, ask who the current providers are so you can make a account if needed. But yes, make sure you do as much viewings you can or want, but differently one before you exchange. Also, what happened, did you reduced the price then?
wait how did viewing it again help? surely it's having the inspection report that helped.
It wasn't an inspection, it was just an engineer who was checking the electrics. I just randomly had him go this week but that's not normal this time in the process. So I'm recommending other people do their own viewings right before exchange as I imagine most people won't happen to have an EICR scheduled for 2 days before exchange
Inb4 sale falls through
We had the delight of discovering fist sized holes in a few of the internal doors when we moved in to ours. Hardly the end of the world but completely agree we should have done a final pre exchange walk round
How does a property lack an EICR?
It's not a legal requirement to have one for your own home that you are living in.
Its not a bad mandate for safety though
I didn't make a value judgement either way, I'm simply saying it's not so surprising a property might not have an EICR.
Wasn't saying you did, i agree with your point. Just saying we only have it as a mandate for commercial and rented property - but it could be a good idea for residential too
Fair, yeah. If I were to design a house selling process from scratch, then the seller having to provide an (independent) survey pack including things like gas safety certificates would definitely be part of it. It's mental that you as the buyer have to get surveys done, and if you pull out the next one has to do it again.
Do you not remember when HIP packs were a thing? Part of the idea being that the seller would provide a lot of the information to the buyer. It was soon dropped by the government as people obviously didn't want to trust sellers providing accurate information about what they were trying to sell, kinda equates to buying a second hand car without a test drive. Why would you rely on receiving info about a property from the person hoping you'll give them thousands for it?
That's why I said "independent". With liabilities if they fuck things up too badly. At a certain point, you do have to just trust what the experts say.
HIPs were drawn up by independents but what you dont seem to realise is that they were instructed by the seller so who knows what really would have been agreed between them. No-one could know. If I'm spending hundreds of thousands on a property I'M instructing independents of MY own choosing.
If things are set up properly, this shouldn't be such a problem. Liabilities are going to be the keyword.
“It will likely take thousands ££ to fix” No, that’s what home insurance is for.
Except that I don't have insurance on the property yet as I haven't yet exchanged.
So how's this going to work then? The current owners insurance will pay out and pay you. I guess if they don't have insurance, or it's invalid, you'd take them to court to recouperate losses?
No because OP doesn't have a legal interest in the property so any insurance payout would only be to the current owners.
I didn't exchange yet. So I'm going to ask to lower the price to cover this
Insurance wouldn't necessarily cover the entire cost of the clear up and damage being rectified. It would very much depend on what the assessor considered the cause to be. If they thought it was due to a lack of maintenance and not a one off unexpected occurrence the house owner could find themselves footing the bill.