Tips to ensure a quick house sale.
TL;DR: Engage with your Solicitor and Engineer first before you put your house on the market. Ensure that all maps are correct, certificates are in order and planning exempt works are certified. Ensure your attic conversion is compliant and certified. A pre-sale inspection report is a worthwhile investment, before you sell.
We have heard it all before. The Solicitor was slow, the Engineer found a problem, the documents were missing… There are multiple reasons why the transition from ‘Sale Agreed’ to ‘Sold’ takes time. However, many of the delays could have been prevented if the Vendor had gone through a simple checklist before they brought the house to the property market.
The following should be considered before you put your house on the market, in order to ensure that the sale will go through without any delays:
Engage with your Solicitor first. They may have to request deeds and files from your Bank, and this can take time (6-8 weeks). You could be in the unenviable position where your deeds have been mislaid! So, this should be your starting point.
Engage with your Engineer. A pre-sale report is worthwhile as it will evaluate all documents, maps and planning files before you sell. These documents may need to be updated and this can be a lengthy process, especially if there are items of non-compliance with planning that may need to be resolved at this stage.
Enquire about your property with an Auctioneer first to establish value and market conditions, but do not engage them until your deeds are in place and all items of compliance are checked and certified.
When MyPropertySurvey.ie undertake a pre-sale engineering survey of a property, we look at all areas of compliance. At an early stage, we can evaluate these pre-sale issues and then advise on the best way forward. When properties go to market with everything resolved and certified, the sales generally will proceed without any delay. Would you sell a car without washing it or going for an NCT?
As part of our work, we are engaged to survey property for potential purchasers and the following is a list of common issues and defects that arise over and over again!
Maps, Maps, Maps! These can cause issues for a number of reasons. Sometimes, an older property being sold may require a new “Land Registry Compliant Map”, as all property sold has now to be registered with Tailte Éireann. This is called ‘First Registration’. Some maps may have errors, these can occur if boundaries were changed in the past and not updated. Sometimes we see errors when old maps were converted to digital maps and the conversion made a different boundary assumption. Map problems and boundary rectification are the number 1 sources of delay in property transactions, from our perspective.
Planning issues. Work done without the benefit of planning permission, sheds and attic conversions are the main source of problems when selling. A planning search and inspection for planning compliance should be undertaken beforehand. Non-compliant work may require retention planning permission, which can potentially delay a sale by 3-6 months. You should aim to sell your property with an updated “Certificate of Planning Compliance” from an Engineer, which will certify that everything is substantially correct in planning terms.
Building Regulation Compliance. The main areas in this regard are usually with attic conversions, lack of fire doors and fire safety provisions in three storey properties. You may have upgraded your windows in the past, but replacement bedroom windows must be fire compliant after the 1997 regulations. These areas cause major headaches for compliance certification, and often times attic conversions have to be reduced to non-habitable uses in order to be regarded as substantially compliant.
Attic Conversions: A headache upstairs!
Do you watch all of those attic conversions on YouTube or TikTok? They look great, but the vast majority of them are non-compliant with regulations for typically the following reasons:
Incorrect ceiling height. A habitable room should have a ceiling height of 2.4m.
No fire escape. Rooflights are placed too high on the roof, so no fire escape can be provided.
No fire doors. All doors surrounding a stairs in a three storey property should be fire doors, with self-closers and intumescent strips.
No planning permission. Attic conversions for habitable use are not planning exempt and require planning permission. Storage use may be considered as an exception, but any alteration to the façade of a property may require planning permission.
Incorrect stairs. Winders are generally not considered appropriate in a stair and if they are used, they should be in the lower half of the stair.
Structural interference. The cutting of an engineered ‘truss’ roof is potentially negligent practice and should never be undertaken when converting an attic. An engineered truss roof uses lighter timbers and are very strong. However, cutting trusses weakens the roof structure and can cause a roof to spread. All structural works should be designed, supervised and certified by an Engineer.
Non-certification. Undertaking construction work in the absence of professional guidance is never advised. It may result in work that will not be certified, undermines the original certification and may devalue your property in terms of compliance.
So, if you are considering an attic conversion, make sure it is compliant, as you will be wasting your money if it is not and it will have no added value to you home.
Septic Tanks.
Generally speaking, rural houses in Ireland have either a “Septic Tank & Percolation Area” or a “Proprietary Treatment System”. Nothing is more infuriating than walking around a site and having difficulty finding even the basic parts of a septic tank system! From missing AJ’s, defective percolation areas and failing systems, we have seen it all! Unfortunately, 9 out of every 10 septic tank systems that we inspect have defects! All systems should be registered with the local authority, this is a simple online registration. It would be prudent to have the system emptied, cleaned and any defects fixed.
When to engage an Auctioneer.
When you have engaged with your Solicitor and Engineer first.
Ensure that all maps, documents and items of compliance are in order.
Ensure that and planning and building regulations are in order.
Ensure that all works are compliant and classified correctly.
Engage with the Auctioneer when all your ducks are in a row. As you can see, there are many issues that need to be addressed before you sell your property. It is worthwhile to undertake a pre-sale inspection report to evaluate these, especially if you have made changes to the property.
