It seems the news has more and more reports about unsafe blocks of flats. I saw one news story over the weekend about a block where it was expected that the council would serve a notice that the residents had to leave; I saw a report last week about a block where the residents were told to leave and find alternative accommodation.
A quick look shows there are many more.
How horrible to be told that you have to leave your home. The place you saved your money to buy and make your own, only to be told it was not safe . The stress, the mental anguish, the uncertainty of living, or having lived in a property which is not safe, through no fault of your own.
This week, I took a call from a former client. He told me his wife had bought a flat prior to him meeting her and that they had been trying to sell it for over two years. She had eventually agreed a sale. Clearly, he just thought it was because the flat was in a converted office block and was not therefore to everyone’s taste but I always ask for the full address and pull up the property on Rightmove so I can see it and whether there is anything I should know about. He told me there was no issue with cladding; he thought that could be something which might be putting people off.
I had to agree with him… it was a lovely flat. Looking at the pictures it was well decorated and spacious, but it was on the ninth floor of the office block and there were fifteen floors in total. I mentioned to him about the height of the building and it was clear that this had not been discussed with the estate agents. I then told him that I could not act for him. He told me he was not going anywhere else; I pointed out to him it was my insurers which would not allow me to act. And then I realised that I did not know any other local firms I could send him to for advice. No-one in my area seems to do work for buildings of this height.
As I finished the conversation (which was far more detailed and lasted some considerable time as I explained the position to him, stressing it was a decision by firms not to act due to the complexity of the regulations and the view of our insurers) I thought about how this was going to impact the couple; newly married, needing to take out monies from the flat to buy a joint property so they can start a family. How many couples are in this position? How many will just be losing properties due to the unsafe building which is not their fault? It is such a sad story, duplicated all over the country.
This is written by a real high street conveyancer who wishes to remain anonymous. Read more in Today’s Conveyancer every week.
4 responses
I take too many phone call from people stuck with flats that cannot be sold. I spoke to a young lady who only bought 2 years ago for a re-mortgage who said “it’s ok, I did my research, my solicitor got me to sign a ‘waiver'”. Her landlord is one of these affordable housing providers that has got caught up with the Tri-Fire scandal.
Conveyancers need to get together to do something about the bad builders and constant pressure and unreasonableness we are seeing from the newbuild developers and their solicitors to get properties exchanged and completed. We are accepting building regulations sign off at face value. We are accepting complex legal structures on both freeholds and leaseholds without question or because the client simply says “I want to buy, get on with it”. Why are we accepting 2 service charges on a freehold estate? Why are local authorities unable to take on responsibility for roads and water authorities for the sewers? There is no one separately looking at these “communal areas” so the developers will continue to hand these over to unsuspecting residents to deal with the aftermath of shoddy construction.
Something needs to give as the cause of delays is not a lack of digitisation, it is a lack of thinking or questioning the status quo (which AI is not going to step-in as it serves only to give an answer, not an opinion).
We are accepting building regulations sign off at face value – A lot of firms are not. I am sick of tired of dealing with re-sales of properties 2/3 years old and there is no building regulation certificate, no gas safe certificate, no electrical certificate. I have even come across matters without the warranty being put in place. All because the developers are sending the work to rubbish factory firms who do not look after the client.
Frankly, I think it should be a legal requirement that an independent snagging inspector should sign off the house prior to completion and no completion should be allowed to take place without that. Small snags, fair enough but I have seen some absolute whoppers that should not have got passed the site manager/new home warranty supplier/building control.
Frankly, in this country, the building regs certificate and warranty is not worth the paper it is written on anyway. There needs to be much more accountability against these firms and site managers.
The Government need to take responsibility here but they are not. The Tory Government introduced the Building Safety Act 2022, a terribly drafted piece of legislation which all of us want to avoid doing work on. The Tory Government criticised Leasehold something chronic to the point where we don’t want to touch it regardless. Labour joined in on that bandwagon. The Labour Government seemingly are happy sat criticsing the Tory Government’s decisions and have no plans for anything. The Labour Government have done nothing and are seemingly doing nothing to help shore up the Leasehold market. The Leasehold market is well and truly stuck because successive Government’s cannot make decisions, do not have a plan and are leaving them on their own. A whole housing market sector is trapped. As a Conveyancer of 15 years experience, you would not get me touching Leasehold or the Building Safety Act at the moment and I hazard a guess that a lot of others are in the same boat. We are all going to need to go through a round of re-training if the Government pulls its fingers out on Leasehold.
I am saddened by the time it has taken for so few to have realised what came to light as a consequence of the loss of lives within the Grenfell disaster. I must honestly watch the recent Netflix release of the Grenfell Documentary, and so too should everyone, and then put pressure on all, from the top down, to rapidly introduce a quality of remediation that meets acceptable quality standards.
There is a serious risk that more will suffer severe financial loss, as well as find mortgages a challenge and insurance at ludicrous premiums. There is a wake-up call that those responsible have chosen to ignore, opting instead to press the timeless snooze button.
Placing the responsibility for the Regulator in the hands of the MHCLG is a further journey into the massive pit that has been dug around the building of flats.