Thinking of purchasing a house. Question on perc area

louthyman

Me and my wife have been searching last 3 years for the perfect home for our family. We've 2 sons, 2 daughter's and have been looking on the market for a 5+ bed house in county cork. We've now found one in county limerick and its only 20 mins from where we live now and it tick's every box for now but im not to sure about the percolation area, so thought id ask a few question's on it here on this forum before i take it any further.

When talking to the owners of the property they informed me that the house was built using cash they received from an inheritance payout and when building this house, they had some problem's with their engineer at the planning stage. You see they changed the position of the house on the site just before the plans were suppose to be submitted to the council however there was some sort of a mix up and the first set of plans went in and was approved.

The situation got even more messy as the house was built using the second set of plans yet the planning was for the first set that was received and approved by the council. The owners did not take anything to do with the planning and did not know anything untill early 2007 when they tried to sell it but could not because of these planning issue's.

They took the house of the market untill now but back in 2008 they're engineer sorted everything out free of charge and got approved retention for the new house design that was built on site. Now this is where the question i have on the percolation area comes in. Any percolation area i've seen designed and installed, they have all been 4 runs of pipes all joined together with 4 vents all popping out of the ground. (see pic below)




The percolation area on this site in question has 2 runs of 14m pipes, 1 run of 11m and another 9m with this 9m run taking a ? degree bend at the top so it connects into the pipe that's T'd of the main pipe coming from the percolation box. The owner informed me that it's constructed this way because if all the runs were the same length then the percolation area would be in the 20m distance its to be away from the house. He also told me that this design is legal and approved by his own engineer and it fall's under the T-value's of 15-30 and needs the 48m of piping but im not to sure because every percolation area ive seen, they have all had 90 degree bends at each side and not this 45 or 120 degree bend on one corner of this area.

These 48m pipes are all connected at the bottom with 90 degree bends and T's and only has 3 vent pipe's. If my calculations are right, this add's another 6m onto the 48m and will be percolating more than what its suppose to with the 15-30 T-value's and why does it not have 4 vents instead of 3 i seen coming from the ground.

Really i know i should hire another surveyor/engineer to check all this out for me but seeing as monies tight, i thought i'd ask here first. You see, we have had 4 offers on other house's in the last 3 year's and it's all been money wasted (money saved if you look at it with another perspective seeing as we did not buy these house's with fault's) when the surveyor finds something wrong. I have a good idea on what to look out for when buying a house and usually find out as much information as possible before hiring a surveyor to save on cost's, hence this thread.

If i wasnt interested in this house, i wouldnt even have give it a second thought and walked away but we're getting it for a good price and me and my wife have fell in love with the house as it's exactly what we want and the views just take our breaths away.

I have a rough sketch that the owner of the property gave me a few day's ago and will up load soon to show you the site layout.

louthyman

Poor Uncle Tom

Alarm bells should be ringing loudly.

The house that was built wasn't the one that was granted planning permission (It doesn't matter what the reason was) so how likely is it that the percolation area is what was granted planning permission? It is all covered, so if it doesn't appear correct from what is visible you must assume it is not.

You need to check the original planning application to see what was proposed as regards the percolation area and get a professional to check the entire property. It is also likely the LA would have asked for certification of the percolation area as part of the retention permission or even as a condition of the original planning permission.

Just to note, uneven lengths of percolation trenches goes against SR6, 1991, section 3.3.2 on page 15 refers
http://www.siteassessor.com/images/dl/598cc866-9e13-102f-bc4a-a0da625daa40.pdf

Somebody telling you the percolation area is 'all legal' isn't good enough when they stand to benefit financially from selling the property. If it is 'all legal' then they should be able to provide full indemnified certification, but as you can see it is not in compliance with the very basic SR6 1991.

Buyer beware.

louthyman

Poor Uncle Tom wrote: »

Alarm bells should be ringing loudly.

The house that was built wasn't the one that was granted planning permission (It doesn't matter what the reason was) so how likely is it that the percolation area is what was granted planning permission? It is all covered, so if it doesn't appear correct from what is visible you must assume it is not.

You need to check the original planning application to see what was proposed as regards the percolation area and get a professional to check the entire property. It is also likely the LA would have asked for certification of the percolation area as part of the retention permission or even as a condition of the original planning permission.

Just to note, uneven lengths of percolation trenches goes against SR6, 1991, section 3.3.2 on page 15 refers
http://www.siteassessor.com/images/dl/598cc866-9e13-102f-bc4a-a0da625daa40.pdf

Somebody telling you the percolation area is 'all legal' isn't good enough when they stand to benefit financially from selling the property. If it is 'all legal' then they should be able to provide full indemnified certification, but as you can see it is not in compliance with the very basic SR6 1991.

