Are all surveyors' home reports as ridiculous as the one I just got? – Stephen Jardine
Surveyors are being forced to neutralise their language to protect themselves against the threat of legal action
“The house has a roof and some walls and some doors and windows. It seems fine.” If you are thinking of buying a property, please feel free to utilise that information. It’s about as much use as your average Scottish home report and it won’t cost you £500.
The current system was introduced in 2008 with the aim of providing better insight to sellers and buyers and to address the problem of multiple surveys being carried out.
When I sold a property 20 years ago, the same surveyor inspected on behalf of three different possible buyers. By the final visit, he didn’t even bother to take out his tape measure and notebook. That was ludicrous so the new system was introduced. However a lot has changed since then.
‘No tests whatsoever’
Nowadays society is much more risk averse and that is reflected in the work of surveyors who seem to be terrified of only one thing. No, not a shortage of hardhats and theodolites but rather the prospect of being sued.
As a result, best practice now seems to be saying and doing as little as possible but still charging for the paperwork. These are some highlights from a home report I recently received:
*It was dry and sunny on the day of inspection. This report should be read in the context of these weather conditions.”
*Access into the eaves roof space was restricted due to the store cupboards being full of stored items.”
*Random windows were opened and closed where possible. Doors and windows were not forced open.”
*The floors throughout the property are covered and their surfaces could, therefore, not be inspected.”
*No tests whatsoever were carried out to any systems or appliances.”
And for this you need a Building Surveying degree? No doubt it comes from the University of the Flipping Obvious. The rest of the report was not much better – a pot pourri of obfuscation and avoidance all packaged up and delivered for a tidy sum by the firm of Risk, Averse and Expense.
Torture chamber in the basement?
But you can’t blame them. A Scottish Government examination of the operation of the first decade of the Home Report system revealed more and more surveyors were worried about it being used as the basis for litigation by dissatisfied sellers or buyers.
“Surveyors neutralise their language in order to protect themselves in case a buyer tried to use the Home Report to get compensation from them in the event of a subsequent problem,” it concluded.
But that’s not much use to anyone. Sellers have to shell out for a report that doesn’t properly reflect their property. Surveyors don’t get to really say what they want to say and purchasers may end up buying a house with a torture chamber in the basement because nobody pulled back the carpet to take a look.
The solution is to pay for a more comprehensive report which examines everything but that is expensive so it comes down to your appetite for risk.
However the shortcomings in Scotland are nothing compared to the far worse system in England where you can buy a house, pay for a survey and then have seller of the house being bought by the people you were buying from change their mind and cause the whole chain to collapse. Now that really is mad.
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