What happens with the survey?

Before an official mortgages offer comes through from the lender, they will want to value the property that you want to buy to make sure that the value of the property is correct and they will not find themselves having lent money on a property worth less than what they lent.

They are not doing this for your sake though. This is for them and to benefit them, and its only aim is to value the home. What it will not do is find out problems under the surface of the property. It may not find damp, it may not find some cracks in the wall, and you may find yourselves with costs on moving in you had no idea about until after completion.

To avoid this surprise, you would be best advised to get more information from a homebuyer's survey, which inspects the property in far more detail than the lenders' valuation. This could be done by the lender's valuer, or someone not in contact with your lender.

A step up from this is a full structural survey. The lender may demand this, or you can get it done yourself. This survey will tell you if the property is sound or if it needs major repairs. You should get a qualified and independent surveyor to carry this out. Your friends and relatives may be able to recommend one. Or you could find details in the Yellow pages or your local library may have details. Surveyors who are part of professional associations will have the letters ARICS or FRICS after their name - these are associates or fellows of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors.

Should you buy a flat, you may be partly responsible under the terms of the leasehold for common parts of the building. Thus, if the stairway, the roof or the garden need repairs, you may have to pay towards that, even though it's not part of your flat. Your surveyor should thus look at the whole building. Find out if the building either needs or has recently had any major repairs. Has it been recently redecorated, had a new roof or a new lift fitted. If repairs have been done or are needed, you should know if you need to pay towards a share of these costs.

In order to work out the cost of the survey, the value of the property is taken into account. The reason for this is that if the survey misses something important and you end up having to pay for it, the surveyor can be held responsible. So the cost of the survey goes partly towards insurance for the surveyor, and the higher the value of the property, the more insurance a surveyor needs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

© AskFinancially.com 2009

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