Owning your own home

Our guy came out, asked how much we were offering, walked in and out of each room, said "I see" a lot, and then fucked off.

Had to pay for one of those guys when we required a valuation to buy more of our flat. Seem to remember it being a couple of hundred quid for him to spend <5 min wandering round and then picking a figure.

Seems like a pretty sweet gig. Even used a bike to go between jobs.

I had to use one of these guys too, once, and yes, they spent very little time at the place.

To be fair, they were commissioned only to product a fair market value report, nothing structural, but they were not cheap.

I used http://goldcrestsurveyors.com/ when I bought my place, and because the house is 150 years old I paid for their full building survey rather than a homebuyers report. What I received was very comprehensive, with photos of all the areas of concern, and accurate estimates of the extent and cost of work required. Well worth it, as it enabled us to get the place for far under the asking price.

they are probably getting paid about £150.

Yeah, probably sourced through some aggregator where they pitch for the work and lowest bidder wins. Probably quite grim.

yep - i work for a firm that has the contract to survey all of the assets of a certain supermarket/funeral director/bank chain. our rate is appalling, bit the final figure at the end of the year gives the board a boner, so they do it.

we all had to chip in to get it done, too. which was amazing. directors and associates doing the most basic building surveys you have ever seen (ie - all on an app)

i had to do seven stores in cornwall, so i took the mgb, stayed at my in-laws and drove around cornwall for two weeks.

if i had been doing my normal job, i would have earned three times as much money.

Shouldn't local searches bring this stuff to light?

We are selling out flat soon, but our kitchen has half the doors off the cupboards (the doors are fine, but the carcass they attach to is shite and the hinges tore out)
I am going to put a dowel down the side and drill through and make it work (bodge of the highest order, that will probably not last too long) now the ethical thing is to tell any prospective buyers that the kitchen needs refitting but we are concious of losing £££ on the sale price. The bathroom is also dated, so there is scope for them to barter on the price, if they are inclined.

Tl;Dr do I tell buyers that the kitchen is shit or let them find out after buying it?

let their £150 surveyor find it...

:)

Is paying a deposit on exchange a fairly standard thing?

We're being asked for 10% of the purchase price.

I can see how this might be a problem if you were looking for a 95+% mortgage

No idea what size area that quote refers to but it suddenly makes the £1,200 we've been quoted for doing a 28m2 room seem reasonable.

10% is totally standard.

You can ask for a lower deposit but the seller would need to agree.

Yes, paying a non-refundable deposit at the time of exchange is the norm. If you have a 95% mortgage I think, and I could be wrong here, the lender stumps up the remainder.

This is what happened to us when buying with Woolwich. We paid our 5%, they paid the other 5%.

Having been dumb enough to buy a place with a couple of similar bodges in place (that I didn't spot), I would urge you to do the ethical thing.

However, it sometimes seems in property that you get buyers trying to negotiate you down for things even if you have adjusted for them in the asking price.

So I suppose my quasi-ethical strategy would be this - set the asking price for the flat as if it didn't need the kitchen doing, and make the flat look nice for he photos. Then when you have a buyer on the hook, give them hints about the kitchen and be prepared to let them negotiate you down.

That way they feel like they've won when you accept their price chip, plus you don't pay twice for the kitchen works or alternatively feel like a dick for not disclosing it.

Increase the size of the hole/s where the hinges were screwed into to 6mm. Chop down a rawl plug and stick it in with some good strength adhesive (sticks like shit). Wait half hour and then screw the hinges back in. Should be as solid as new

Spend £10k refitting the kitchen and bathroom. Ask £20k more. Profit.

We decided to not spend 10k on refurbs and spend £300k on a new gaff. Unprofit.
(Essex innit)

Tl;Dr do I tell buyers that the kitchen is shit or let them find out after buying it?

They'll find out before they buy it, probably.

I also reckon that unless you pitch the place as 'newly renovated with state of the art kitchen' by not telling them you aren't doing anything dishonest; buyers don't expect the stuff that comes with the place to last forever.

Now if you have a crack-den-hive-dealership next door that you've reported to the police it would be unethical not to disclose it to the buyers. Some people hide that shit, too.

Sorry man, I didn't know that. I wouldn't have joked. It must be hard enough having to move to Essex without people having fun around you. Stay strong.

So the banks made a mortgage offer, the survey came back with no real problems, and today the solicitor sent the contract through.

This suddenly feels quite serious.

So me and my partner were chatting to her Dad the other day when he mentioned that he'll have paid his mortgage off in approx. 5 years. Instead of downsizing now that (nearly) all the kids have left home, they want to get a bigger place; her Mum wants a massive garden for an allotment and their dogs, big kitchen as she loves to cook, and more room to accommodate grandchildren sleepovers and friends staying, etc.

He brought up the idea of us pooling our money together from selling our properties and looking into a suitable house for us, with a kind of granny annexe for them. If unable to buy outright, are these a pain to mortgage?

lugging bikes up and down a narrow stairwell has left much of our tiny flat in a bit of a paint-state.

fellow we had round yesterday quoted us £7300 to paint entire 2 bed flat. that's said stairwell, 2 beds, entrance hall, lounge, kitchen and some damp proofing in the bathroom, doors, rads and skirting, evening out any dents and uneven bits plus tarting up the outside sills. includes materials. managed to negotiate down to £6900. sound about right?

I paid £2,200 to paint my 2 bed flat, as part of a complete renovation though. Didn't include things like tarting up, skirting, sills or any plastering work either (tho did include rads)