Selling our Home - Need Architect / Structural Engineer

CurranBun

Hi there,
Myself & my husband are selling out home.

My husband is in the building trade and converted the attic himself and also completed an extension on the back of the house, with friends in the trade, everything is 100% structurally OK, however the Estate agent suggested that we will need an Architect or Structural Engineer to view the attic & extension and sign off that they are safe etc. As the buyers solicitor will request these, which is perfectly fine.

Does anyone have any advise of who we can go to to get this done? and also a rough cost? (we are in the wicklow area)
We want to get it done ASAP so that we dont delay anything once we go sale agreed for the prospective buyers.

Thanks in advance

Calahonda52

were there any steel beams used in the work which are now hidden from view?
e.g. when extension was built..
If so you will have an issue with having a structural engineer signing off on this, without some opening up.

Architect will not be able to do this piece.

dusteeroads

OP please keep us informed as to how you get on.

antiskeptic

CurranBun wrote: »

Hi there,
Myself & my husband are selling out home.

My husband is in the building trade and converted the attic himself and also completed an extension on the back of the house, with friends in the trade, everything is 100% structurally OK, however the Estate agent suggested that we will need an Architect or Structural Engineer to view the attic & extension and sign off that they are safe etc. As the buyers solicitor will request these, which is perfectly fine.

Does anyone have any advise of who we can go to to get this done? and also a rough cost? (we are in the wicklow area)
We want to get it done ASAP so that we dont delay anything once we go sale agreed for the prospective buyers.

Thanks in advance

pm sent

antiskeptic

Calahonda52 wrote: »

were there any steel beams used in the work which are now hidden from view?
e.g. when extension was built..
If so you will have an issue with having a structural engineer signing off on this, without some opening up.

Architect will not be able to do this piece.

The people to ask are estate agents. Who do they recommend for signing off purposes. They'll usually have professionals on their books who are conversant with "enabling the conveyancing process to proceed unhindered" If the extension was built before the time when structural engineer sign off was required then that would aid the unhindering.

Calahonda52

antiskeptic wrote: »

The people to ask are estate agents. Who do they recommend for signing off purposes. They'll usually have professionals on their books who are conversant with "enabling the conveyancing process to proceed unhindered" If the extension was built before the time when structural engineer sign off was required then that would aid the unhindering.

The reality is that if the buyer insists on having it, which any prudent buyer and lender would, then all these notions of unhindering are pure fantasy, and just an opportunity for these ***** [ insert as appropriate] to stick their snouts in the OPs trough without any prospect of delivery on what he wants.

antiskeptic

Calahonda52 wrote: »

The reality is that if the buyer insists on having it, which any prudent buyer and lender would, then all these notions of unhindering are pure fantasy, and just an opportunity for these ***** [ insert as appropriate] to stick their snouts in the OPs trough without any prospect of delivery on what he wants.

The reality (if my multiple house selling experience is anything to go by) is:

- buyers haven't a bulls notion about any of this. They aren't going to insist on something they don't know to insist on.

- the buyers solicitors haven't much more of a bulls notion about this than the buyers.

- the arch-cert is just one item in a multitude of items attended to during conveyancing - some a darn sight more important (believe it or not) than the arch-cert. The name of the conveyancing game is processing paper. Not examining the purity of it.

- the buyer wants to close. The buyers solicitor wants close. The solicitor wants to make sure his personal ass isn't hung out to dry. The cert, whether delivered by a a mierenneuker (ant-f**ker in Dutch, one who dot's every i and crosses every t) or someone who doesn't so much as look at the place before issuing a cert ... are all going to contain the same words: "substantially conforms to building standards".

- the lender can't tell the difference between "substantially conforms" by architect A and "substantially conforms" by architect B.


-

I was selling a house once that was still in the finishing stage of renovation. The purchaser had organised their survey - understanding that the finishes could be inspected later. I was kicking up a fuss with the (long in the tooth) builder to make the place spic and span for the surveyors arrival. "Why bother - he's only going stamp on the floors and tap on the walls". Which is precisely all he did. He didn't spot the extension built on party lines both sides (for which I'd written agreement). Nor did he question the 15 degree roof angle (low angle tiles were installed). He spotted the chipped roof tile on the new extension - which I had been going to replace but was told by the builder to leave "better give him something to write up - otherwise he'll keep on looking".

Where on earth did a long in the tooth builder glean that impression?



I understand the desire to render Ireland's way a lot different than the bish bash bosh approach we traditionally take. But the reality is still very bish bash bosh. And I might say, having lived in Holland - where everything ran on rails and everything conformed to the letter (or seriously else), there's a lot to be said for our way of doing things. It has it's downsides, of course. But so has their constricted, bureaucratic, rigid, rules-infested way. Bish bash bosh does mean travesty, rip off, downright disgraceful at times, true. But I breathed a deep sigh of relief on returning here after years there.