Rogue Surveyor?? Please Help!!

[sausagemcreedy]

Hi Guys

 

I'm not sure whether I am posting on the right thread here, or even if there is a thread on this subject, so apologies if I am in the wrong place.

 

I have a property in Scotland which was my family home until following a bereavement I had to move to England. I am staying with my mother until my home sells as I can not afford to run two houses.

 

My property is in a smallish town where everybody knows everybody. I put the house up for sale in March and luckily had three interested parties very quickly. The interest was registered before the property was marketed and before I had the HIPPS survey completed. The estate agent / solicitor knew the property was becoming available and had mentioned it to her friend. As explained, everybody knows everybody and word spread quickly.

 

One of the interested parties offered to pay for their own survey to speed up the process. The estate agent explained that if they purchased the property without it being marketed, I would save money on marketing and survey fees so this seemed like a good idea.

 

When the survey came back, it stated that the property had subsidence. This was a huge shock to me, as obviously this can make the property unmortgagable. Word spread and two of the interested parties pulled out immediately and one offered me £65k less than I was hoping to sell for.

 

I couldn't afford to sell our home for such a loss, so instead I contacted my insurance company.

 

4 months later I am just coming out the other side of this nightmare. My property is over 100 years old and luckily I had a couple of surveys completed on it throughout the years I have been there to check for movement, etc. These have always reported that the house is as solid as a rock. My insurance company appointed a loss adjuster who sent two surveyors out and both reported that the property absolutely does not have subsidence.

 

In the meantime, I have missed out on three properties here in England. I only have a very small budget and so homes I can afford to buy or rent down here only come up once in a while. I am having to start the selling process over again. Because of the close knit community (which I had always enjoyed being part of), everybody now knows that my property was suspected of having subsidence and nobody will go near it, despite the surveys which say otherwise.

 

So finally to get to the point! Do I have any recourse against the surveyor who claimed my property had subsidence? His professional opinion has caused me untold strain and stress, not only the massive delays while my insurance company investigated, but the properties I have lost out on renting / buying in England. My and my children's belongings are all in Scotland until we can move into our own place as there is no room for them here. My children hardly have any toys, etc. here... not to mention that I will probably have to sell at a loss and lose a lot of money.

 

As a footnote, I know that the surveyor is a personal friend of the couple who requested the survey be completed. However, the new solicitor / estate agent I am using insist that he is very much respected and extremely proffessional.

 

I'm sorry this is such a long post and I don't mean to sound so sorry for myself, it's just that I had invested everything into my home and I'm so tired from all the worry and sleepless nights about it.

 

Thank you for reading, any advice very gratefully received.

[rebel11]

hi

 

I think all surveyor's are regulated,

so maybe contact these people, you can also getsome free advice

Complaints | Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors

[IdaInFife]

Do you have it in writing from the surveyor that there was subsidence?

[sausagemcreedy]

Hello again, thank you for your replies and apologies for the delay in responding - Rebel11 - thank you so much for the link, it's been very helpful! IdaInFife - you have summed up my problem perfectly here - because the survey was completed for the interested party, I do not have access to it. The only information I have is what the estate agent / solicitor has quoted to me over the 'phone. So therefore, while I know that subsidence had been highlighted, I do not have this in writing myself. Surely there must be a way around this? Thanks again.

[IdaInFife]

It all hinges if the survery was completed 'correctly'. I am unsure if you have any 'rights' to get a copy of the survey. Do you know the name/company name of the surveyor? Maybe with the link above you can find out if your entitled to get a copy of it as without it I donlt think you would have much to stand on.

 

Ida x

[GuidoT]

I am a chartered surveyor, let me know the name of the firm or person and we will see if they are chartered. If they are chartered I will help you formulate a complaint to the RICS, although the RICS will not be in a position to decide you are entitled damages / compensation, but they can be used to bring pressure to the fore.

 

If it exists you are entitled to that report, if a surveyor has undertaken a report on your property you are entitled to see a copy of such - no different to your credit report.

[IdaInFife]

Thanks for clearing that up

 

Ida x

[buzby]

What concerns me is that as the seller, it is not your survey. Therefore you have no claim against the surveyor only the interested purchaser. Cynics could suggest that the whole situation was engineered to depress the price! That said, HIPS is largely pointless for these reasons.... Would you trust a survey given to you, or undertake your own?

[GuidoT]

A surveyor can owe a tortious or contractual duty of care irrespective of who the report was prepared for. The Contract (Rights of Third Parties) 1999 Act may assist here (provided it has not been contracted out of).