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As it stands if you back out, without an engineer’s report saying otherwise they’ll have to put on the brochure that the house might well be subsiding. They really won’t want to do that.
Likewise this... Is this assuming you make some sort of formal declaration to the seller that you think the house is subsiding?
lemonade-
There’s no formal form or anything.
The agent has a legal obligation to inform buyers of anything that may affect their decision to buy.
If they’ve been shown a surveyor’s report saying a house has subsidence and nothing from an engineer to supersede this then it has to go in the marketing material.
Imagine being a potential buyer who drove 150 miles to a viewing then found out about such a survey.
Hefty
Ok. So it’s your decision where to go.
With this survey you’ll not [easily if at all] be able to legitimately get buildings insurance as you’ve been made aware the house is already falling down a bit so you can’t insure it against falling down. Your mortgage company will require buildings insurance.
To get past this you’ll probably have to pay for a structural engineer (maybe £500) to give a definitive view on what’s happening rather than the conjecture a surveyor provides. If the engineer says it’s finished moving around you just fill the cracks and away you go, if they say they’re not sure or it’s definitely a problem then walk, it’s not worth the heartache and effort trying to fix someone else’s subsidence to end up with a house that’s tough to sell because it’s previously subsided.
You could try to get the seller to pay for the engineer. As it stands if you back out, without an engineer’s report saying otherwise they’ll have to put on the brochure that the house might well be subsiding. They really won’t want to do that.