This is not an exhaustive or a complete subject. It is likely to change over time, with edits, additions and deletions, and is simply a collection of my thoughts based on many years of experience. You should follow your instincts, and you must always seek your own professional advice.
When scrolling through property sales websites for your dream home, it is very tempting to look for the nice houses which have been ‘done up’ and could be an easy purchase. Buy. Move in. Unpack. Put the kettle on and order a takeaway. This is what a lot of people do. It’s easy and you are placing a huge amount of trust in the quality of the work done. You like what it looks like, but is it really as good as it looks? Only time will tell.
This approach comes with some often unseen risks. I have written elsewhere on this Blog about high-risk purchases, those that have been retrofitted for thermal upgrades and property that has been ‘lovingly restored’. If you haven’t yet read those, please do take a few minutes to read them after this one.
However, there is another option. You could do what thousands of others do. You could buy a house that is dated, clearly needs repairs and ‘modernisation’ and might, to the untrained eye, look a wreck. These houses are honest.
Sometimes the most honest house is the one that needs work
There is something I rather like about surveying a house that is obviously in need of repair and refurbishment.
It is honest.
The roof is tired. The windows need attention. The kitchen has seen better days. The decoration is dated, the heating system is old and perhaps there are damp patches, cracked plaster or some rotten timber. Nobody is pretending that it is anything other than a house requiring investment.
For a purchaser with a realistic budget, that can actually be a very good place to start.
I have always encouraged my clients not to be frightened simply because a survey identifies repairs. The purpose of a building survey is not to produce a list of reasons why you shouldn’t buy a house. It is to give you information.
Once you understand what needs doing, approximately when it needs doing and what it is likely to cost, you can make an informed decision.
You know what you are buying
One of the advantages of an obviously tired house is that relatively little is being concealed by presentation.
Compare that with a property which has been rapidly refurbished immediately before sale. Everything may look wonderful. Fresh paint, new flooring, a fashionable kitchen and perhaps some attractive new bathrooms.
But what is underneath it all?
Fresh decoration can hide damp staining. New plasterboard can conceal defective walls. New flooring can make it impossible to see what has happened beneath it. A newly decorated house is not necessarily a well-maintained house.
By contrast, a property which hasn’t been decorated for twenty years can sometimes tell me far more about itself.
Old water stains tell a story. Cracks can be assessed properly. Previous repairs are visible. Dampness has not necessarily been painted over.
In surveying terms, that can be extremely useful.
You get to decide how the money is spent
There is another important advantage.
When you buy somebody else’s newly refurbished house, you are paying for their choices.
They chose the kitchen. They chose the bathroom. They chose the flooring, heating, insulation, windows and finishes – and the cost of all of those things will usually be reflected in the asking price.
Buy a house requiring refurbishment and you get to make those decisions yourself.
More importantly, you can spend money on the things that actually matter.
The roof can be repaired properly. Defective rainwater goods can be replaced. Electrical installations can be upgraded. Heating can be improved. Dampness can be investigated rather than simply covered over.
With an older or traditionally constructed building, you also have the opportunity to make sure that repairs are undertaken using appropriate materials and techniques rather than inheriting somebody else’s inappropriate alterations.
Repairs don’t all have to happen on Monday morning
This is something purchasers sometimes forget when reading a building survey.
A survey might identify £30,000, £50,000 or considerably more of potential expenditure. That sounds alarming when presented as one number.
But houses don’t usually work like that.
Some repairs may be urgent. Others might reasonably be undertaken within two or three years. Some may form part of planned refurbishment. Others can wait until a room is redecorated or until scaffolding is erected for another purpose.
Understanding priority and phasing is therefore just as important as identifying the defects themselves.
A good survey should help you distinguish between:
“This needs dealing with now” and “This is something you should budget for in the future.”
They are very different things.
The purchase price matters
Of course, none of this works unless the numbers make sense.
A house requiring substantial expenditure needs to be priced accordingly, and the purchaser needs to retain sufficient funds after completion to undertake the necessary work.
Spending every available pound on the purchase and then discovering that the roof needs £20,000 of repairs is unlikely to be enjoyable.
But where the condition is reflected in the price and an appropriate refurbishment budget has been retained, buying a property requiring work can make very good sense.
It may also give you something increasingly difficult to find: the opportunity to improve a building rather than simply paying a premium for somebody else’s improvements.
Don’t fear the survey
Perhaps this is the most important point.
A long building survey does not necessarily mean that you are buying a bad house.
Older buildings need maintenance. Components wear out. Roof coverings eventually need replacing. Windows need repairing. Services become obsolete. None of this should come as a surprise.
What matters is understanding the scale of the work before you commit yourself.
I would much rather tell a client:
“This house needs quite a lot of work and this is what I think you should budget for”
than discover after they have bought it that expensive problems had been hidden behind a very attractive refurbishment.
Buying a house should not be about looking for perfection. Very few buildings are perfect.
It is about information gathering.
Understand the building. Understand its defects. Understand the likely costs. Decide what needs doing first and what can wait.
Then make your decision with your eyes open.
For the right purchaser, a tired house requiring repair isn’t necessarily something to fear.
Sometimes it is the most honest house you can buy.
Disclaimer: Anything posted in this Blog is for general information only and it is not in any way intended to provide any advice, legal or otherwise, on any general or specific matter that you can rely on. You should always seek your own legal and surveying advice.