Surveying a Home Before You Buy

What Is A Survey?

A survey is an evaluation of the property with a view to discovering any potential problems. People sometimes confuse it with a mortgage valuation, which provides no information on the property except for its expected value.

Why Have A Survey?

Surveys are useful for finding out if there’s something wrong with a property before you buy it. For example, a house might be suffering from a serious problem like subsidence or damp; a detailed survey will point this out and give you an expected price on how much it will cost to fix. Especially useful if you’re an inexperienced homebuyer, if the building you’re buying is old or unusual, or if you have doubts about the condition of the property, they can be an invaluable way of saving you a lot of stress and money in the long run.

Who Performs A Survey?

Finding a surveyor who’s locally based can help make any quotes that they give you relevant and realistic. If you’re buying an unusual building, finding a surveyor who’s a specialist in these particular types of property is also a good idea. Any survey should be performed by a qualified surveyor, preferably a member of the Royal Institute of Surveyors as they always have professional indemnity insurance.

What Are The Types Of Survey?

There are three main types of survey:

Condition Report

The most basic type of survey, this will provide you with ‘traffic light’ evaluations for all of the major elements of the building, together with a summary of risks. It won’t include any advice or valuations for potential problems, and is fairly cursory, so quite limited in practical usefulness.

Home Buyers’ Report

A step up from the condition report, this survey will provide basic information about any major potential problems, but won’t delve into the details. Although more thorough than the condition report, it’s still non-intrusive so will only deal with issues that are apparent at first sight. You’ll end up with a valuation and an insurance reinstatement value that tells you how much the property would be worth if it were to burn down. And despite giving you a general idea of the state of your proposed investment, it tends to avoid making any concrete statements that you can use to back yourself up in a legal setting.

Building Survey

Costing from around £500 to £2000, a building survey is the most detailed and concludes with an extensive written report giving you the details of any issues with the property, as well as advice on the cost, difficulty, and timing of repairs. Ideal if you want to ensure that every aspect of your property is in top condition before you make any decisions on buying.

You can find out more information about buying your next home from our team of property experts! Get in touch with us today https://www.nswproperties.co.uk/contact.html