How soon for Survey

Jinny_Cat

Hi All,

We went sale agreed on a property 2 weeks ago. How soon would you recommend we get the survey done. ?

Cheers/

Navy blue

Depends on the circumstances - are the vendors in a chain to purchase their new home? If so, how many links in the chain and how far along with their purchase are they? The more complex the vendors survey, the more things can go wrong and that leaves a higher chance of your sale falling through.

I personally would get a survey done as soon as you can. Then if it throws up any serious red flags, you're finding out before you get too invested. We went sale agreed on an older property recently and we had the survey done within a couple of weeks. There was always the risk that the sale could fall through and the money would be wasted, but I would have preferred to know about any major issues early in the proceedings. Thankfully our survey was pretty clean and we're are progressing.

Jinny_Cat

Thanks. The house we are sale agreed on is unoccupied. Our own house is sale agreed to a FTB 2 weeks now. We are still awaiting to hear from them regarding a survey on our current home. Just don't want to be too quick organising a survey, just in case the sale of our home falls through. I have been getting quotes of between 550 -650 for a survey, which I think is quiet steep. The house we are purchasing is a 3 bed end terrace buit in the late 80's.

Navy blue

I would go ahead with the survey if it were me. Sounds like the purchase is unlikely to fall through and even if you lose your current buyers, you'd presumably still hope to go ahead with the purchase and put yours back on the market or go back to the under bidder? We paid €395 for a three bed detached cottage in rural Cork, though our surveyor is not insured so that may have made it cheaper

Emma2019

550 sounds about average but cheaper is available.

I waited until the people I was buying from went sale agreed before I did my survey but as yours is unoccupied there doesn't seem to be a reason to wait unless you think something has gone wrong with your FTB. How far away from sending them contracts are you? And how far away from receiving contracts? If they haven't requested the deeds yet that can take 8 weeks.

JimmyVik

You should be able to get one for €500 or less so shop around.

Also dont sweat the survey. There are people who freak out when it shows a few leaks or cracked ceilings or a bit of mould in the corner of a room with a blocked up vent and pull out of the sale.

Dont let it spook you when you get it and use it to your advantage.

These days you wont get money off for normal issues in the survey, but some things that look worse than they are on the report can drive away your competition. Chances are if someone pulled out that was sale agreed before you got sale agreed it was because they got spooked.

Jinny_Cat

Thanks All. We only went sale agreed 2 weeks ago on our property and subsequently went sale agreed on the same weekend for our new property. I'll shop around for the surveyor, hopefully, try to get one for under €500.

SupaCat95

Myself and the wife arent in construction. We couldnt see anything too much wrong with a property we wanted to buy. The surveyor found plenty wrong and stopped after he spotted 70k of damage and didnt bother to look at the attic. We were cash buyer and were tempted to save money with no surveyor.

Do not cheap out on a surveyor. Get a good one. My neighbour got a surveyor who wrote a report based on a Daft.ie webpage. A good surveyors report saved us a ton.

A survey should be done as soon as you go "sale agreed". The faster you agree to buy the faster you move in.

treascon

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117873067#Comment_117873067

So where is your comeback with the surveyor if something is subsequently found wrong with the house?

pooch90

Just to note, we got our survey done within a few weeks of going SA. We did it before the contracts and map were sent over. This meant they couldn't check the boundaries so we had to get him back again.