Owning your own home

There was a regulation change about 10 years ago which requires the main water and gas pipes to be bonded with a pretty chunky cable to the consumer unit. This has to be done within a short distance from their entry to the property. It's a pretty big deal for a lot of consumer unit upgrades because the utilities often enter the building a long way from the consumer unit and 10mm earth is not easy to hide. Hard to say what the bonding you have there is if it's not the main equipotential bonding but the installer might just hang one on there anyway because the joke is plumbers have no idea what equipotential bonding is anyway and they certainly can't spell it!

Apologies to plumbers of the forum who are undoubtably exceptions to this and will know that equipotential bonding exists to ensure that during an earth fault exposed metalwork will be at the same voltage as the earth and will act as an earth path thereby decreasing the time for the breaker to operate.

There's a great description of it on page 39-40 of this months professional electrician magazine. :-

https://professional-electrician.com/magazines/october-2023/

It was my presumption that whichever walls are original would be solid brick, but the newer walls (definitely at least the rear extension) would be cavity walls

That’s what we have. Main part of the house was built in 1890 and is all solid brick, but the rear extension built in the late 90’s is cavity wall.

Okay thanks a lot for the explanation. I've reached out to the gas engineer that installed that pipe to ask if that was done or is needed. Is this typically more likely to sit with an electrician?

Totally an electricians job. It's a requirement if there's any notifiable work on the consumer unit, things like adding a circuit or changing the consumer unit. Otherwise it's not a retrospective requirement.

There were other forms of equipotential bonding required in the regs before the current ones so most installations have some going on depending on their age.

We had a similar warning when we got our gas meter replaced 5 years ago, still haven't done anything about it. Will get it sorted whenever we get the place rewired.

Thanks @Airhead @Greenbank

Apologies to plumbers of the forum who are undoubtably exceptions to this and will know that equipotential bonding exists to ensure that during an earth fault exposed metalwork will be at the same voltage as the earth and will act as an earth path thereby decreasing the time for the breaker to operate.

There's a great description of it on page 39-40 of this months professional electrician magazine. :-

https://professional-electrician.com/mag­azines/october-2023/

I read this like an HIGNFY answer.

My little corner of east london appears to be full of delusional fools

https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/140959259#/?channel=RES_BUY

This guy…

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london…full of delusional fools

Alright, grandad

Wow

Last sold for £42k in 1997 .....

Total first world problems, I know, but why is buying a house such a needless pain in the arse?

Through a chance encounter with the seller we both ascertained that the estate agent has been doing classic estate agent things (lying to both of us telling us the hold up is the other party, referring work to people they are friendly with, rather than professionals with a track record of doing things). I have tried very hard not to generalise and to give this estate agent my trust, but I've caught them telling barefaced lies to me. Then the local authority told us it'd take just under a month to return searches, but have just completely missed the deadline they set themselves with no apology, and no new deadline for when it'll be done.

I'm trying to just go with the flow and not stress, but the control freak in me hates how little is in my control, and the miser in me hates how many people are involved in the process who earn their slice seemingly without caring whether they do a good and honest job or not.

@hazzelfrazzel sorry to hear you're having a stressful experience.

How much detail/info do you get from your solicitor? We're going through the process of selling and buying and don't really get a peep out of the estate agent (same one for sale and purchase #villagelyfe). Everything goes through our Solicitor who is incredibly pro-active.

Maybe its different for everyone but I don't really recall involving previous estate agents in anything apart from the earlier stages of the process.

It's a horrible process. I bought a place with no chain and no estate agent and the conveyancing solicitor managed to make me hate him so much I lost a lot of sleep thinking of the most horrible things that could happen to him.

To add to first world problems. We're about 5 weeks away from exchange and I am still trying to get building control to approve an amendment to warrant and then come out and do an inspection all with the hope of getting the certificate.

I'm trying to play it cool but absolutely shitting it at the same time. But yeah, first world problems.

If anyone has any experience of the pitfalls of getting Building Control to sign off I am all ears as I have never done this before!

I think estate agents insert themselves into the process to make sure they get their commission.

My solicitor refused to speak to the estate agents which they hated (they actually told me I should get someone else) but I told them tough, I wouldn't want my professional adviser speaking to them anyway.

Why do estate agents exist other than to take a cut of the money? Do they add anything of value, anything a buyer or seller couldn’t sort out themselves with a conveyancer? Almost every one I’ve dealt with has been shamelessly venal or beyond incompetent.

Once you are in the process the solicitors should be running the show. Last time we bought, a family friend had just set up an estate agency so were very proactive pushing people as a way of progressing getting paid.

But that was very much an exception. Ignore the EA and deal with your solicitor.

My works were easy once they came to assess. I was polite and he signed it off with a " your windows really should have trickle vents but meh" I think it helps my builder has a good relationship with Building control and I was polite.

the miser in me hates how many people are involved in the process who earn their slice seemingly without caring whether they do a good and honest job or not

Sorry you're having such a crap time with it. I don't think this is being miserly at all, it's just basic decency to do a reasonable, honest job. But unfortunately the property/construction sector has way too many people like this.

Could you report the agent to the industry body? I don't know if there's any point but actually lying is obviously below whatever professional standards they set themselves as an industry.

@Grumpy_Git I live in hope! I've had a few phone calls with the chap who will likely come out and assess and he seems like a good guy but quite thorough - I have been nothing but polite so I hope that helps. I think I'd be more relaxed if it wasn't so close to selling the place.

How quickly did you get the certification? Our guy said it can be same day but I'm skeptical given they have 10 days to respond to each change/amendment.

@hazzelfrazzel

Ignore the EA and deal with your solicitor

This everyday.