Buyer beware.

Alarm bells are ringing but we have fell in love with this house/site and probably wouldn't be able to afford this size of house again with views this has.

The house was the same type house, just in a different position on the site and everything was built to the plans, well nearly everything.

I'm just of the phone to the seller and he's assured me that the house has all cert's for all work done. Everything in the house looks build to very high standard. I've viewed this 3 times and cant find a fault anywhere apart from this. I'm thinking if there's a cert for this area then it must be ok because i cant see an engineer passing this if its against the reg's.

I'm even wondering is there any room in that area for the 48m of pipe and i'll re-do it without the cutting of the corner like what's done now.

I was looking online at the plans and im reading - length of piping required is 48m. Can you confirm for me that when it state's that i need this of, does this mean 48m in all 5 run's of pipe(adding in the bottom also) or 4 x 48m perc pipe runs. Something im not that up to date on so i thought i'd ask because if it is the latter, there definitely isn't any room.

Poor Uncle Tom

louthyman wrote: »

Alarm bells are ringing but we have fell in love with this house/site and probably wouldn't be able to afford this size of house again with views this has.

The house was the same type house, just in a different position on the site and everything was built to the plans, well nearly everything.

I'm just of the phone to the seller and he's assured me that the house has all cert's for all work done. Everything in the house looks build to very high standard. I've viewed this 3 times and cant find a fault anywhere apart from this. I'm thinking if there's a cert for this area then it must be ok because i cant see an engineer passing this if its against the reg's.

I'm even wondering is there any room in that area for the 48m of pipe and i'll re-do it without the cutting of the corner like what's done now.

I was looking online at the plans and im reading - length of piping required is 48m. Can you confirm for me that when it state's that i need this of, does this mean 48m in all 5 run's of pipe(adding in the bottom also) or 4 x 48m perc pipe runs. Something im not that up to date on so i thought i'd ask because if it is the latter, there definitely isn't any room.

3 x 16m = 48m

4 x 12m = 48m

5 x 9.7m = 48m

any of the above, but do not count in the end sections.

louthyman

Poor Uncle Tom wrote: »

3 x 16m = 48m

4 x 12m = 48m

5 x 9.7m = 48m

any of the above, but do not count in the end sections.

The sketch is a very rough so ill have to get the exact measurements of where it say's 7m on the 9m side of the perc area because i think i might just sneak it in there just as long as it doesn't run into the 20m away from the house. Hopefully i can or i could possibly fill the area in with some hard core/top soil where its shaded. The site stretches another 15m in that direction though most of it is boggy land and there's a drain, so iv'e only really 5 meters to play about with.

Is all this above possible without planning permission. At a guess i would think it's o'k seeing as the retention was approved in december 2008. That gives me to december this year to get this area up to compliance seeing as youve 5 years from date to get it all finished

Poor Uncle Tom

louthyman wrote: »

Is all this above possible without planning permission. At a guess i would think it's o'k seeing as the retention was approved in december 2008. That gives me to december this year to get this area up to compliance seeing as youve 5 years from date to get it all finished

Few things to watch for:

A retention permission is for works already carried out, so unless that permission is for retention and completion then you can't do anything under the 5 years of that permission.

You would only be able to do works for which there was planning permission, in this case probably the first planning permission and only if you are inside 12 years and 109 days from the grant date otherwise you will need a new permission.

If you need a new permission you will have to ensure compliance with the EPA's code of practice including carrying out a Site Suitability Assessment.

louthyman

Poor Uncle Tom wrote: »

Few things to watch for:

A retention permission is for works already carried out, so unless that permission is for retention and completion then you can't do anything under the 5 years of that permission.

You would only be able to do works for which there was planning permission, in this case probably the first planning permission and only if you are inside 12 years and 109 days from the grant date otherwise you will need a new permission.

If you need a new permission you will have to ensure compliance with the EPA's code of practice including carrying out a Site Suitability Assessment.

I will look into all this. Thanks for your advice Can you tell me also about the 3 vent pipes instead of 4, would this be a problem ?

Poor Uncle Tom

louthyman wrote: »

I will look into all this. Thanks for your advice Can you tell me also about the 3 vent pipes instead of 4, would this be a problem ?

The vent pipes shouldn't be a problem as the SR6, 1991 states. However, once the trenches are wrong, the percolation area is wrong.