Forums Forums Wirral Information Ask - Wiki Wirral House buying advice please?

Hi! I'm currently house hunting and out of all the properties I've seen, I have 2 favourites, both in Leasowe.

What I'd really like to know is, can anyone please give me a personal recommendation for a surveyor and a conveyancer in the event that my offer is accepted? I'm a first time buyer and really need some hand holding! My parents have lived in the same house for 35 years, so they're well out of the loop!

Any other words of hard earned wisdom will also be very welcome!

Not the sort of thing most of us have regular dealings with in order to recommend..I would be more inclined to pick one you can get to and park easily. Last time I had to I used solicitor in New Brighton called David Roberts?
Regarding surveyor are you also considering a structural survey (more expensive).
Fees are not always the same so maybe email a couple for price

What you pay for a surveyor is someone with a trained eye to look around tap the walls shove damp meter in them and maybe look in loft. The report they give you can be used to try and knock money off the house price.

As a former QS I did my own and just paid a small fee to a damp company to give it a once over,

The mortgage company often send in their own surveyor to check the property is worth lending money on.

good luck

Hi,Cant give any advice but thought you may be interested in my sons house which will be going on the market in the next 2-3 weeks.Its in Leasowe not on the estate .If interested in viewing please p.m me,. Thanks

Ive used Ian Free Solicitors for a house purchase amongst other things a while back . Found he was straightforward and thorough with his paperwork . Reasonably priced because youre not paying for fancy offices or anything, the premises in West Kirby are basic. Worth getting a quote perhaps. Distance wont matter as you only visit a couple of times to sign stuff as the rest can be done by mail . No idea on surveyor though sorry.
The advice I was given re choosing my first home , was to visit in bad weather, randomly visit outside at different times of day and late evening, especially school and pub exit times one visit to check parking on a weekend, and check beyond your boundaries to consider whether theres a good place for yobs to congregate (eg a footpath by your rear fence that happens to have a bench or lampost by it).Note direction of property if you like a sunny backgarden.
Regarding the purchase ,I dont know whether its standard , but Id suggest when you buy , that your sellers declaration form has direct questions about whether the property has had(or ongoing) things like flooding, damp, subsidence, dry rot , infestation etc, as well as boundary disputes and neighbour conflict. Gives you at least a small chance of comeback if seller says NO and theyre lying. I think theres a couple of people on Wiki with legal skills who may come on and offer you a better insight. Good luck

PS Also , Moneysavingexpert website is extremely useful for all sorts of things . Theres a section on buying tips http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/mortgages/house-buying-guide and the forums on the site are brilliant for answering all those extra questions you might have. (although cant take the place of professional advice obviously, but its a good guide if several people come on with the same answer to something.)

Thank you for all your replies and advice!

I've been quite bewildered by the whole process... I really do think we should be taught at school some of the basics of house hunting, (mortgages, financing and the legal side of things,) because what we don't know can (and does!) hurt us!

When we moved back to Wirral from London 8 years ago I got online quotes for both conveyancing and surveys.We settled on a firm in Norwich http://www.lambertpugh.co.uk/ and they were excellent. all done by post, very thorough, kept us up to date at all times and much cheaper that any competitor. Same with surveyor, very good, really excellent report. So we did not need to even go near either premises and all went like clockwork. My son also used Lambert Pugh when he moved from one London address to another. He was also very pleased and in his case particularly that he did not have to visit the premises. Try this site
http://www.compareconveyancingquotes.co.uk/index.php?gclid=COHTj7q6y8gCFacfwwodqnUN6g

Have you asked the Estate Agent or any Estate Agent, if they could advise you ?
The reason I ask ,is because when we moved back to the area ,as I had not a clue, I found one by using the Yellow Pages. The Estate Agent asked who I was using and they gave the thumbs up.
So they must know who are good ,bad or indifferent.
A friend of mine had a survey done in Wallasey in the last few months. The guy was dreadful, to the point he was so incapable, he couldn't even carry his own ladders around the house and up the stairs, she had to do it for him !

Good luck! It's such an exciting time , i.e.if you don't have a nervous breakdown . Think that comes when you sell

Granny , estate agents get kickbacks for recommending their solicitor/surveyor mates, so I wouldnt think they are necessarily the BEST ones, just they do the job ok. You certainly wont see them recommending slow and sure ones as the EA's want the sold property off their books asap so they can move on to the next commission.

I

Totally agree with you .Its nuts leaving education not have a clue about such things .

When I left education I didn't have a clue how to bake a cake---I had to get married to sort that out but its probably cost me more than a house!! I jest--she is still baking cakes as my BMI testifies

I worked for an estate agents in Moreton until recently and we never took any kickbacks for recommending any solicitors or surveyors. We only recommended those who did good jobs, it wasn't in our interests to use anyone else. Some solicitors are greedy take on too many clients but can't handle the workload and they delay the whole process potentially causing the whole chain to break. I'd always recommend Vanessa Hughes at Percy Hughes and Roberts for conveyancing. Let me know by PM if you want to know the names of those to avoid!

I should have said 'some' EA's Uffda, sorry . No offence intended to anyone on here .

Be careful about relying on your surveyor. Re the last house I bought, the surveyor missed a fault in the attic, which I spotted on a later visit. I had a second surveyor look at it....the end result was £5,000 off the house price.

I would try to attend the survey as it is done....you can ask the surveyor about loft conversion possibilities, extension possibilities etc. You can also do other checks such as looking at the state of the electrical fusebox/circuitbreakers, check sockets and lights work, check the taps work and how noisy the pipes and floorboards are, check the boiler and radiators work, check all the doors and windows open and close (including garage doors), check gas/electric fires work. Check for cracks in the walls. Basically look at everything you can and ask yourself if it looks OK or risky. Ask the surveyor to pay close attention to any extensions.