Research suggests seven million home owners did not h...

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10 August 2016

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Research suggests seven million home owners did not have a survey

Over seven million owners have chosen not to have a survey completed on their current property - with half of them regarding a mortgage valuation as being sufficient.

This claim comes from Churchill Home Insurance which says buyers are scaling back on the level of surveys completed on their property pre-purchase and often choosing to go down the cheapest-possible route.

Research for the company was conducted amongst 2,000 adults during June, and follows up previous surveys.

The number of owners having at least a base level survey has actually increased over time, from 63 per cent 20 years ago to 91 per cent in the last 12 months, the firm says.

However, the number of owners having the comprehensive building survey has reduced significantly from 28 per cent 20 years ago to just six per cent in the last 12 months.

More than half of those who needed major work doing to their property within a year of moving in said the issues were serious enough to have influenced their purchase, had they had prior knowledge.

Separate research for Churchill, amongst surveyors, reveals some as saying their clients opt for cheaper assessments of their home because they want to save money throughout the purchase process.

The surveyors questioned said the three most common problems with a property that wouldn’t be detected unless buyers had a comprehensive building survey were damp, problems with the roof structure, and subsidence.

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- Mike Lewis
- 10 August 2016 08:57 AM
It has always been the case that buyers will save a few hundred pounds on what we all know is the greatest purchase of our lives. Utter madness. Of equal concern is the lack of new younger surveyors choosing general practice survey work in preference for the more "sexy" agency work. If this continues, there will be hardly any qualified Chartered Surveyors available to provide structural surveys in the coming years. And what is the RICS doing about this???

- Matt Stephens
- 10 August 2016 09:58 AM
to extrapolate the 7 million figure from a sample size of only 2000 is just wrong

- Daniel Linton
- 10 August 2016 15:11 PM
Apart from that a Homebuyers survey is not fit for purpose. The surveyor lists things that COULD go wrong as well as WHAT is actually wrong with a home, leading to confusion. This therefore leads to people thinking they should just go down the cheapest route as they feel they already know what could possibly go wrong with any home. I understand that surveyors have to do this to protect their indemnity but a definitive survey on what does need to be done to the house at the point they are buying would be a lot more useful rather than the grading of 1, 2 or 3, which buyers seem to have difficulty in understanding!

- Steve Fouracre
- 10 August 2016 18:48 PM
I must admit I tell everyone to do so and then on my last house purchase 3 years ago I didnt have a survey and regretted it. You may feel its a loss of several £00 but it is worth it in my opinion